ha, great article, never thought abt Morrison being the inspiration for "Tugboat"
― sleeve, Thursday, 8 October 2015 20:39 (eight years ago) link
yeah, pretty funny. also wild that the UT band he joined kicked him out! great job, dudes.
― tylerw, Thursday, 8 October 2015 20:41 (eight years ago) link
just realized that the Peel Slowly & See box set is 20 years old this fall... crazy. i can remember saving my pennies and nickels!
got this second-hand a couple years later, with trade-in of my first batch of unwanted promos as a writer, at local CD Warehouse. Thought I didn't like the Velvets, based on friend who became obsessed w/them in 1993 around the time of the reunion (I'm still mostly cool on the first album) but hearing WL/WH and VU and Loaded was a proper revelation. And the liner notes... David Fricke is the king of the form.
― please don't shampoo your eyes (stevie), Friday, 9 October 2015 08:24 (eight years ago) link
great article, thanks!
― niels, Friday, 9 October 2015 11:27 (eight years ago) link
i don't think the 93 live album is quite as bad as everyone seems to think... lou is the weak link, but the others sound good. mainly wish that sterling would've stepped out on lead more -- he only gets like two solos.
― tylerw, Thursday, October 8, 2015 4:07 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink
I should probably revisit it, but whenever I see the cover, all I can think of is Lou singing "SHINYSHINY. SHINYBOOTSOFLEATHER."
― Montgomery Burns' Jazz (Tarfumes The Escape Goat), Friday, 9 October 2015 13:44 (eight years ago) link
lol yeah. lou really has trouble singing a lot of those songs.
― tylerw, Friday, 9 October 2015 14:08 (eight years ago) link
My only memory of that 1993 live album is "Linger an-ah-ah-ah-on. Your pale blue eyes."
― EZ Snappin, Friday, 9 October 2015 14:18 (eight years ago) link
Never heard it but his guitar playing was pretty good when I saw them.
― Terry Micawber (Tom D.), Friday, 9 October 2015 14:24 (eight years ago) link
my byline on a true piece of VU trainspotting ephemera! omg. http://41.media.tumblr.com/97a74ca2197ef4c7eed45cd12759db34/tumblr_nxckvmRhyL1qzy30io1_1280.pngit's a "newspaper" promo piece for the Loaded box set (including a flexidisc w/ a demo of "rock & roll")
― tylerw, Thursday, 5 November 2015 16:04 (eight years ago) link
congrats!
― sleeve, Thursday, 5 November 2015 16:10 (eight years ago) link
Wow, that is so cool!
― Montgomery Burns' Jazz (Tarfumes The Escape Goat), Thursday, 5 November 2015 16:36 (eight years ago) link
I would subscribe to a Velvet Underground newspaper, as long as there wasn't a lot of ads.
Congrats btw!
― chr1sb3singer, Thursday, 5 November 2015 16:38 (eight years ago) link
David Fricke, watch out, there's a new kid in town.
― Caput Johannis in Disco (Tom D.), Thursday, 5 November 2015 16:38 (eight years ago) link
haha, thank you. it is quite a thrill.
― tylerw, Thursday, 5 November 2015 16:46 (eight years ago) link
too cool!
― niels, Thursday, 5 November 2015 18:28 (eight years ago) link
rad!
― brimstead, Thursday, 5 November 2015 20:18 (eight years ago) link
"You know how people get when they're cornered? Like triangles."
― Memes of the Pwn Age (James Redd and the Blecchs), Friday, 6 November 2015 15:55 (eight years ago) link
VU trainspotting observation of the day: billy yule's drumming on the live at max's tape is hilarious
― tylerw, Friday, 6 November 2015 15:56 (eight years ago) link
Haven't listened in many years but yeah, more or less.
― Memes of the Pwn Age (James Redd and the Blecchs), Friday, 6 November 2015 15:58 (eight years ago) link
It's really good on the version of Some Kinda Love though.
― Caput Johannis in Disco (Tom D.), Friday, 6 November 2015 15:58 (eight years ago) link
(Better than Clem Cattini)
― Caput Johannis in Disco (Tom D.), Friday, 6 November 2015 15:59 (eight years ago) link
That's my brother Doug's brother ... ah forget it.
― Memes of the Pwn Age (James Redd and the Blecchs), Friday, 6 November 2015 16:00 (eight years ago) link
(lol at your never ending hatred for Clem Cattini. Do you even like "Hurdy Gurdy Man"?)
― Memes of the Pwn Age (James Redd and the Blecchs), Friday, 6 November 2015 16:01 (eight years ago) link
by "hilarious" i don't even mean "bad" really (though it's sometimes bad). he's pretty entertaining (and seems to be having a fun time).
― tylerw, Friday, 6 November 2015 16:03 (eight years ago) link
Seeing James Corden play Clem Cattini in that film about Joe Meek didn't help tbh.
― Caput Johannis in Disco (Tom D.), Friday, 6 November 2015 16:06 (eight years ago) link
some very cheesy fills in "I'm Waiting for the Man." Not terrible though
― Memes of the Pwn Age (James Redd and the Blecchs), Friday, 6 November 2015 16:08 (eight years ago) link
I still think that's Bonham on "Hurdy Gurdy Man." It's a better story that way.
