velvet underground - venus in furs

Shards of Velvet Afloat in London

John Cale reaches too hard for the pay phone in the lobby of his hotel. Bang. It explodes into the soft corner of his forehead, just above the eye. Someone watching nearby laughs out loud, then apologizes. "I'm sorry, it was just so... outrageous." "Ah yeah," John smiles, understanding. He turns his attention back to the receiver, pausing now and then to gently rub the sore spot above his eye.

Backstage at the Roundhouse, Nico sits alone on a flight of wooden steps that lead up to the stage. A black velvet cape over her shoulders, one leg up and the other extended, her chin resting on her hand resting on her knee. Under empty beams and open blue lights on Sunday night. Waiting until it is time.

Let this first be an epitaph, for a group everyone was hip to but no one had enough time or energy to save, and then some notes on two survivors. After five years of trying, the one, the only, unique Velvet Underground is no more, finally finished; over and done. Although there may be a band that will still use the name, only Sterling Morrison remains from the original group. Lou Reed, lead guitar, words, music and atmosphere, is back living with his parents on Long Island. Maureen Tucker, who beat the drums, gave it up six months ago and didn't even work at the Velvet's long-overdue gig this summer at Max's Kansas City. John Cale, viola, left the band two and a half years ago. Nico, who sings, left before he did. Until a week ago, the only way to hear these people together was on the first Velvet Underground album. Separately, John is also on the second and his own album, Vintage Violence. Nico has made three albums, Chelsea Girls, The Marble Index, and the latest, Desertshore. And then, last week, a small announcement in a hip London magazine said: "John Cale - Nico, Roundhouse, Sunday." An old-time rush, like when you first went to the Fillmore and found out that Janis Joplin was a person.

John Cale is staying in a white faced hotel in South Kensington. The hotel features a downstairs dentist and a hall of mirrors. The smell of anaesthesia hangs heavy and the mirrors reflect John Cale, moving through the lobby towards the door.

"Take good care of him," his lady calls out from atop some stairs. John keeps moving. "We're only going for a walk. What could happen... in London?" "People get lost on walks, don't they?" John says without stopping, moving out of the lobby into the rain and then into a pub.

John Cale's face is soft, fleshy. He looks like he's wearing a suit even when he isn't. Since leaving the Velvet Underground, he's been in New York "twiddling thumbs" and working with quadrophonics for CBS. He produced the first album for the Stooges and did the arrangements and producing for Nico's last two albums. After seven years, John will soon be leaving New York for L.A., a terrifying prospect. "They say I'll have to learn how to drive a car. I will, won't I?" He's going to work for Warner's Reprise and will also be doing the soundtracks for films. But now, on Friday night, he is two days away from working his first gig since Boston, 1968, with the now-dead Velvet Underground.

The Velvet Underground was a whole other dimension in the rock world. New York, New York, sweetheart, strungout vicious and twitching in spangled pants and see-through shirts coming into your living room to destroy your middle-class sense of propriety and well-being. Andy Warhol, of course, found the Velvets in a Greenwich Village nighthole and made them the band in his traveling freak show, the "Exploding Plastic Inevitable".

To this day, you may hear it said that the Velvets were just another Long Island rock and roll band. Yes and no. Songs like "I'm Waiting for My Man", "Heroin", "Sister Ray" and "I'll Be Your Mirror" do not come from hanging out at Nathan's in Oceanside (at least not back in 1967). One day Brian Jones brought Nico around to Andy's factory and the whole other dimension acquired another wrinkle, a lady with a unique voice. There in the background was John, bending and distorting notes on the viola so that you can hear the smack flow in "Heroin" and "go rushing on a run" right along with the music. Another wrinkle. Not many classically-trained musicians get as involved in the pop jungle as John, who also plays organ, and guitar, and writes words as well as music.

