Anthony Decurtis Lou Reed

Walk on the Wild Side: The Best of Lou Reed was the standard record company "hits" compilation surveying Reed's five-year, eight-album sojourn at RCA from 1972 to 1976. Its 11 songs included two from Lou Reed, three from Transformer (among them, of course, this album's title track, Reed's sole chart hit), one from Berlin, two from Rock N Roll Animal (one of which is "Sweet Jane" minus the introductory fanfare), and the title tracks from Sally Can't Dance and Coney Island Baby, plus the previously non-LP B-side "Nowhere at All." It was a bulletproof selection, as unimaginative as it was dependable, which oddly was why it worked so well. Reed's solo career had seen some extreme tangents, and this album caught them, from the Dylan-ish "Wild Child" to the glam pop of the Transformer material…

Lou Reed and Kris Kristofferson The Bottom Line Archive Series: In Their Own Words: With Vin Scelsa - A new album captures a rare collaborative performance by Lou Reed and Kris Kristofferson. The artists met up at the New York club the Bottom Line in February 1994 and discussed songwriting and their histories with radio host Vin Scelsa.

Lou Reed - Different Times, Lou Reed In The '70s (1996) {RCA 66864-2}
EAC rip (secure mode) | FLAC (tracks)+CUE+LOG -> 432 Mb | MP3 @320 -> 183 Mb
Full Artwork @ 300 dpi (jpg) -> 20 Mb | 5% repair rar
© 1970's, 1996 RCA Records / BMG | 66864-2
Rock / Rock & Roll / Psychedelic Rock / Art Rock

Lou Reed is very much an album-oriented artist, and those who think they may develop a serious interest in his work are better advised to seek individual titles than compilations. If you just want some of his best songs around the house, though, this is a well-chosen, economic 17-track survey of his best material from his best period as a solo act (the early to mid-'70s). Drawing most heavily from the Transformer and Berlin albums, this has his most famous/notorious early solo works ("Walk on the Wild Side," "Vicious," "Satellite of Love," "Caroline Says"), some inferior but notably different remakes of songs he recorded with the Velvet Underground ("Lisa Says," "I Can't Stand It," "Sweet Jane"), and other high points like "Kill Your Sons" and "Coney Island Baby.

In 1972, Lou Reed was a minor cult hero to a handful of rock critics and left-of-center music fans who championed his former band, the Velvet Underground, but he was unknown to the mainstream music audience. By 1986, Reed was a rock & roll icon, widely hailed as a master songwriter and one of the founding fathers of punk, glam, noise rock, and any number of other vital rock subgenres; he even scored a few hits along the way. If you want to know what happened during those 14 years to make such a difference, the answer can be found in The RCA & Arista Album Collection, a 17-disc box set that brings together nearly all of Reed's recorded work from this period…