THIS COLLECTION SMELLS LIKE A BUFFALO TURD! YUK! This collection is way too short and is missing so much and it makes no sense because there's SO MUCH room left on this cd. I don't get record companies that decide to release an album on cd yet they don't do anything to enhance an already measly collection. What is the point???? Anyway, you get the ultra classic "Satellite of Love" with those great Bowie harmonies at the end and hand claps and you also get the expected "Walk on the wild side" which was one of only two top 40 hits scored so far in Lou's career. You also get a slice of the incendiary "Rock n' roll animal" with "Sweet jane" but the scorching guitar twin attack opening has been chopped off which really sucks since it's one of the highlights of that album but "White light" plays on uncut. There's the laidback tendertale of "Coney Island baby" in where Lou proclaims that he "wanted to play football for the coach" and then dedicates the song to his transexual love interest Rachel saying that he would give it all up for her. You also get the playful "Wild child" and "I love you" off his debut and "How do you think it feels" from the ultra depressed but masterful "Berlin". Now my big problem with this collection is where is the artful and touching masterpiece "Perfect day" and the brutal epic "Street Hassle" and the harrowing "Lady day" and the poetic eloquence of "Women" etc.... I mean Lou is one of the greatest writers of all time so when you say "The Best of Lou Reed" well then you expect to get not a taste of the best of but THE BEST OF!!!! This is a cd release of an old album so add in the classics like "Street hassle" and or a interview possibly never released before or something else other than this pathetic excuse for a collection from one of the icons of rock. You'd do much better by breaking out a few more bills and getting the Lou conceived double collection "NYC MAN" where you get a slice of Velvets and a BIG CHUNK of Lou's solo career. There's no other way to do it because Lou is that great an artist. Skip on this morsel and get yourself A REAL MEAL and don't forget to click on that response button and voice with me that you agree that this collection SMELLS LIKE A BUFFALO TURD!!!!!! WHEW!!!!! MAN IT STINKS!!!!!!!!!
Other Essential Lou/Velvet Albums that every rock fan should also have in their collection=The Velvet Underground and nico,The Velvet Underground, Loaded, New York, Berlin, The Blue mask, Transformer, Rock n' roll animal, and Coney Island Baby.
Ho-Hum "Best of..." package best left on the shelf There are a few things about this "Best of" collection that deserve mention:
1) The photo-montage on the cover shows Lou with longtime "girlfriend" Rachel, a transsexual man who Lou dated for a large part of the mid-70's. Lou has refused to mention a single word about her since about 1978. (She also appeared on the inner jacket of the Sally Can't Dance LP)
2) "Nowhere At All" is a little known non-LP B-side. It's pretty good, actually.
3) Unlike so many of his later single-CD "Hits" collections, this pulls songs from all of his solo LP's (up to 1977, that is) minus Lou Reed Live and Metal Machine Music (MMM hardly classifies as a "Rock" album).
4) The "Intro" section to "Sweet Jane," found on "Rock 'N' Roll Animal" has been edited out. Considering the fact this it is one of the GREAT guitar workouts of any "Live" record EVER, I think this is a terrible mistake. However, in order to fit such an eclectic mix of songs onto a single CD, I guess it was necessary.
What this CD accomplishes is it gives the listener a very basic introduction to 70's Lou Reed. Be warned, the sound quality is ATROCIOUS. I suggest this CD is for "completists" ONLY. For everyone else, try "The Wild Side: Best of Lou Reed" instead. If you REALLY want "Nowhere At All," download it from iTunes.
Walking Wild Lou Reed and the Velvet Underground have always been a bit of an -- shall we say -- acquired taste. But the songs on this WALK ON THE WILD SIDE compilation are very much a showing of Reed's more mainstream side; you could almost call them pleasant. Reed has released a lot of "hits" packages over the years (one must put the word "hits" in quotations, because Reed has found little commercial appeal outside of the song this collection takes its name from), but this particular release is a great way for music fans unfamiliar with Reed's work to find something easy to latch onto before delving deeper into his darker, more disturbing side. This is not too dark as to scare off the newcomer, but it isn't dishonest either.
I'm describing this CD as if it's a fluffy collection of Top 40 sounding tracks. This isn't actually true, of course. Only when compared to the rest of Reed's discography do songs like "Wild Child" and "Sally Can't Dance" seem relatively tame. Which isn't to say there isn't a hard edge here; there is. In particular, the live performances of the two Velvet Underground songs ("Sweet Jane" and "White Light/White Heat") are harsher and louder than the studio versions as originally performed (even if this record used shorter versions than from the live album they came from). The nastier, seedier side is subtle, but present, always lurking just beneath the surface. He's singing about the dirtier side of life: drug-pushers, prostitutes, and their various clientele. He may dress them in the fanciest of melodies, but they're still there.
The release date for this collection was 1977, and it does a pretty good job of showing what sort of stuff Reed was up to in the 70s. Reed was doing a lot of weird stuff back then, both musically and in reference to his chemical intake, and the songs on here reflect that diversity. The glam influences of the David Bowie-produced TRANSFORMER are represented by "Satellite of Love" and "Walk On The Wild Side". Lou's brief flirtation with commercial appeal by emphasizing musical smoothness and "cool" over straight lyrics-and-rock is denoted by the inclusion of the title track from SALLY CAN'T DANCE. Lou-Reed-as-poet is, of course, on display throughout. Even Lou-Reed-as-joker is included: what else are we to make of "New York Telephone Conversation"? And just for kicks, the kid in "Coney Island Baby" who just wanted to play football for the coach has a cameo too. Given the short amount of time available on a single album, we don't get a particularly deep look at Reed's 70s material, but it is a broad one.
WALK ON THE WILD SIDE was the first Lou Reed album I owned, and I've bought many more since then. This is a great hook to get yourself familiar with Reed's stylings before diving in headfirst. Get this collection and then get ready to want to get a lot more.
Lou Reed I owned this cassette back in the early 80s! Loved it! I played it until it fell apart. I'm just now getting around to replacing it with a CD. I do recommend this collection of Lou Reed's best.
A decent, but all-too-short best of. "Best of Lou Reed" was put together back in the dark ages before CDs expanded the amount of material you could put on an anthology album. As it goes, it's a decent sampling of 1970s era Lou Reed that includes material from most of his albums from that up and down period. It contains "Walk on the Wild Side," his only radio ready hit, as well as "Satelite of Love" and "Wild Child" which are just as accessible. Unfortunately, however, the live version of "Sweet Jane" that made it on to this disk is the edited radio version rather than the far superior extended guitar jam original. On the ples side, the album avoids including any portion of the horrid "Metal Machine Music," which is far and away Lou's worst album.
Overall, this collection is likely best purchased by those who are primarily interested in "Walk on the Wild Side" as a single. There is nothing here that ardent fans probably don't already own. It's a good introduction to Lou Reed's dark genius, but that's all it is.
Anything Goes Trivia
Trevor
Megaton Man