"In Chicago, I was singing lead because Lou had hepatitis, no one knew the difference. We turned our faces to the wall and turned up very loud. Paul Morrisey (later the director of Trash) and Danny Williams had different visions of what the light show should be like and one night I looked up to see them fighting, hitting each other in the middle of a song. Danny Williams just disappeared. They found his clothes by the side of a river, with his car nearby... the whole thing. He used to carry this strobe around with him all the time and no one could figure out why till we found out he kept his amphetamine in it."

"We worked the Masonic Hall in Columbus Ohio. A huge place filled with people drinking and talking. We tuned up for about ten minutes, tuning, fa-da-da, up, da-da-da, down. There's a tape of it. Played a whole set to no applause, just silences."

"In San Francisco, we played the Fillmore and no one liked us much. We put the guitars against the amps, turned up, played percussion and then split. Bill Graham came into the dressing room and said, "You owe me 20 more minutes." I'd dropped a cymbal on Lou's head and he was bleeding. "Is he hurt? " Graham said. "We're not insured.""

"Seven Darden brought this young chick up to meet me there and he introduced her as "one of my ardent admirers." This was a long time ago and I didn't know about such things, so I said, "Pleased to meet you," and walked off. Two days later in L.A., here comes Severey again with this girl. I say hello again and leave. We're all staying at the castle in L.A., and things are very hazy, if you know what I mean. Well, this girl is there too. I smile but I still don't understand. About two in the morning the door of my room opens and she walks in naked and gets into bed. Went on for five nights. I don't think I even got her address."

The Velvets suffered from all kinds of strange troubles. They spent three years on the road away from New York City, their home, playing Houston, Boston, small towns in Pennsylvania, anywhere that would pay them scale.

"We needed someone like Andy", John says. "He was a genius for getting publicity. Once we were in Providence to play at the Rhode Island School of Design and they sent a TV newsman to talk to us. Andy did the interview lying on the ground with his head propped up on one arm. There were some studded balls with lights shining on them and when the interviewer asked him why he was on the ground, Andy said, "So I can see the stars better." The interview ended with the TV guy lying flat on his back saying, "Yeah, I see what you mean."

Two days to his first live gig in almost three years and John does not yet have anyone to back him up. "We need a band. There's one that might help us," John says, looking as if he is thinking about something else, something that is just out of focus and unclear. "Traffic. Worked with Stevie Winwood once in a studio. I was outrageously drunk. He kept plinkin' away and I yelled at him, there was a row... it was outrageous. But I don't know. We'll have to get somebody..."



Sunday night at the Roundhouse. A guy is swinging back and forth on a weighted rope, transcribing great circles across the whole backstage area, putting people's lives in danger. "Hey man, can you move?" an usher asks someone. "This guy is swinging on a weighted rope." "The guy who moved," a bystander says. "That's Mike Heron." Mike Heron, of the Incredible String Band, and John Cale are going to play together. Nico comes through a door. People who want to speak to her move towards her. They circle around. She remains standing still, perfectly secure, surrounded by talking people yet totally alone.

She goes on stage first, before a large and noisy crowd packed in to see Pink Floyd, who will follow. "I don't know what mood you're in", Nico says to the audience in her unreproducible voice. "I suppose you're in a very peace-loving mood."

She begins with "Janitor of Lunacy" from her new album, pumping away steadily, her legs in high leather boots on the harmonium pedal, her shoulder bag hanging from her chair. The combination of her voice, syllables stretched to madness and dropped, and the cavernous repetition of the harmonium slow the Roundhouse crowd down. The stage goes all black except for soft purple and green spots high above her head. The light show flickers down to a single picture, all grainy and glowing. The people stop talking. A great hall becomes a mediaeval cathedral.

John plays viola in the background, then switches to piano. "I'm glad you like it," Nico says, after some applause. "John is going to sing some songs now. Maybe I'll be back for one more."

She leaves, taking her shoulder bag with her. John plays a song at the piano and
comparisons with Randy Newman are not unfair to either of them. Mike Heron comes out. No one introduces him. The crowd cheers and applauds. They do "Gideon," "Macbeth" and "Please ", all from "Vintage Violence".

