The Alpha and Omega of V.U. Sets

This set contains 5 CD's, each exceeding 70 minutes in length. Every Velvet Underground album released during their active partnership is here in its entirety, sandwiched on disc between first-issue tracks -- demos, "alternate" cuts and live recordings. The tracks and albums are arranged in chronological order, with each disc isolating a coherent "period" in the band's brief career.

Disc 1 is a 78-minute demo recorded in 1965, before the V.U. had attracted notice of any profitable sort; the demo was supposedly intended to speed them out of obscurity. Represented on this disc are Lou Reed, John Cale and Sterling Morrison, all on guitar, with Cale occasionally scraping away at his viola. The band performs here without a drummer, which is odd because Maureen Tucker's percussion sounds so "integral" to their albums. Although it runs on for nearly 80 minutes, the disc contains only 6 songs, most played numerous times by the band with varying degrees of success: a perversely soothing "Venus in Furs," sung by Cale, "Prominent Men," soon to be dropped from their repertoire, "Heroin," "I'm Waiting For The Man," "Wrap Your Troubles In Dreams," later recorded by the doomed pop goddess Nico for her first solo album, and "All Tomorrow's Parties," sung here by Reed and company, who attempt three-part vocal harmony. Ignoring the demo's musical merits, it proves itself a winner at this late date through its preservation of young Lou Reed's bizarre, perhaps comic attempts to sing and play like Bob Dylan. He slides notes up the scale in an exaggerated nasal whine, like the rising cry of an air-raid siren; the higher the note, the louder Reed sings. He accompanies his singing with acoustic guitar and harmonica, the latter instrument blown with an enthusiasm inversely proportional to Reed's distance from the microphone.

Alongside this interesting disc of "urban folk-music," Discs 2-5 feature the V.U. as "rock band." The "previously unissued" tracks range in quality from good to very good; one of the best, "Melody Laugh," lasts 10 minutes, has harmonized feedback and fuzz but no melody to speak of until its final moments, and works as a sort of "tension exercise." Some of the outtakes from the band's Loaded album sessions have been superceded by Rhino's Fully Loaded collection, but they nevertheless fill out an excellent fifth disc and provide a poignant conclusion to this set.

Surprises abound for both the initiate and the jaded fan. The "real albums" on these discs require little comment; it seems probable that anyone who would buy the box set already owns at least one or two of the V.U. albums contained therein. The songs have been digitally remastered yet again, which gives the second V.U. album, White Light White Heat, a new sheen and - for the very first time - full stereo separation. It's nice that Polygram padded the issue with 25 never-released, essentially "new" recordings. And it’s nice to hear the third album, The Velvet Underground, in its original mix (described as the “closet” mix because it’s somewhat cramped-sounding).

Nearly as nice are the extramusical goodies. Enclosed is an 80-page book chronicling the band's career and the genesis of each song or album included in the collection. A profusion of relevant photographs enhances the text. For those who miss packaging gimmicks like the Sgt. Pepper cut-out sheet, this box set offers a cheap thrill, to which the title alludes ("Peel Slowly and See..."). Andy Warhol designed the cover of the first V.U. album, The Velvet Underground and Nico, to feature a bright yellow banana on a white background. Warhol's banana, a sticker, could be "peeled" to expose a .... well, what do you think? (Hint: it's pink.) This "pop-art" conceit was so important to all parties concerned that the album, recorded in 1966, waited in the can for nearly a year while MGM (the V.U.'s original record company) figured out how to mass-produce the cover. Polygram's CD box resurrects Warhol's original concept, for what it's worth; like a pat of butter on the kitchen wall, a thin flexi-peel holds fast to the box's glossy, laminated surface, allowing for safe and repeated exposure of the substrate.

My only complaint about the Polygram set concerns the omission of a rare and important recording. Granted, the song in question was never performed by the Velvet Underground, but it deserves a place in any V.U. anthology claiming to be "comprehensive." Here's why:

Lou Reed met John Cale when both were taking odd musical jobs for money, during the first flush of American Beatlemania in 1964. Reed, at the time, worked as a company songwriter for Long Island-based Pickwick Records, and he had come up with a dance tune, purportedly inspired by a fashion fad of wearing ostrich feathers in the hair or hat; so says Reed, anyhow. "The Ostrich," formally a distant cousin to "The Locomotion" and "The Twist," made some mouths water at Pickwick, and the company arranged for Reed to perform his number at high school dances, proms and such with a band of itinerant professionals, employed by Pickwick specifically to promote "The Ostrich" and incite a new dance craze. Cale was one of the hired musicians; Reed and Cale discovered that they shared certain musical ideas and inclinations; and when "The Ostrich" bit the dust, they decided to form their very own band, which later became the Velvet Underground.

Recordings of Reed's "Ostrich" actually exist; one, of a live performance in a gymnasium, was illegally issued on a bootleg album about 10 years ago. Polygram, I feel, should have released a digital master of the best recording extant, just for the sheer fun of it, if not as a public service. According to the lyrics, our only source for this practice, any two people can do The Ostrich: one kneels and rests his or her head on the dance floor, the partner then attempts to stomp the head through the floor; switch; repeat until curfew.