Lewis Allan Reed was an American musician, songwriter, and poet who lived from March 2, 1942, until October 27, 2013. He had a solo career that lasted five decades in addition to being the Velvet Underground’s guitarist, singer, and primary songwriter.
The Velvet Underground gained recognition as one of the most significant bands in the history of underground and alternative rock music, despite not being particularly successful commercially throughout its lifetime. Throughout his lengthy career, Reed was known for his distinct deadpan voice, creative and provocative lyrics, and experimental guitar style.
In order to work as an internal songwriter for Pickwick Records, Reed relocated to New York City in 1964. On two songs from The Surfsiders Sing The Beach Boys Songbook, he sings lead vocals. In addition, Reed created the track “The Ostrich” for Pickwick, a satire of then-current dance music that featured lyrics like “drop your head on the floor and have somebody walk on it.”
His bosses thought the song had hit potential and put together a backing band to help promote it. The Primitives were Reed, Welsh musician John Cale, who had recently moved to New York to study music and was playing viola in composer La Monte Young’s Theatre of Eternal Music, sculptor Walter De Maria, and Tony Conrad.
Cale and Conrad were surprised to discover that Reed tuned each string of his guitar to the same note for “The Ostrich,” which they dubbed his “ostrich guitar” tuning. This technique produced a drone effect, similar to Young’s avant-garde ensemble’s experiments. Despite being disappointed by Reed’s performance, Cale was impressed by Reed’s early repertoire (including “Heroin”), and a collaboration began to form.
What is Lou Reed famous for?
Lou Reed is a songwriter whose place in the rock pantheon is primarily due to his role as the leader of the Velvet Underground, a New York City-based quartet that produced four under-appreciated but enormously influential studio albums from 1965 to 1970.
