Dean Wareham writes about Lou Reed for Salon

Dean, Lou and Britta

Dean Wareham has written a piece on Lou Reed for Salon.

Driving out of Vegas Sunday morning, my phone started to buzz with text messages about Lou Reed’s passing. The first was from my friend Pete Kember, aka Sonic Boom, a member of the great English band Spacemen 3, who once reworked Reed’s “Street Hassle” into their own “Walkin’ with Jesus.” It is quite obvious that without Reed we cannot imagine David Bowie, Roxy Music, the Stooges, Joy Division, Big Star, Sonic Youth, the Only Ones, Mazzy Star or Stereolab existing in quite the same way.</p>

…

I had been told that Lou could be prickly; he certainly had a reputation for being surly with journalists (especially English journalists, whom he seemed to enjoy antagonizing), but I have learned that a lot of people say a lot of things about people they have never met. One thing I know for sure is that Lou was generous and attentive to us; he would always stop his own sound check in time for Luna to play a few songs (and I’ve been on plenty of tours where the headlining band does not bother with that nicety).</p>

He's also shared on Soundcloud the live performance of Ride Into the Sun with recorded with Lou Reed in 1996

One afternoon in Toronto Luna started playing “Ride Into the Sun” at sound check and Lou instantly proposed that he and I sing it together that night. So for the last song of our set on the rest of the tour, Lou would wander out onstage and sing with us. We liked to think our guitar sounds were pretty cool but Lou’s steely guitar was beautiful too, in a harder way.</p>

Salon: Dean Wareham on Lou Reed: "Velvet Underground seemed to appear fully formed, beyond influence"

See also Lou Reed (1942 – 2013)