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Lou's Zoo Reviews -- LOU REED: THE COVER ARTIST

I'm done looking at all of Lou Reed's solo studio albums. I just wanted to finish out the week and post one more piece on Lou before I put this to rest (in peace).

While so many musicians have covered Lou's music, Lou also covered other people's songs. I wanted to draw attention to some of my favorites.

Lou's Zoo Reviews – 2000's ECSTASY

This series will focus on Lou's solo career only, a historic overview, from 1972's Lou Reed to 2000's Ecstasy. What follows is hardly definitive, short-handed at best, and purely my opinions. 

ECSTASY 

This is the last Lou Reed solo studio album I am going to review for this series, and, as far as I am concerned, this is his final solo studio album (let's never mention The Raven ever again). This also happens to be another one of my top five favorite Lou Reed albums.

Ecstasy is another album that features an exploration of relationships, but now the concept is seen from the Mature Lou Point Of View. All the old issues are present – infidelity, power games, devotion, insecurity, disappointment, and, of course, ecstasy – but Lou has come to some new understandings of his traditional themes and this album showcases his thoughts.

Lou's guitar playing is great on this album and his songwriting is as strong as when he was in his prime.

Knowing that Lou will never make another album, I think that Ecstasy is the perfect denouement to a legendary career.

Lou's Zoo Reviews – 1996's SET THE TWILIGHT REELING

This series will focus on Lou's solo career only, a historic overview, from 1972's Lou Reed to 2000's Ecstasy. What follows is hardly definitive, short-handed at best, and purely my opinions. 

SET THE TWILIGHT REELING 

I'm not sure what to make of this album. It's a typical Lou Reed release, with great songs buried within tripe.

Here's Lou is trying to connect with his childhood, declaring his love for Laurie Anderson, trying to be political, and trying to be a “poet".

There are a few moments of brilliance in this album, though. You just have to make your way through a certain amount of muck to find them.

Lou's Zoo Reviews – 1992's MAGIC AND LOSS

This series will focus on Lou's solo career only, a historic overview, from 1972's Lou Reed to 2000's Ecstasy. What follows is hardly definitive, short-handed at best, and purely my opinions. 

MAGIC AND LOSS

Given the impetus for this series of reviews, this album takes on a greater significance than perhaps it warrants. Still, here it is, 1992's Magic and Loss, an album that takes as its reason for being Lou's meditation on death.

Lou had recently lost two people whom he considered close friends, the songwriter Doc Pomus and “Rita” (who, some say, is Rotten Rita from Warhol's Factory days). When I heard this album, I was confused by it. I kept it at arm's length initially and then, through some force of will, decided I was going to figure it out. It is an album that takes time and patience.

Lou has never been the best at expressing any emotions that didn't involve disappointment and/or derision in his music. If detachment is an emotion, well he was good at expressing that, too. But ruminating on mortality? Expressing pain at the loss of loved ones? Showing empathy and understanding? This was uncharted territory for Lou in his songs.

This album, I think, shows him honestly confronting feelings he didn't quite understand, trying to harness them into words, and stumbling over himself in the process. It's an artist producing art – and whether you think he succeeded or not, you have to at least respect him for trying. 

Lou's Zoo Reviews – 1989's NEW YORK

This series will focus on Lou's solo career only, a historic overview, from 1972's Lou Reed to 2000's Ecstasy. What follows is hardly definitive, short-handed at best, and purely my opinions. 

NEW YORK 

After sinking to some rather extreme musical lows with his last two albums, Lou roared back into the public consciousness with this biting, angry condemnation of the state of the world at that time.

Lyrically, this one shows a more mature Lou who is finally able to look outside himself and see the world for what it is (not the world that he decides it is, or the world that is out to get him). While his song writing is at its height, his musicianship on this album sinks a bit.

Still, overall, this is a great album.

Lou's Zoo Reviews – 1986's MISTRIAL

This series will focus on Lou's solo career only, a historic overview, from 1972's Lou Reed to 2000's Ecstasy. What follows is hardly definitive, short-handed at best, and purely my opinions. 

MISTRIAL 

Oh gawd, this album. Mistrial is a mistake. It's probably the only Lou Reed album I will only listen to under extreme duress. In a way, it encompasses everything that went wrong in 1986 (even though so many things also went right) and I have no choice but to blame MTV for this hunk of crap, because I can, and so I do.

Lou's Zoo Reviews – 1984's NEW SENSATIONS

This series will focus on Lou's solo career only, a historic overview, from 1972's Lou Reed to 2000's Ecstasy. What follows is hardly definitive, short-handed at best, and purely my opinions.

NEW SENSATIONS 

The mid-80's brought us a new Lou, clean and sober, who brought to the studio a sense of playfulness and mirth. The aptly titled New Sensations is more of a pop album than a rocker, and with this album good old grizzled Lou started on a multi-media blitz in order to cement his face on the Mount Rushmore of Rock.

New Sensations is easy to dismiss as insipid, light, and bereft of any real intellectual value, but then again, one could say this about a lot of the music in 1984. Throughout the album, Lou seems to be looking to you to bring him home, give him a sandwich, and allow him sit on your couch to watch the Grammys.

