Underskog

“There was this whole glam thing going on, so I just put myself in that head. It’s not like I had to go very far to do it. I have about a thousand selves running around. It’s easy.” (Lou Reed)

Lou Reed gjorde noe med vår musikalske bevissthet. Som gitarist, sanger og låtskriver ga han oss nye oppdagelser som forandret måten vi tenkte og gjorde rock på. Hans avantgarde protopunkeksperimenter med The Velvet Underground mot slutten av 60-tallet fikk stor innflytelse på musikken som kom etter og har gjort ham til en av dem som ofte blir referert til som inspirasjonskilde for andre artister opp gjennom historien.

Transformer var platen som viste verden hvilket potensiale som befant seg i Reed som soloartist og som i løpet av 1972 tok ham fra å være kredibel kultmusiker til internasjonal superstjerne. Fem tiår senere er platen fortsatt såpass potent og relevant at det er et av de mest etterspurte blant våre lytteklubbhuer i Oslo.

Vi har derfor invitert lydtekniker Ken Scott til søndagsmatiné i byen for å fortelle historiene rundt innspillingene i Trident Studios, før vi demper lyset, skrur opp volumet og hører albumet fra begynnelse til slutt på en hifi-set up i verdensklasse, preparert av lydmolekylistene hos Duet Audio.

Lou Reed, foto: Mick Rock

WEIRDOENES VENN
Man kunne godt sett for seg Reeds låtskriving fortsette i rockepoet-tradisjonen til Bob Dylan etter at han ga seg i VU. I stedet tas lytteren med på en variert musikalsk rundreise fra kabaretstilen på Make Up til den T-Rex-aktige rockelåta Wagon Wheel, fra den småtrassige pønken på Vicious til den balsamerende balladen Perfect Day.

Han vendte sitt sløye, kule blikk mot New York Citys byoriginaler med grimme fortellinger om Gothams gustne natteravner, svarthumoristiske observasjoner av hans mistilpassede venner fra kunstnerkollektivet i Andy Warhols The Factory, befriende frakoblet borgerskapets bedøvende forutsigbare narrativer. Han sang om sjalusi og kjærlighet og livets mørke sider på en usminket og ikke-fordømmende måte, og ble en stemme for utskuddene, de brokete, krokete karakterene som kavet på kanten av samfunnet.

“I just wrote about people I knew and where I come from.” (Lou Reed)

Lou Reed fotograferes av Mick Rock

BOWIE – RONSON – SCOTT
David Bowie gjorde coverversjoner av White Light/White Heat i liveshowene sine og hadde vært Velvetsfan lenge da deres felles plateselskap RCA foreslo at han skulle produsere Lous nye album, en oppgave han fant en smule skremmende til å begynne med:

“I was petrified that he said, ‘Yes’, that he would like to work with me in a producer capacity. I had so many ideas and I felt so intimidated by my knowledge of the work he had already done… Lou had this great legacy of work.”

Sammen med David Bowie i rollen som produsent, og en av «The Spiders From Mars», gitarist Mick Ronson, som hjalp til med arrangementene slik han også gjorde det på The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust tidligere samme år, fant vi den talentfulle lydteknikeren Kenneth Scott. Han kom fra Abbey Road til Trident Studios i Soho et par år tidligere for å gjøre The Man Who Sold The World med Bowie.

Ken Scott i studio

KEN SCOTT
Ken Scott startet allerede som 16-åring som andretekniker, eller såkalt “Tape Operator”, i EMI Studios i London (nå kjent som Abbey Road). Han jobbet seg etterhvert opp til å bli lydingeniør og fikk skru lyd for en imponerende rekke artister fra midten av 60-tallet, som Pink Floyd, Elton John, Manfred Mann, Peter and Gordon, The Hollies, Judy Garland, Cliff Richard, The Shadows, og senere, på 70- og 80-tallet, band som Supertramp, Mahavishnu Orchestra, Billy Cobham, Jeff Beck, Devo og Duran Duran.

Alvoret startet imidlertid med The Beatles’ A Hard Days Night, The White Album og Magical Mystery Tour som førte til at han også fikk jobbe med en rekke av soloprosjektene til John, Ringo og George, som Harrison’s All Things Must Pass og Lennons Give Peace A Chance. Scott gjorde ferdig klassikeren A Salty Dog for Procol Harum før han startet et lengre samarbeid med Bowie og fikk medansvar for det som i dag står igjen som noen av de største klassikerne i rockehistorien, Hunky Dory, Ziggy Stardust…, Aladdin Sane og Pin Ups, og altså kveldens utvalgte, Lou Reeds Transformer.

