Peel Back and See

One of my proudest moments running the infamous Album Club at my high school involved The Velvet Underground & Nico (1967). I would often entertain/piss off my fellow classmates every Tuesday Morning Meeting with an advertisement for the album we would feature on Wednesday. My friend Alison was really pumped about presenting the album, none of us had heard it before. We were out-muscled by all the jocks patting each other on the back for something that they won or whatever and no one got to make any announcements. I chalked it up as a loss and moved on- I knew our main core of maybe five would show up. Little did I know, Allie wasn’t settling for that.

She made her way to the main office and asked to make an announcement on the PA. My heart soared. Over a dozen people showed up, people I didn’t even know. Seniors who adored Lou Reed. Warhol fans too.

It’s one of those icons in rock. Five years later, buying it on 180 gram vinyl (mono) at Newbury’s in Hyannis, I still have fans coming up to me telling me they love the album. In particular, this sales guy at Macy’s. Lock tight in his suit, I saw a nostalgic smile on his face as he said “Great album” with his eyes honed in on the 12” cardboard banana under my arm.

I’m still not sure how I feel about the album. It defiantly brings up down and out memories from high school- liquid eyeliner, cassette bootlegs, an ER visti, staring at the ceiling feeling ways about stuff. With my new art school eyes, I see at as a wonderful piece of art. The Velvet Underground, under the wing of Andy Warhol, would perform along side film projections and bizarre color light shows and drugs….drugs…and some more drugs. It was a multi-media happening called the Exploding Plastic Inevitable. This album is basically an artifact of that (as seen on the back photo). The cover itself was mostly a Warhol creation. A silkscreen sticker of a banana would peel back to reveal a pink banana. Warhol would continue with this interactive album cover in 1971 with The Rolling Stones’s Sticky Fingers cover that had an actual zipper on the fly of the jeans.

As for the actual musical production of the album, Warhol was as much of a producer as he was a producer of Paul Morrissey’s horror films in the ‘70s (Fun Fact: Morrissey took all the photos for the gatefold). He would show up to the studio, say “Oh wow that’s great” and split. Lou Reed and Tom Wilson (the man who produced the Mother’s first two albums as with Dylan’s “Like a Rolling Stone”) essentially produced the album.

However, the whole existence of the album and the band was Warhol’s invention. He was the one who had Nico, a model and resident of the Factory, join the group despite Reed’s objections. It is that reason why I like this album more than any other Underground record. I adore Nico’s voice. I guess I have a soft spot for weird vocals. “Femme Fetale” is so freaking beautiful. Her voice simultaneously tempts and repels you and the melancholy of the whole production kills me.

I’m not the biggest fan of Lou Reed but “Heroin” is such a powerful song. It throws me right back to Mr. Murphy’s room, listening to it for the first time with the lights off. I couldn’t move. I was completely focused on the song. The meditating guitar part- it’s almost Indian but it’s two chords.

It’s my wife.
And it’s my life.