THE VELVET UNDERGROUND @ 55

The third, eponymous LP from The Velvet Underground is turning 55 years old this month, being released in March of 1969. After the searing abrasiveness of their previous album, White Light - White Heat, which pinned the VU meters on people's hi-fi systems as it attempted to be the loudest album ever released, Lou Reed was determined to do a complete about face with their third release, aiming for softness and emotional tenderness, with songs focused on relationships and spiritual/religious introspection. For Reed, it was essential to demonstrate the band's versatility in order to thwart any attempts to pigeonhole them into any particular style or sound. The result was an album of predominantly gentle beauty, packed with some of Reed's most memorable songs.

After recording their second album, John Cale found himself on the outs with the band and ended up being fired in September of 1968. His replacement, Doug Yule, was suggested by Sterling Morrison after being scouted by the band's road manager. Yule was warmly welcomed to the group, especially by Reed, who some band members claim may have gone somewhat overboard in his praise and encouragement of the new recruit, inflating his ego somewhat. Regardless, when they went into the Hollywood based TTG studios to record, the mood among the band was jovial, and by all recollections, the process of creating the album was an enjoyable experience for all involved.

Reed was eager to have all of the band members contribute to the album as lead vocalists, even managing to persuade the shy Maurine Tucker to contribute her voice to the album's closing track, After Hours. It was a challenging task for the drummer, who insisted on recording her vocal with a minimum of people present in the studio during her final take. Lou was insistent on her taking on the task though, as he felt her frail, childlike voice was perfect or the song's themes of social anxiety and isolation. After she finished her take, she said that she wouldn't sing it live unless someone requested it.

Though the recording process for the album was a pleasant experience for the band, when it came to mixing, Reed's insistence on doing the mix himself, without consulting the other members, stepped on toes and resulted in a lot of dissatisfaction and animosity from the rest of the band. An alternate mix of the album was done, with both finding their way into pressings, so there's some confusion around as to the preferred mix. Reed's version, dubbed the "closet mix", emphasized his vocals and drowned out the backing parts, alienating the rest of the band. This was the initial mix that was released, but an alternate mix by MGM staff engineer Val Valentin ultimately became the more commonly available version of the album.

With only The Murder Mystery, which featured songwriting and vocal credits from all four members, harking back to their more experimental tendencies, the remainder of the album was accessible enough that the band had high hopes that it would be a breakthrough for them when it came to sales, but poor promotion from their label, again, meant that their efforts would be under appreciated at the time of the album's release, even though it received roundly positive reviews from the critics. It would only be in later years, as the band's influence and legacy grew, that their records would receive the attention they deserved, as generations of new fans continued to rediscover the group and began to comprehend their influence on so many who came in their wake. Retrospectively, the album is considered, not only essential in terms of the band's canon of work, but in terms of landmark recordings from that era, frequently resulting in the LP being counted among numerous "best of" and "must listen" critic and fan lists.