OK, now Iâm going to have to dig up my homemade version, which Iâm kinda proud of since it was on a 4-track reel and monophonic synths.
And I titled it âWhite Butt/White Feet.â
OK, now Iâm going to have to dig up my homemade version, which Iâm kinda proud of since it was on a 4-track reel and monophonic synths.
And I titled it âWhite Butt/White Feet.â
OK, now Iâm going to have to dig up my homemade version, which Iâm kinda proud of since it was on a 4-track reel and monophonic synths.
And I titled it âWhite Butt/White Feet.â
289 viewsJul 6, 2023 And then my mind split open...
ââWhite Light/White Heat was a real frustrationâ, Sterling Morrison, the underrated Velvet Underground guitar player, told me in 1985. âWe wanted to do something electronic and energetic. We had the energy and we had the electronics, what we didnât take into account was whether it could be recorded. If we went into a studio now, it would work, because they have the equipment; then they didnât, so thereâs incredible leakage from track to track. We could have done it if we had all played individually, but we didnât like to, we liked to play simultaneously. We didnât know the album was doomed until we actually mixed it downâ.
Three years before, Lou Reed had made a similar statement when I pointed out that his song «The Blue Mask» sounded like that distorted 1968 album, like «I Heard Her Call My Name». âYeah, I know thatâ, he said. âThis is far better. More complex, better lyrics. I wanted to have a song like this recorded well for a change, so you could hear it. It always bothered me that in «Sister Ray» you couldnât hear the lyrics. I wanted to be able to have the power but have it recorded well and yet still not have it be sterile just because itâs recorded well, so that was the goalâ.
Let's jump four decades ahead and behold how those sonic venoms, compositions that propelled the rockânâroll heritage into uncharted, cathartic, intoxicating and perverse territory, have survived dormant, alien eggs now deep fried by the intrepid band The Ostriches. Yes, like that first recording of commercial ambition by a young Lou before he met Cale. In the boy from Brooklyn via Long Islandâs murky rebel stance, «The Ostrich» intended to join the hit songs that invented a fashionable dance, only this one seemed dangerous and dislocated (âYou put your head on the floor and have somebody step on itâ).
The Ostriches are Juancar Parlange and Alvaro Segovia. With only their electric guitars, the duo brings White Light/White Heat back to life. And itâs not artificial life, but proof that a music launched into the future âperhaps without the Velvets themselves being aware of itâ continues to bear fruit as long as it is approached by creators with the intention of extending its legacy, not simple replicators of what is already known. The Ostrichesâ take on White Light/White Heat is not a celebratory or reverential reading, which it also is, but a refoundation of a unique and historic act, lived in some New York studios at the end of the Sixties, that seemed unrepeatable but it turns out it wasnât.
The mercurial recreation of that obnoxious album by The Ostriches is entirely instrumental; we only hear guitars. Percussion, organ, some voices, everything unfolds in perfect simulation invoked by guitars.
âElectricity comes from other planetsâ, Lou Reed sang on another Velvet Undeground song. Well, after listening to this, maybe not: we carry it deep inside, in the neuronal synapses, in the unconscious. It is life itself.
Ignacio JuliÃ
Video "Blow Up" by Andy Warhol 1964
Sister Ray (Music: Lou Reed, John Cale, Sterling Morrison, Maureen Tucker)
Texas Forever Records & Management
ok, that took me back to a place I haven't been for a long time. epic.
289 viewsJul 6, 2023 And then my mind split open...
ââWhite Light/White Heat was a real frustrationâ, Sterling Morrison, the underrated Velvet Underground guitar player, told me in 1985. âWe wanted to do something electronic and energetic. We had the energy and we had the electronics, what we didnât take into account was whether it could be recorded. If we went into a studio now, it would work, because they have the equipment; then they didnât, so thereâs incredible leakage from track to track. We could have done it if we had all played individually, but we didnât like to, we liked to play simultaneously. We didnât know the album was doomed until we actually mixed it downâ.
Three years before, Lou Reed had made a similar statement when I pointed out that his song «The Blue Mask» sounded like that distorted 1968 album, like «I Heard Her Call My Name». âYeah, I know thatâ, he said. âThis is far better. More complex, better lyrics. I wanted to have a song like this recorded well for a change, so you could hear it. It always bothered me that in «Sister Ray» you couldnât hear the lyrics. I wanted to be able to have the power but have it recorded well and yet still not have it be sterile just because itâs recorded well, so that was the goalâ.
Let's jump four decades ahead and behold how those sonic venoms, compositions that propelled the rockânâroll heritage into uncharted, cathartic, intoxicating and perverse territory, have survived dormant, alien eggs now deep fried by the intrepid band The Ostriches. Yes, like that first recording of commercial ambition by a young Lou before he met Cale. In the boy from Brooklyn via Long Islandâs murky rebel stance, «The Ostrich» intended to join the hit songs that invented a fashionable dance, only this one seemed dangerous and dislocated (âYou put your head on the floor and have somebody step on itâ).
The Ostriches are Juancar Parlange and Alvaro Segovia. With only their electric guitars, the duo brings White Light/White Heat back to life. And itâs not artificial life, but proof that a music launched into the future âperhaps without the Velvets themselves being aware of itâ continues to bear fruit as long as it is approached by creators with the intention of extending its legacy, not simple replicators of what is already known. The Ostrichesâ take on White Light/White Heat is not a celebratory or reverential reading, which it also is, but a refoundation of a unique and historic act, lived in some New York studios at the end of the Sixties, that seemed unrepeatable but it turns out it wasnât.
The mercurial recreation of that obnoxious album by The Ostriches is entirely instrumental; we only hear guitars. Percussion, organ, some voices, everything unfolds in perfect simulation invoked by guitars.
âElectricity comes from other planetsâ, Lou Reed sang on another Velvet Undeground song. Well, after listening to this, maybe not: we carry it deep inside, in the neuronal synapses, in the unconscious. It is life itself.
Ignacio JuliÃ
Video "Blow Up" by Andy Warhol 1964
Sister Ray (Music: Lou Reed, John Cale, Sterling Morrison, Maureen Tucker)
