Velvet Underground And Nico, The [Remastered] - Velvet Underground (The)/Nico > Reviews > Peel slowly and see...

Author's product rating:   

Originality	Groundbreaking
Lyrics	Thought-provoking
Quality and consistency of tracks	A couple of weak links
How does it compare to the artist's other releases	Outstanding
Value for Money	Excellent

Advantages:	Lou Reed on top form, Wonderfully varied styles
Disadvantages:	Nico ruins some of the tracks by singing on them

Recommend to potential buyers:

yes

Full review

"We fly to the cozy brown snow of the east" mumbles Lou Reed on the epic "Black Angel's Death Song" - This basically states the album's modus operandi. The Velvet Underground were renouned drug enthusiasts and as this album was created in the height of Andy Warhol's "Pop Art" phenomenon, the Velvets found themselves deeply emersed in the culture (their cover art was designed by Mr. Warhol, who also produced the album itsself!!) The result is a hypnotic and distorted masterpiece, plucking from different styles such as pop, blues, jazz, psychadelica and even pre-empting punk!
The first track, "Sunday Morning" is a pleasing and beautiful song describing the wonders of the sabbath, rather sinple in structure (as with much of the rest of the album) yet not without that evil, yet irresistable underbelly of sex, drugs and the seemingly impending death of rock n roll. "Heroin" starts off as a semi-accoustic, melodic jam session, which increases speed at intervals before exploding into echoey nothingness capping it all off with a furious aural assault. "European Son" is the strangest song on the album, starting with a dual of bass and guitar, lou reed raps "You spit on those under 21" before going into a 5-minute attack on the listeners' stereo speakers. Of course some tracks are problems: most noteably the ones which nico sings on: her terrible voice is compounded by the fact that the rest of the band are playing music that will change the way people listen to rock n' roll: particularly on tracks such as "All Tomorrow's Parties". In short, the whole album is about drugs. Nothing is left to the imagination. This may seem a little vulgar now, as such artists as Dr. Dre and OPM have done much to glamourise and therefore legitimate drug-use, yet this is 1967. Here, the Velvet Underground have created a timeless classic that is a must for any real music fan.