"Please" begins:


Won't you help me, please?
I'm growing old
A billion years ago
Won't you help me sneeze?
I've caught a cold.

It ends:

But it can't be that bad
Back in Trinidad
Come and see me soon
If ya get back from the moon.



They end the set with "Bring It Up" and Heron does remarkable things with his voice and his fingers. Nico comes back, does two more songs, and leaves.
Backstage, someone asks John Cale, "Did you get off?" He stammers for a moment. "Aw, it was lovely," the admirer says. "Why didn't you say that right away?" John asks, "I can never tell." His hair is a little damp in the back and his face is flushed and the first gig is out of the way and over.


Nico is in London and the grey light and constant traffic stream outside her hotel
window with the rain. The light is soft in her room, the room is long and narrow, vertical lines dance off the wallpaper. Another hotel room in the city. Her speaking voice, like her singing voice, comes from the far side of death. Often, she has trouble understanding what is said to her. Much of her time is spent floating down thought-rivers inside her own head.

"If I had a back-up group now," she says, "I would do the old songs like "All Tomorrow's Parties" and "I'll Be Your Mirror". I don't think I would do "Femme Fatale". "I haven't that much of a sense of humor." "Back then it was all right. It was a part I was playing. My hair was blonde and I..."

She turns and looks at the wall.

"It has changed. Now. I don't know what part I'm playing."

People have decided in 1971 it is time for Nico to work regularly, to be known. The publicity flow is cranking up and people from the trade papers have been in and out all day. At the end of the day, she is tired: "I feel like marshmallows."
Coming in from out of the rain the next day, she pauses in the hall of mirrors to wipe some drops of water off her face. She does it quickly, impersonally, like the owner of a new Rolls-Royce polishing away the dust from its shiny finish.

"I have done a radio interview today", she says. "Why are your songs so morbid and decadent?" the man asked me. They are not morbid, I told him... Then he said something about acid." "All the people I knew who were doing acid and drugs have turned into wine." She smiles. "I mean to say towards wine."

"No," she giggles, "I was right the first time."

Nico will be in Rome tomorrow. If she drives her van straight through, she can be back in her hotel room in Paris in two days. But it is very warm in Spain now. The dress she has on is red and embroidered. It comes from Mexico. Her boots are Spanish. The passport she travels with is German. Perhaps she will return to Egypt. She feels at home in the desert, in New York too because "it is so crowded, it is another desert." She picks up the phone to change the flight she is leaving on. "Hell-o," she booms into the phone. "Yes, yes," she says, "I will come to pick up the ticket. The name?... Miss Nico." Tomorrow, she will be somewhere else. It matters little.

Wherever Nico goes, she finds the same thing.

The Velvet Underground - Heroin (song only)

Biography

The Velvet Underground was a pioneering experimental rock band from New York City first active from 1965 to 1973. Its best-known lineup consisted of vocalist/guitarist Lou Reed, bassist/violist John Cale, guitarist Sterling Morrison and drummer Maureen Tucker. The band also collaborated with Nico for their debut album in 1967, under the supervision of producer and pop artist Andy Warhol.

Some see The Velvet Underground as being a bridge between the pacifist themes of the late 60s and the sheer chaos and indifference of the mid-70s punk movement.

The Velvet Underground was one of the first rock music groups to experiment heavily with the form by incorporating avant-garde influences. The group’s often raw, sometimes difficult sound would influence many later punk, noise rock, and alternative music performers, and singer Lou Reed’s lyrics brought new levels of social realism and sleaze to rock. Critics Scott Isler and Ira Robbins argue that ”The Velvet Underground marked a turning point in rock history. After the release of The Velvet Underground & Nico knowing the power of which it was capable, the music could never be as innocent, as unselfconscious as before.”

