CANDY CAME FROM
OUT OF THE ISLAND
IN THE BACKROOM,
SHE WAS EVEYBODY'S DARLING
Transformer
is the second
solo
studio album
by American
recording artist
Lou Reed.
Produced by
David Bowie
and
Mick Ronson,
the album was
released on
November 8, 1972
by RCA Records.
It is considered an
influential landmark
of the
glam rock genre,
anchored by
Reed's most
successful single,
"Walk on the Wild Side",
which touched on
controversial topics of
sexual orientation,
gender identity,
prostitution
and
drug use.
Although Reed's
self-titled debut
solo album
had been
unsuccessful,
Bowie had been an
early fan of
Reed's former band
The Velvet Underground
and used his fame
to promote Reed,
who had not yet
achieved
mainstream success.
Background
As with its predecessor
Lou Reed,
Transformer
contains songs
Reed composed while
in the
Velvet Underground
(here, four out of eleven).
"Andy's Chest"
was first recorded
by the band
in 1969
and
"Satellite of Love"
demoed in 1970;
these versions were
released on
VU
and
Peel Slowly and See,
respectively.
For Transformer,
the original
up-tempo pace
of these songs
was slowed down.
"New York Telephone Conversation"
and
"Goodnight Ladies"
were played
live during the band's
summer 1970
residency at
Max's Kansas City;
the latter takes
its title refrain
from the
last line of the
second section
("A Game of Chess")
of T. S. Eliot's
modernist poem,
The Waste Land:
"Good night, ladies,
good night, sweet ladies,
good night, good night",
which is itself a
quote from
Ophelia in Hamlet.
As in Reed's
Velvet Underground days,
the connection to
artist
Andy Warhol
remained strong.
According to Reed,
Warhol told him
he should write a song
about someone vicious.
When Reed asked what
he meant by vicious,
Warhol replied,
"Oh, you know,
like I hit you
with a flower",
resulting in the song
"Vicious".
Reed wrote in his book,
Between Thought and Expression,
about his single
"Walk on the Wild Side":
"They were going to make
a musical out of
Nelson Algren's book
A Walk on the Wild Side.
When they dropped
the project
I took my song
and changed
the book's characters
into people
I knew from
Warhol's factory.
I don’t like to
waste things.
https://mega.nz/folder/f3Bzmb7J#r02ezuQ7YyHu0DQArOUD1g
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