Lou's Zoo Reviews – 1983's LEGENDARY HEARTS

This series will focus on Lou's solo career only, a historic overview, from 1972's Lou Reed to 2000's Ecstasy. What follows is hardly definitive, short-handed at best, and purely my opinions. 

LEGENDARY HEARTS 

Lou's twelveth solo studio album, Legendary Hearts, is dedicated to his wife at the time, Sylvia Morales.

But this is not an album brimming with love songs, rather it explores the complexity that exists in being in a relationship with Lou – power games, jealousy, and abuse are all mixed together with traditional ideas of love.

Robert Quine is credited on guitars for this album, but the story goes that Lou went back into the studio before the album was released and re-mixed it to the point where you hardly hear any of Quine's contributions whatsoever.

Lou's Zoo Reviews – 1982's THE BLUE MASK

This series will focus on Lou's solo career only, a historic overview, from 1972's Lou Reed to 2000's Ecstasy. What follows is hardly definitive, short-handed at best, and purely my opinions.

THE BLUE MASK

Here we go. Probably my favorite of Lou's solo studio albums, The Blue Mask is Lou back bringing the noise.

Having the good sense to find collaborators who could bring the best out of him, Lou teamed up with guitarist Robert Quine and this album highlights what that team-up was capable of. This is a guitar driven album, and the Quine/Reed sound pours out with intensity or sweetness or sweet intensity given the demands of the songs.

In typical Lou fashion, there are as many thickly bad songs here as there are some of his best work to date.

Also in typical Lou fashion, once people started saying as many nice things about Quine as they did about Lou, Lou cut him out of his life.

Lou's Zoo Reviews – 1980's GROWING UP IN PUBLIC

This series will focus on Lou's solo career only, a historic overview, from 1972's Lou Reed to 2000's Ecstasy. What follows is hardly definitive, short-handed at best, and purely my opinions. 

GROWING UP IN PUBLIC 

This is a pretty interesting album all told, filled with tales of Lou trying to kick his habit by drinking, stories of his relationship falling apart, and vitriol about his parents. Lou had an especially complex relationship with his Long Island Middle-Class Jewish upbringing – some real wild Oedipal stuff so I've heard, and he liked to be vicious in his songs about his folks.

This album is filled with the highs and lows that have begun to be the norm in a Lou Reed album. I'm especially fond of the album cover art for Growing Up In Public. Lou, in his v-neck sweater, looking all glum and serious and shit – it's like it was school portrait day and he was pissed mom made him wear his “nice sweater”.

Aw, Lou, you're cute as hell.

Lou's Zoo Reviews – 1979's THE BELLS

This series will focus on Lou's solo career only, a historic overview, from 1972's Lou Reed to 2000's Ecstasy. What follows is hardly definitive, short-handed at best, and purely my opinions. 

THE BELLS 

This is a hard album to take seriously. It is full of pompous missteps and grandiose failures, but it is quintessential Lou. For me, this album marks a turn in Lou's career as an artist.

From The Bells forward, his albums will suffer from a slew of such head-scratchingly bad songs (anchored between works of genius) that you have to wonder if he was doing it on purpose. Lou had puffed himself pretty far by this point, thinking he could do no wrong. But he was wrong, and many of the songs on this album were wrong too.

For some reason the critics loved The Bells. I often forget that it even exists. Lou perplexes. The Bells does too.

Lou's Zoo Reviews – 1978's STREET HASSLE

This series will focus on Lou's solo career only, a historic overview, from 1972's Lou Reed to 2000's Ecstasy. What follows is hardly definitive, short-handed at best, and purely my opinions. 

 STREET HASSLE 

Now THIS is a Lou Reed album – or at least a Lou Reed album as I define the term. It's thick and viscous and grating and full of attitude. It also has some beautiful poetry and some incredible songs. Combining studio work with live recordings, Street Hassle is certainly in my top five of favorite Lou Reed solo studio albums – it's the Lou he wants you to remember.

When this album came out, Lou had already been christened the “Godfather of Punk” and Street Hassle lives up to that moniker. So many of the themes he had been working with in his body of work -- addiction, isolation, cruelty, disassociation, filth – found a mature voice here.

It's not a make-out album, it's not a dance album, it's not even a particularly good album to take on a road trip. What it is, though, is the quintessence of an artist, understanding his role as a creator.

Lou's Zoo Reviews – 1976's ROCK AND ROLL HEART

This series will focus on Lou's solo career only, a historic overview, from 1972's Lou Reed to 2000's Ecstasy. What follows is hardly definitive, short-handed at best, and purely my opinions. 

 ROCK AND ROLL HEART 

Lou's first album for Arista Records, and his seventh solo studio release, is a weird album. You get the sense that Lou has come into his own – well, his “own” is kinda the wrong word to use with a guy like Lou – let's just say that he's found a voice that works for him.

Lou says that he wrote most of this album in the studio. He supposedly took one month to record and mix it. It has that sort of sound.