Pre-history (1964-1965)

The foundations for what would become The Velvet Underground were laid in late 1964. Lou Reed had performed with a few short-lived garage bands and had worked as a songwriter for Pickwick Records, a job Reed described as ”a poor man’s Carole King”. Reed met John Cale, a Welshman who had moved to the United States to study classical music. Cale had worked with John Cage and La Monte Young, but was also interested in rock music. (Young’s use of extended drones would be a profound influence on the early Velvet’s sound). The pair rehearsed and performed together, and their partnership and shared interests steered the early direction of what would become the Velvet Underground.

Reed’s first group with Cale was the short-lived The Primitives, assembled to support a Reed-penned single, “The Ostrich”. Reed and Cale recruited Sterling Morrison – a college classmate of Reed’s who had already played with him a few times – to play guitar, and Angus MacLise to play percussion. This quartet was first called The Warlocks, then The Falling Spikes.

While moving into his New York City apartment Reed found the book The Velvet Underground by Michael Leigh, a book about sadomasochism, left by previous tenant Tony Conrad. Reed and Morrison have reported the group liked the name, considering it evocative of “underground cinema,” and fitting, due to Reed’s already having written “Venus In Furs”, inspired by Leopold von Sacher-Masoch’s book of the same name, also dealing with sadomasochism. The band immediately and unanimously adopted the book’s title for its new name.

Early stages (1965-1966)

The newly named Velvet Underground rehearsed and performed in New York City. Their music was generally much more relaxed than it would later become: Cale described this era as reminiscent of beatnik poetry, with MacLise playing gentle ”pitter and patter rhythms behind the drone”.

In July of 1965, Reed, Cale and Morrison recorded a demo tape. When he briefly returned to Britain, Cale gave a copy of the tape to Marianne Faithfull, hoping she’d pass it on to Mick Jagger. Nothing ever came of the demo. The demo was eventually released on the 1995 box set Peel Slowly and See.

When the group accepted an offer of $75 for their first paying performance at Summit High School, in Summit, NJ, MacLise left the group, protesting what he considered a sell out. ”Angus was in it for art”, Morrison reported.

MacLise was replaced by Maureen Tucker, Jim Tucker’s younger sister. Tucker’s abbreviated drum kit was rather unusual: She generally played on tom toms and an upturned bass drum, using mallets rather than drumsticks, and she rarely used cymbals. The band having asked her to ‘do something unusual’, she turned her bass drum on its side, and played standing up. When her drums were stolen from one club, she replaced them with garbage cans, brought in from outside. Her driving rhythms were at once simple yet exotic, influenced by Babatunde Olatunji and Bo Diddley records, and became an essential part of the group’s music. The group earned a regular paying gig at a club, and gained an early reputation as a promising ensemble.

While the American west coast was undergoing the Summer of Love, psychedelia and flower power, the typically east coast Velvets concerned themselves with darker subject matter: transvestites, heroin addiction, and sadomasochism. Also setting them apart from their contemporaries was their use of feedback and amplifier noise in a musical context, exemplified by the seventeen minute track “Sister Ray” from their White Light/White Heat album.

Andy Warhol and the Exploding. Plastic. Inevitable (1966-1967)

Andy Warhol became the band’s manager in 1965, and suggested they feature the german-born singer Nico on several songs. Warhol’s reputation certainly helped the band gain a higher profile. Though Reed eventually fired Warhol, he praised the integrity of his early efforts with the group. Warhol helped the band land a coveted recording contract with MGM’s Verve Records, with himself as nominal ‘producer’, and gave the Velvets unprecedented free reign over the sound they created.

During their stay with Andy Warhol, the band became part of his multimedia roadshow Exploding. Plastic. Inevitable., for which they provided the musical part. This show played a couple of months in New York City, then took to the road all over the United States and Canada until its last installment in May 1967.

In 1966, MacLise temporarily rejoined the Velvet Underground for a few E.P.I. shows when Reed was suffering from hepatitis and unable to perform. For these appearances, Cale sang and played organ and Tucker switched to bass guitar. Also at these appearances, the band often played an extended jam they had dubbed “The Booker T”, after the leader of the musical group Booker T & The MG’s; the jam later became the music for “The Gift” on White Light/White Heat. Some of these performances have been released as a bootleg; they remain the only recordings of MacLise with the Velvet Underground.

