Lou Reed EXPORT - Softcover

Anthony DeCurtis

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1473666066 ISBN 13: 9781473666061

Publisher: John Murray, 2017

Synopsis

The essential biography of one of music's most influential icons: Lou Reed

As lead singer and songwriter for the Velvet Underground and a renowned solo artist, Lou Reed invented alternative rock. His music, at once a source of transcendent beauty and coruscating noise, violated all definitions of genre while speaking to millions of fans and inspiring generations of musicians.

But while his iconic status may be fixed, the man himself was anything but. Lou Reed's life was a transformer's odyssey. Eternally restless and endlessly hungry for new experiences, Reed reinvented his persona, his sound, even his sexuality time and again. A man of contradictions and extremes, he was fiercely independent yet afraid of being alone, artistically fearless yet deeply paranoid, eager for commercial success yet disdainful of his own triumphs. Channeling his jagged energy and literary sensibility into classic songs - like "Walk on the Wild Side" and "Sweet Jane" - and radically experimental albums alike, Reed remained desperately true to his artistic vision, wherever it led him.

Now, just a few years after Reed's death, Rolling Stone writer Anthony DeCurtis, who knew Reed and interviewed him extensively, tells the provocative story of his complex and chameleonic life. With unparalleled access to dozens of Reed's friends, family, and collaborators, DeCurtis tracks Reed's five-decade career through the accounts of those who knew him and through Reed's most revealing testimony, his music. We travel deep into his defiantly subterranean world, enter the studio as the Velvet Underground record their groundbreaking work, and revel in Reed's relationships with such legendary figures as Andy Warhol, David Bowie, and Laurie Anderson. Gritty, intimate, and unflinching, Lou Reed is an illuminating tribute to one of the most incendiary artists of our time.

About this title

About the Author

Anthony DeCurtis is a contributing editor for Rolling Stone, where his work has appeared for more than 35 years, and a Distinguished Lecturer in the Creative Writing Program at the University of Pennsylvania. He is the author of In Other Words and Rocking My Life Away, the co-writer of Clive Davis's autobiography, The Soundtrack of My Life, a New York Times bestseller, and the editor of Blues & Chaos: The Music Writing of Robert Palmer and Present Tense: Rock & Roll and Culture. DeCurtis is a Grammy Award winner and has served as a member of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame nominating committee for more than 20 years. He holds a Ph.D. in American Literature and lives in New York City.

Review

DeCurtis is well placed to trace Reed's five-decade career, drawing on insider knowledge but skilfully balancing it with detailed research and fascinating interviews * Mojo Magazine * A serious and comprehensive account * Guardian, Books of the Year * An even-handed, well-researched portrait * Financial Times * There were, [DeCurtis] states in the introduction, "aspects of his sex life, his drug use, and his cruelty" that Reed would "have loved to erase" - yet, while less prurient than other recent biographers, DeCurtis recognises that an airbrushed portrait would be a travesty of a life * Sunday Times * Anthony DeCurtis was one of the few music critics Lou Reed read and whose company he enjoyed. After reading this sublime and subtle book, the mystery of Lou's respect for Anthony is revealed. Anthony is a great story teller, a writer's writer, turning pain into beauty the way Lou did in his songs * Bono * An eloquent account of a harrowing life transformed by love in the end. Anthony DeCurtis does a brilliant job of synthesizing the disparate parts of Lou Reed's life into an insightful, moving narrative. I highly recommend it * Suzanne Vega * Completely captivating * GQ * A brilliant artist has found a biographer with the insight to, as Lou said, 'pass through the fire' and be a definitive interpreter of both his music and his life * Sting * Lou Reed is Lou Reed! * Iggy Pop * Lou Reed was one of music's most brilliant and complicated figures-an explorer, a provocateur, and always a true artist. With grace and grit, Anthony DeCurtis has delivered a revelatory and insightful chronicle of this most challenging rock & roll icon, and Lou Reed gets the biographer he deserves * Alan Light, author of The Holy or the Broken * How did a middle-class suburban boy grow up to be king of Manhattan's wild side? Thanks to this groundbreaking biography, now we know . . . A must-read for fans of rock and roll, New York City, or sex * Ada Calhoun, author of St. Marks is Dead * Anthony DeCurtis captures the soul and the essence of Lou Reed in his terrific new biography of the brilliant, culture-shaping musician. DeCurtis' great gift of storytelling gives fascinating insight and perspective to Reed's complex personality and cutting-edge musical talent. This is a must read * Clive Davis * I'm not the first musician to pledge allegiance to Lou and the Velvets, and I won't be the last. Read this book, and explore the f*cking genius that was Lou Reed * Peter Buck, co-founder and lead guitarist of R.E.M. *

Edition details

• Publisher: John Murray
• Publication date: 2017
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 1473666066
• ISBN 13: 9781473666061
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 519