― Montgomery Burns' Jazz (Tarfumes The Escape Goat), Friday, 6 November 2015 16:09 (eight years ago) link
I can't stand the drumming on Max's myself, it's so distracting
― Οὖτις, Friday, 6 November 2015 16:12 (eight years ago) link
I like the story just as JPJ told it.(xpost)
― Memes of the Pwn Age (James Redd and the Blecchs), Friday, 6 November 2015 16:13 (eight years ago) link
It's a tad, uh, over-enthusiastic. Don't know what they were putting in those free burgers they were feeding young Billy at Max's.(xp)
― Caput Johannis in Disco (Tom D.), Friday, 6 November 2015 16:15 (eight years ago) link
i guess that's billy on the studio take of "oh sweet nuthin"? some good drumming there. dude was what, 17 years old?
― tylerw, Friday, 6 November 2015 16:18 (eight years ago) link
Thought that was Tommy from Long Island.
― Caput Johannis in Disco (Tom D.), Friday, 6 November 2015 16:19 (eight years ago) link
wiki sez it was billy (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Billy_Yule) but could be wrong
― tylerw, Friday, 6 November 2015 16:21 (eight years ago) link
I always think it must be the other guy.
― Memes of the Pwn Age (James Redd and the Blecchs), Friday, 6 November 2015 16:23 (eight years ago) link
― Οὖτις
this, I really hate it, as far as I'm concerned that album belongs in the dustbin with Squeeze. I don't think I even own a copy anymore. I can live with the Billy tracks on Loaded tho.
― sleeve, Friday, 6 November 2015 16:23 (eight years ago) link
yeah Loaded is fine
― Οὖτις, Friday, 6 November 2015 16:24 (eight years ago) link
i dunno i enjoy max's whenever i put it on, but yeah, it does throw into relief how utterly central to the band's sound moe tucker was
― tylerw, Friday, 6 November 2015 16:26 (eight years ago) link
Some good chat from Lou between numbers, "A tender love song, about love between man and subway...", something like that. Yeah, I haven't heard it in years either tbh.
― Caput Johannis in Disco (Tom D.), Friday, 6 November 2015 16:27 (eight years ago) link
that long "some kinda love" is a highlight ... i dig the off the rails "white light white heat" ... and the general ambiance.
― tylerw, Friday, 6 November 2015 16:29 (eight years ago) link
but yes it pales in comparison to the live 1969/quine/matrix stuff of course
(Drum track on "Hurdy Gurdy Man" is not so great actually, it's certainly no "A Day In The Life" which it kind of resembles, drumfills-wise)
― Memes of the Pwn Age (James Redd and the Blecchs), Friday, 6 November 2015 16:36 (eight years ago) link
Never mind all that..
how do I get that "Loaded" newspaper?
― Mark G, Saturday, 7 November 2015 18:01 (eight years ago) link
The last time I listened to the Max's stuff I was in high school and it was on cassette and I was having a hard time understanding why anyone liked anything about VU post "White Light" and that record certainly didn't help.
I enjoyed it a lot more this past wknd when I was listening to it, agreed that Billy Yule's drumming is hilarious.
What struck about listening to it again and this is something I think about whenever I listen to "Loaded", the playing and esp Lou's singing, really feels unbound by any sort of expectations. There's an air to these records of "man no one is ever going to hear this, let's just bang it out and go home" which always gives this era of the band a sort of melancholy and that's even more apparent to me now of the Max's stuff.
― chr1sb3singer, Monday, 9 November 2015 14:45 (eight years ago) link
yeah, i think that is a good point about Lou's vocals -- we take for granted his singing on "sweet jane" for instance, but if you really hone in on him there, it's kind of an amazing (and weird!) performance!
― tylerw, Monday, 9 November 2015 15:11 (eight years ago) link
Head Held High!
― Caput Johannis in Disco (Tom D.), Monday, 9 November 2015 15:15 (eight years ago) link
He's so un-self-conscious throwing in all those soul singer moves...it's exactly the sort of thing you do at practice to try to get the drummer to laugh not when yr in the studio trying to lay down a hit song.
― chr1sb3singer, Monday, 9 November 2015 15:17 (eight years ago) link
Sadly three or four years later he could barely sing at all, judging by the bootleg I was listening to last night, doing all that shit of getting the phrasing all wrong and not bothering to sing the tune, stuff you associate with latter day Lou.
― Caput Johannis in Disco (Tom D.), Monday, 9 November 2015 15:18 (eight years ago) link
Makes one wonder if he couldn't have taken some of that discipline he allegedly put into become a Tai-Chi Master and used a little of it to practice a little vocal technique.
― Memes of the Pwn Age (James Redd and the Blecchs), Monday, 9 November 2015 15:25 (eight years ago) link
something definitely changed post-VU in his vocal attack. occasionally you'll hear him get it back in the solo years, but yeah, his phrasing often seems off (which almost never happened in the VU years).
― tylerw, Monday, 9 November 2015 15:29 (eight years ago) link
it sounds like he does it on purpose though, right? like, he's above (or just bored) singing the song the way it was recorded
― brownie, Monday, 9 November 2015 15:30 (eight years ago) link