The Velvet Underground and Nico (1967)

At Warhol’s insistence, Nico sang with the Velvet Underground on four songs off their debut album, The Velvet Underground & Nico. The album was recorded in one or two days — there is some uncertainty between the band members’ memories — at TT&G Studios during the November of 1966, and released by MGM Records in March of 1967.

The album cover was famous for its simple, suggestive Warhol design: a bright yellow banana with ”Peel Slowly and See” printed near a perforated tab. Those who did remove the banana skin found a pink, phallic, peeled banana beneath. This would later be used as the cover to their boxed set, appropriately titled “Peel Slowly and See,” released in 1995.

Eleven songs showcased their stylistic range, veering from the pounding attacks of “I’m Waiting For The Man” and “Run Run Run,” the droning “Venus In Furs” and “Heroin” to the quiet “Femme Fatale” and the tender “I’ll Be Your Mirror”.

The overall sound was propelled by Reed’s strong deadpan vocals, Cale’s droning or shrieking viola, Morrison’s often rhythm and blues or country-influenced guitar, and Tucker’s hypnotically simple but steady, propulsive beat.

The Velvet Underground & Nico peaked at number 171 on Billboard Magazine’s top 200 charts, but the promising debut was dampened somewhat by legal complications: The album’s back cover featured a still from a Warhol motion picture, Chelsea Girls. The film’s cinematographer, Eric Emerson, had been arrested for drug possession and, desperate for money, claimed the still had been included on the album without his permission. MGM Records pulled all copies of the album until the legal problems were settled (by which time the record had lost its modest commercial momentum), and the still was airbrushed out.

White Light/White Heat (1968)

The Velvet Underground performed live often, and their performances became louder, harsher and often featured extended improvisations. Cale reports that at about this time, The Velvet Underground were one of the first groups to receive an endorsement from Vox. The company pioneered a number of special effects, which the Velvet Underground utilized on White Light/White Heat.

Reed fired Warhol as manager, and Nico was jettisoned, partly due to her unreliability. In September 1967, the VU recorded what would become their second album, White Light/White Heat, with Tom Wilson as producer. It was released January 1968.

The recording was raw and oversaturated, one of the harshest, loudest records yet released. Cale has stated that while the debut had some moments of fragility and beauty, White Light/White Heat was ”consciously anti-beauty”. Isler and Robbins suggest that the record ”is almost unbearably intense.”

The title track and first song starts things off with Reed pounding on piano like a demented Jerry Lee Lewis. The eerie, hallucinatory “Lady Godiva’s Operation” remains Reed’s favorite track on the album.

Despite the dominance of noisefests like “Sister Ray”, and “I Heard Her Call My Name”, there was room for the darkly comic “The Gift”, a Reed-penned short story narrated in Cale’s deadpan Welsh accent. The meditative “Here She Comes Now” was later covered by Galaxie 500, Cabaret Voltaire, and Nirvana.

In 1968, a year after Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band and Are You Experienced, there was an experimental feeling throughout rock music, while it should be noted that the Velvets are arguably the foremost pioneers in this realm. There were a few other experimenters with noise, but few were tackling noise with as much apparent glee as the V.U. White Light/White Heat was hugely important, and “Sister Ray” is arguably one of the most significant rock songs of the late 1960s. The songs’ simple 3-chord progression along with screeching organ and lead guitar, all distorted perhaps beyond the bounds of tastefulness, coupled with William Burroughs-influenced lyrics, was completely unique. “Sister Ray” is often seen as one of the earliest precursors of punk and alternative rock, with its blistering instrumentation and alarming lyrics.

The second album’s cover was a subtle black-on-black picture of the tattooed arm of Billy Name, one of Warhol’s “Factory” members. White Light/White Heat entered the Billboard top 200 chart for 2 weeks, at number 199.