Mick Rock og Lou Reed under lanseringen av deres felles bokprosjekt ‘Transformer’. Bowery Street (NYC) 10. april, 2013 – et halvår før Reed døde, 71 år gammel

LOU REED: ’I’m curious. Did you study photography?’
MICK ROCK: ‘No, I picked up a friend’s camera in college on an acid trip. That’s how it all began.’
LOU REED: ‘Well, there you go; now the secret’s out.’

JAN WALAKER – MICK ROCK
Mick Rock tok bildet som ble brukt i grafikken vi kjenner fra det ikoniske platecoveret og som med en rekke fremragende arbeider for blant annet Syd Barrett, David Bowie, Lou Reed, Iggy Pop, Queen, The Sex Pistols, The Ramones, Blondie, Rocky Horror Picture Show, satte nye standarder for fotografiet de neste årene. Sammen med Scott har vi med oss Rocks venn og fotografkollega, mannen bak magasinet Hot Rod, Jan Walaker. Han gir oss innblikk i fotokunsten rundt tiden platen kom ut, samt personlige historier og ferske hilsener fra den legendariske fotografen i New York.

AUDIOMENYEN leveres av Duet Audio og ser slik ut:
- PLATESPILLER: Dr. Feickert Blackbird
- TONEARM: Jelko 12”
- PICKUP: Dynavector XX2 MK2
- FORFORSTERKER: Ayon Auris
- EFFEKTFORSTERKERE: 4 x Auralic Merak monoblokker (2×800 Watt)
- HØYTTALERE: Piega Classic 80.2
- SIGNALKABLER: Midas Reference Flavia
- HØYTTALERKABLER: Midas Reference Silje
- STRØMKABLER: Oyaide Tunami
- STRØMRENSER: Isol-8

KJØREPLAN
Før og etter presentasjonen spiller vi musikk som relaterer seg til albumet, låter bandet og de rundt utgivelsen selv har vært inspirert av, plater fra andre artister som ble gitt ut på samme tid eller som har fulgt i kjølvannet i årene helt frem til i dag, som David Bowie, The Stooges og The Velvet Underground. Bli med og varm opp ørene fra dørene åpnes klokken 16, og sikre deg en god plass i sweetspot’en!

16.00 dørene åpnes – vi spiller albumrelatert musikk
17.00 albumpresentasjon, Horne/Scott/Walaker
17.50 albumlytt (Spilletid 36:40)
18.30 albumprat inkludert publikum
19.00 avrunding

PS. Vi oppfordrer publikum til å slå av telefonene sine og dempe samtalene under albumspillingen.

…

*in english:

Lou Reed, foto: Mick Rock

“There was this whole glam thing going on, so I just put myself in that head. It’s not like I had to go very far to do it. I have about a thousand selves running around. It’s easy.” (Lou Reed)

Classic Album Sundays presents LOU REED ‘Transformer’ (RCA, 1972)
// CAS-host Kent Horne with producer Ken Scott and photographer Jan Walaker

THE BAND THAT INSPIRED SO MANY
We all know what Brian Eno had to say about Lou Reed’s first band The Velvet Underground and it was true. Even if VU’s abrasive noise did not endear them to a mainstream audience, their cult following of the right people ensured their popularity would only grow with band after band citing them as an inspiration. This legacy was further necessary as behind the in-your-face experimental presentation, there were amazing songs, most of them penned by Lou, a former Tin Pan Alley songwriter.

After the Velvets split Lou took along some of VU’s unreleased songs for his first solo effort. His eponymous debut was recorded in London with a host of session musicians who, in retrospect, were not exactly sympatico to Lou’s music. The album flopped but that did not deter Lou from picking himself up and making another one. And it certainly did not stop him from returning to The Smoke as he felt that all of the records that were sounding good were coming out of London.

Lou Reed, Mick Jagger, David Bowie, foto: Mick Rock

LONDON TOWN
Lou’s record company, RCA, introduced him to another one of their recording artists, David Bowie, who was riding high with the success of ‘The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars’. Bowie was a huge Velvets fan having covered ‘White Light/White Heat’ in his live shows and having paid tribute to the band on his album ‘Hunky Dory’. The label suggested Bowie produce Lou’s new album and Bowie found the task daunting as he told Classic Albums,

“I was petrified that he said, ‘Yes’, that he would like to work with me in a producer capacity. I had so many ideas and I felt so intimidated by my knowledge of the work he had already done… Lou had this great legacy of work.”

Bowie enlisted Spider guitarist and arranger Mick Ronson for co-production duties and Ziggy Stardust engineer Ken Scott and together they were able to shape Lou’s songs into an album. Although it did reference the glam scene that was electrifying London, ‘Transformer’ differed from ‘Ziggy’ and its more glittery counterparts with its gritty, realist subject matter. Rather than depicting a fictional apocalyptic space-age world, _‘Transformer’_s stories were mired in the downtown streets of New York City.

