Whiplash girlchild
A long time ago, I decided that Black Angel’s Death Song was my favorite song. It won out for reasons of mood, not melody: something about John Cale’s sawing, hopeless viola and Lou Reed’s dada-duh-Dylan talk-sing spew really spoke to the me of 18—or rather, spoke of me, with my hippie-beat exterior and my avant-chaotic insides. But really, I loved the whole album, loved playing it on my thrift-store record-player, closing my eyes as I listened; loved fake-whipdancing to Venus in Furs, pretending I was Mary Woronov at the Factory.
I was introduced to the album at my friend Mark’s apartment. He was a worshipper of whatever, with block-and-board bookshelves filled with vinyl from floor to ceiling. His love for the Velvets became my own, electric and immediate: I couldn’t get enough of their dark, dark sonic-city songs. Their first album was my gateway drug, but I got the taste for heavier going the more I listened. I woke up to all 17-minutes of Sister Ray every day for a year when I was around 20. Now I prefer side one of The Velvet Underground or the roundtrip-journey of Loaded.
Listening to TBADS again, I think I see why I so strongly identified with it (and it’s all about mishearing a lyric. But then, so many things are.) There’s a point in the song where Lou Reed talks about “a long splendid cut from a knife” and I thought he was talking about my cuts, the damage I did to myself for that brief but inescapable period that’s left me arm-scarred, constantly explaining the stupid choices I made in my late teens. But I googled, and it’s really “a long, splintered cut,” which is about as thrilling as having to say no, I was not in a car accident and no, a cat didn’t scratch me for the 80 millionth time to someone new in my life.
Seeing that The Velvet Underground and Nico is the single common element between three Greatest Album lists takes me back to those Black Angel days (sans sharp objects):
Tags: black angel's death song, loaded, mary woronov, nico, sister ray, the factory, velvet underground, venus in furs
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