Tensions were growing: the group was tired of receiving little recognition for their hard work, and Reed and Cale were pulling the Velvet Underground in different directions. The differences showed in the last recording session the band had with John Cale in February 1968: two pop-like songs in Reed’s direction (“Temptation Inside Your Heart” and “Stephanie Says”), and a viola-driven drone in Cale’s direction (“Hey mr Rain”). None of these songs were released until they were included on the VU and Another View compilation albums.

The Velvet Underground (1969)

Before work on their third album started, Reed fired Cale, and replaced him with Doug Yule. The Velvet Underground was recorded in late 1968, and released in March of 1969.

It’s often been reported that the early edition of the Velvet Underground was a struggle between Reed and Cale’s creative impulses: Reed’s rather conventional approach contrasted with Cale’s experimentalist tendencies. The Velvet Underground would seem to prove the truth of these claims, as the harsh, abrasive tendencies on the first two records were almost entirely absent. This resulted in a gentler sound influenced by folk music, prescient of the songwriting style that would form Reed’s solo career (another factor in the change of sound was the band’s amplifiers being stolen from an airport while they were on tour; they obtained replacements by signing a new endorsement deal with Sunn).

Morrison’s ringing guitar parts and Yule’s melodic bass guitar and harmony vocals are featured prominently on the album. Reed’s songs and singing are subdued and confessional, and he shared lead vocals with Yule, particularly when his own voice would fail under stress. A rare Maureen Tucker vocal is featured on “After Hours,” a song that Reed said was so innocent and pure he couldn’t possibly sing it himself. The album’s influence can be heard in many later indie rock and lo-fi recordings.

A year on the road and the “lost” fourth album (1969)

The Velvet Underground spent much of 1969 on the road, feeling they were not accepted in their hometown of New York City and not making much headway commercially. During the same year, the band recorded on and off in the studio, creating a lot of material that was never officially released due to disputes with their record label. What many consider the prime of these sessions was released many years later as VU. This album has a transitional sound between the whisper-soft third album and the pop-rock anthems of their final record, Loaded.

The rest of the recordings, as well as some alternate takes, were bundled on Another View. After Reed’s departure, he later reworked a number of these songs for his solo records (“Stephanie Says”, “Ocean”, “I Can’t Stand It”, “Lisa Says”, “She’s My Best Friend”). Indeed, most of Reed’s early solo career’s more successful hits were reworked Velvet Underground tracks, released for the first time in their original version on VU, Another View, and later on Peel Slowly and See. The standout from VU is considered by many to be “One Of These Days,” part torch song and part slide-guitar freakout.

Loaded (1970)

In 1969, MGM Records president Mike Curb wanted to purge any drug- or hippie-related bands from MGM, and the V.U. were on his list, along with Frank Zappa’s Mothers of Invention. (Nonetheless, MGM insisted on keeping the tapes of their unissued recordings.)

Atlantic Records signed the Velvet Underground for what would be its final studio album, Loaded, released on Atlantic’s subsidiary label Cotillion. The album’s title refers to Atlantic’s request that the band produce an album “loaded with hits.” Though the record was not the smash hit the company had anticipated, it contains the most accessible pop the V.U. had performed, and several of Reed’s best-known songs, including “Sweet Jane” and “Rock And Roll”.

Though Tucker had temporarily retired from the group due to her pregnancy, she received a performance credit on Loaded. Drums were actually played by several people, including Yule, engineer Adrian Barber, session musician Tommy Castanaro, and Doug Yule’s brother Billy, who was still in high school.

Disillusioned with the lack of progress the band was making and pressured by manager Sesnick, Reed decided to quit the band and did so in August 1970. The band essentially broke while recording the album, and Reed walked off before it was finished. Doug Yule finished the album, singing parts to some of Reed’s vocal tracks. Lou Reed has often said he was completely surprised months later when he saw Loaded in stores. He also said, bitterly, ”I left them to their album full of hits that I made.”

