The Velvet Underground and Nico

Velvet Underground, The

album cover

One of the Most Influential Rock Albums of All Time

Recorded mostly over two days in 1966, The Velvet Underground and Nico was "produced" by the artist and conceptualist Andy Warhol during the period of his multimedia Exploding Plastic Inevitable road show. Warhol, whose iconic banana image is on the cover, insisted that the German model-actress Nico sing on the album, and according to guitarist Lou Reed, made sure the group was able to do what it wanted to do artistically. Nonetheless, years later, multi-instrumentalist John Cale credited Tom Wilson with handling most of the production, saying that Warhol "didn't do anything."

At any rate, the musicians didn't need much help: They'd already developed their own language, with knotted guitars and assorted foreboding dissonances occupying center stage. Cale, guitarist and songwriter Lou Reed, drummer Maureen Tucker, and guitarist Sterling Morrison developed a thrilling and totally unique approach to rock and roll. The concept took elements of Beat-poet stream of consciousness and added gritty realism and aggrandized notions of escape—Don DeLillo in 4/4 time. The songs follow nihilists, antisocial artistes, and other rogues as they endure the hassles of scoring drugs and struggle with all manner of sexual deviance. (Reed took the band name from a book on sadomasochism.)

The three comparatively mellow songs featuring Nico—"I'll Be Your Mirror," "All Tomorrow's Parties," and "Femme Fatale"— set her glassy-eyed detachment against heated rhythm section surges, fractured shards of junkyard guitar, and drones from Cale's viola. The remainder of the album features Reed singing his own songs, among them several that bring a literary fatalism to the junkie life ("I'm Waiting for the Man," "Heroin") and others that chase a new kind of rock abandon ("Run Run Run").

Everything has the electricity of the new running through it. Hearing The Velvet Underground and Nico now, it's impossible to miss those Velvet fingerprints on so much of the music that came after—glam, noise, punk, and grunge, not to mention the fervent poetry of Patti Smith and the odd shadows of R.E.M. Rolling Stone calls this "the most prophetic rock album ever made," and that might actually be an understatement.

Genre: Rock
Released: 1967, Verve
Key Tracks: "All Tomorrow's Parties," "I'll Be Your Mirror," "I'm Waiting for the Man," "Heroin," "Run Run Run."
Catalog Choice: White Light/White Heat; Peel Slowly and See (five-CD set).
Next Stop: R.E.M.: Fables of the Reconstruction
After That: Dream Syndicate: The Days of Wine and Roses
Book Pages: 830–831

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Comments:

#1 from Norman Dolph, New York - 05/17/2010 6:33

Tom Wilson, whom I knew at Columbia in the ‘60s was a wonderful man, and I’m certain would more than willingly share the credit for the Banana Album. The real Credit for the sound of the album goes to John Licata who recorded and mixed the sessions at Scepter. I get a little credit for picking up the tab, saying “take one” and “take two”, and generally keeping the session on the rails. The group made the music. We just stayed out of the way.
all best,
ND

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