Lou Reed, photo: Mick Rock, from the book ‘Transformer’ by Rock og Reed, released spring 2013.

THE FACTORY
‘Transformer’ takes the listener on quite a varied musical ride from the cabaret style ‘Make Up’ to the T-Rex style rock n’ roll of ‘Wagon Wheel’ to the abrasive punk of ‘Vicious’ to the luscious ballad of ‘Perfect Day’. However, it is all held together by the imagery that was garnered from Lou’s time spent with Andy Warhol and his Factory denizens. In his candid, direct and non-judgmental manner, Lou sang about the darker sides of life and the city’s night creatures, or as he told Classic Albums,

“I just wrote about people I knew and where I come from.”

He kept a notebook during his tenure at The Factory, jotting down funny things people had said, but more importantly he observed how this wide array of characters from varied backgrounds were able to reinvent themselves into their own version of beauty. His sympathetic observations woven into tales of these former misfits’ transformations were romantic and beautiful in themselves. And Lou’s urban poetry conjured a range of emotions from jealousy to humour to love. As he told Classic Albums,

“Every song I have written in my life I have tried to write emotionally. All the songs are geared to try and cause an emotion and they are always about conflict.”

Lou Reed, photo: Mick Rock

TRANSFORMED
Within a year, Lou Reed transformed from a cult artist to an international superstar. The Bowie associations certainly did not hurt but it was the songs that made the lasting impressions and won over large audiences. The first single ‘Walk on the Wild Side’ became a Top Forty hit on both sides of the Atlantic, slipping past the censors with one of rock’s most memorable lines. ‘Satellite of Love’ became one of Reed’s signature tunes and ‘Vicious’ is regarded as a harbinger of the punk movement.

Although Mick Rock’s legendary photograph that adorned the album cover referenced London’s stylistic zeitgeist, for the most part the songs did not sound like 1972 and still sound great today. The songs themselves were also able to transform and a case in point is the 1997 version of “Perfect Day” that was recorded as a BBC charity single and featured artists such as Bono, Elton John, Tammy Wynette, Brett Anderson and Reed’s partner Laurie Anderson. Along with ‘I’ll Be Your Mirror’, ‘Perfect Day’ is one of Lou Reed’s best love songs and shows the sensitivity and tenderness that lay behind the rough and rugged exterior even if he questioned the benevolence of his bare emotion with the phrase, ‘I thought I was someone else, someone good.’

Well Lou, you were good to us in that you helped us look at the world a bit differently and listen to music a little deeper. And personally speaking, as for my own transformative years, ‘I’m glad I spent it with you.’ (Colleen Murphy, Classic Album Sundays)

Ken Scott

KEN SCOTT
For the presentation of the album we are delighted to introduce producer and sound engineer Ken Scott, who will tell the stories from the Trident recordings before we listen to the album from beginning to end on our audiophile sound system.

Before Transformer Scott was involved in many of the greatest classics in rock history. From The Beatles’ “White Album”, their Magical Mystery Tour and a number of solo projects for John, Ringo and George, to David Bowies Hunky Dory, Ziggy Stardust and more. He also worked with bands such as Pink Floyd, Supertramp, Mahavishnu Orchestra, Procol Harum, Jeff Beck, Devo, Duran Duran and Elton John. We are humble and excited to have him join us this evening.

Lou Reed, photo: Mick Rock

LOU REED: ’I’m curious. Did you study photography?’
MICK ROCK: ‘No, I picked up a friend’s camera in college on an acid trip. That’s how it all began.’
LOU REED: ‘Well, there you go; now the secret’s out.’

JAN WALAKER – MICK ROCK
Mick Rock is the man behind the picture used in the iconic album cover, and whose work with artists such as Syd Barrett, David Bowie, Lou Reed, ‘Iggy Pop*, Queen, The Sex Pistols, The Ramones, Blondie, Rocky Horror Picture Show and more put new standards for photography during the 70s. We’ll be joined by Rock’s friend, and also photographer, the man behind Hot Rod Magazine, Jan Walaker. He’ll give us insights into the photo art around the time the album was released, as well as personal stories and greetings from the legendary photographer in New York.

Lou Reed, photo: Mick Rock

4.00 Doors open – album related music
5.00 Album presentation – Horne/Scott/Walaker
5.50 Album Play (run time 36:40)
6.30 Q&A with the audience
7.00 The End

AUDIO MENU
installed by Duet Audio:
- Cartridge: Dynavector XX2 MK2
- Turntable: Dr. Feickert Blackbird*
- Tone arm: Jelco750 LB 12″
- Amplifiers: 4 x Monoblocks Auralic Merak 2×800W
- Preamp: Ayon Auris
- Loudspeakers: Piega MLS2
- Interconnects: Midas Reference Flavia
- Speaker Cable: Midas Reference Silje
- Power Conditioner: Isol-8