Reed was particularly bitter about the truncation of a verse from “Sweet Jane”. “New Age” was changed as well: as originally recorded, its closing line (”It’s the beginning of a new age”) was repeated many more times. A brief interlude in “Rock And Roll” was also removed. (Years later, the album would be reissued with the edits restored.) On the other hand, Yule has pointed that the album was to all intents and purposes finished when Reed left the band and that Reed had been aware of most if not all of the edits. The few weeks between Reed’s departure in late August and Loaded’s arrival in the shops in September of the same year also would have left little room for the whole process of editing, reviewing, mastering and pressing.

1970 onwards

Although Loaded’s spin-off single “Who Loves the Sun” did nothing, the album itself is something of a muted triumph. “Sweet Jane” and “Rock And Roll” became U.S. radio favorites, and the band, featuring Walter Powers III on bass, and Doug Yule promoted to lead vocals and guitar, went on the road once more, playing the East Coast of the U.S. and Europe. By that time, however, Sterling Morrison had obtained a B.A. degree in English, and left the group for an academic career with the University of Texas at Austin. His replacement was singer/keyboard player Willie Alexander. The band played shows in England, Wales, and the Netherlands, some of which are collected on the 2001 box set Final V.U. (Longtime fans began mocking the new lineup as the “Velveteen Underground”, perhaps unfairly.)

In 1972 Atlantic released Live at Max’s Kansas City, a live bootleg of one of the Velvet Underground’s final performances with Reed, recorded by fan Brigid Polk. By this time Doug Yule was once again touring the United Kingdom, this time backed with hired hands as Sesnick had sent home Tucker, Powers and Alexander, effectively ending their time with the band. Later that year, Sesnick managed to secure a recording contract with Polydor Records in England, and Yule recorded Squeeze under the Velvet Underground name with Deep Purple drummer Ian Paice. Squeeze is a controversial item among Velvet fans, most of whom flatly decline to consider any post-Lou Reed material as worthwhile. Rarely heard before the advent of Internet audio file sharing, the album’s perceived Middle of the road content is sometimes dismissed out of hand by Velvets fans. Although the album technically is a Velvet Underground release, it is properly Doug Yule’s debut solo album and it might have fared far better if it had been labeled as such, given the actual quality of most of the tracks, some of which would not have been out of place on Loaded. (Interestingly, Yule was actually in the group longer than Cale.)

Post-VU developments (1973-1990)

Reed and Cale, in the meantime, developed solo careers. Sterling Morrison was a professor for some time, teaching Medieval Literature at the University of Texas at Austin, then became a tugboat captain for several years. Maureen Tucker raised a family before returning to small-scale gigging and recording in the 1980s; Morrison was in a number of touring bands, among others with Tucker’s band. In 1988, erstwhile singer Nico died of a brain hemorrhage while bicycling on the island of Ibiza.

Reunions (1990 and 1992-1994)

In 1990, Reed and Cale released Songs For Drella, dedicated to the recently deceased Andy Warhol. (“Drella” was a nickname Warhol had adopted, a combination of “Dracula” and “Cinderella”.) Though Morrison and Tucker had each worked with Reed and Cale since the V.U. broke up, Songs For Drella was the first time the mercurial pair had worked together in decades, and rumors of a reunion began to circulate, fueled by the one-off appearance by Lou Reed, John Cale, Sterling Morrison and Maureen Tucker to play “Heroin” as the encore to a brief Songs For Drella set in Jouy-en-Josas, France.

The same lineup briefly reunited from 1992–1994, resulting in a European tour — both headlining and opening a few concerts for U2 — and a live album, Live MCMXCIII. Cale sang most of the songs Nico had performed with the group.

Before the band could tour the U.S. or record — an MTV Unplugged album was proposed — Cale and Reed fell out again, breaking up the band once more. The definitive end to the band’s checkered career came when Sterling Morrison died of cancer in 1995.

The Velvet Underground-Sunday Morning