Lou Reed‘s songwriting work for Pickwick Records in the mid-1960s is being compiled into a single album – find out more below.
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Before founding The Velvet Underground, Reed worked as a songwriter for Pickwick Records. Now, the songs that he penned during his stint at the company in the mid-1960s have been compiled for a new album: ‘Why Don’t You Smile Now: Lou Reed at Pickwick Records 1964-65’.
The compilation album is due for release on September 27 via Light in the Attic, in partnership with Laurie Anderson and the Lou Reed Archive. You can now pre-order the album in various packages.
As suggested by the album’s name, ‘Why Don’t You Smile Now: Lou Reed at Pickwick Records 1964-65′ will comprise of the material that he had worked on between those two years. The album’s opening track is The Primatives’ ‘The Ostrich’ that features Reed on lead vocals.
You can listen to it below.
The tracklist for ‘Why Don’t You Smile Now: Lou Reed at Pickwick Records 1964-65’ is:
Side A
1. The Primitives – ‘The Ostrich’
2. The Beachnuts – ‘Cycle Annie’
3. The Hi-Lifes – ‘I’m Gonna Fight’
4. The Hi-Lifes – ‘Soul City’
5. Ronnie Dickerson – ‘Oh No Don’t Do It’
6. Ronnie Dickerson – ‘Love Can Make You Cry’
7. The Hollywoods – ‘Teardrop In The Sand’
8. The Roughnecks – ‘You’re Driving Me Insane’
Recommended
Side B
1. The Primitives – ‘Sneaky Pete’
2. Terry Philips – ‘Wild One’
3. Spongy And The Dolls – ‘Really – Really – Really – Really – Really – Really Love’
4. The Foxes – ‘Soul City’
5. The J Brothers – ‘Ya Running, But I’ll Getcha’
6. Beverley Ann – ‘We Got Trouble’
7. The All Night Workers – ‘Why Don’t You Smile’
8. Jeannie Larimore – ‘Johnny Won’t Surf No More’
Side C
1. Robertha Williams – ‘Tell Mamma Not to Cry’
2. Robertha Williams – ‘Maybe Tomorrow’
3. Terry Philips – ‘Flowers For The Lady’
4. Terry Philips – ‘This Rose’
Side D
1. The Surfsiders – ‘Surfin’’
2. The Surfsiders – ‘Little Deuce Coupe’
3. The Beachnuts – ‘Sad, Lonely Orphan Boy’
4. The Beachnuts – ‘I’ve Got a Tiger in My Tank’
5. Ronnie Dickerson – ‘What About Me’
Reed’s last solo album was ‘Hudson River Wind Meditations’, and he later collaborated with Metallica on their 2011 joint full-length, ‘Lulu’. The divisive album garnered such strong reactions from listeners, that Reed once expressed that Metallica fans “have threatened to shoot [him]” because of it.
Nonetheless, Metallica drummer Lars Ulrich has recently doubled down on the effort, writing in a posthumously released book by Reed: “I can’t quite figure it out, but years later, it’s aged extremely well. It sounds like a motherfucker still. So I can only put the reaction down to ignorance.”
In the past, Ulrich described his band’s experience working with the Velvet Underground legend as positive, maintaining that he “wouldn’t change a thing” about it.