Lou Reed was an enigma. A name associated with the Velvet Underground, some of whose records I owned, his wonderful Transformer album produced by David Bowie whom I admired. His Live albums “Rock n Roll Animal” and “Live” were, and still are, amongst the best live albums I have heard, the songs coming alive in a live setting. Sadly , the  classic “berlin”  line up was gone:  featuring  Steve Hunter, guitar, dick Wagner, guitar, Ray Concord , keyboards, Pentti Gan, drums, and Prakash  John, bass. Those duelling lead guitars but a memory.

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He had a reputation as a maverick as evidenced by “Metal Machine Music”, hence his soubriquet “Loopy Lou”, nut he also had one of the most  envied back catalogues in rock  So when he announced three dates at London’s Hammersmith Odeon I swooped for a ticket. Live performances were his milieu and that was where I was going to be, with Lou Reed, vocals and guitar, Stuart Heinrich, guitar, Ellard “Moose” Boles, bass, Marty  Fogel, sax, Michael  Suchorsky, drums, and  Chuck Hammer, Roland guitar synth.  Heinrich was to stay with Lou for many years, as was Moose Boles whose other collaborations were with Gregg Allman, Stevie Ray Vaughn, David Bowie, Buddy Miles,  Steve Marriott, and Steve Miller. Chuck hammer went on to work with David Bowie on his “Scary Monsters album, most memorably on “Ashes to Ashes”

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This wasn’t a vintage band, but their competence was vital behind Lou’s quixotic leadership.

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The tradition at the Odeon was that the tickets said “Show starts 7.30pm, an unbilled support appears around 7.45pm, retreats or retires, depending on how well they are received by 8.30, and the main act then comes on at about 9.15. But Lou was seemingly unaware of this, or was extraordinarily impatient to perform that night. At 7.25pm we were in the circle bar having ordered our first round of drinks and were discussing who the support band was likely to be. At 7.30pm the sound of blazing guitars filtered into the bar, only barely disturbing our first few sips of beer, at 7.31 that sound crystalised into the unmistakeable intro to “Sweet Jane”.  Cue pandemonium in the bar as it emptied for us to take our seats.

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What followed was a high octane set of what was, in retrospect, his finest material, with “sweet Jane” making way for Bowie favourite “Waiting for the Man”, a perfect “Perfect day”, an uneasy, doleful “Heroin” and a glorious “Wild Side” in the days when Lou had not tired of the song and the full impact of the risqué lyrics had only just become apparent. Ray Davies may have tantalised us with the exploits of Lola in Soho, but when the Sugar plum fairy and Little Jo went to the Apollo- you should have seen them go, go, go, and it was of a different order entirely.

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It was one of those rare, seamless sets where each song complimented the last,  then  next one, and musical epiphany was piled one on another, as bodies in a bacchanalian orgy, writhing in orgiastic ecstasy, and climaxing with an intense “Pale Blue Eyes” ending at 9.10 with some still arriving assuming that he was only about to come on.

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Naturally there was a muscular, vicral response from the crowd for such a performance. It demanded an encore. The records suggest that Lou rarely played encores on this tour, but tonight was different. At around 9.35, fully half an hour  after he had lft, and after which a slice of the audience had assumed that he was returning, the house lights went down and he reappeared to great acclaim.  But what followed was the antithesis of what had gone before, a languid, ramshackle, disjointed effort with the ban desperately trying to make sense of it all. Was it drink, was it drugs, was it sheer bloody minded ness, I will never know. A medley starting with “Rock n Roll” disintegrated into  a Hendrix style Star spangled banner, which lurched into an un simon and garfunklelesque “America”. The moose and Suchorsky saved “You keep me Hanging On” from totl implosion but Lou insisted on keeping on going when the band had given up, an so had the audience.

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At the same time one of the best and worst gigs I have ever attended.

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Setlist

Sweet Jane

I’m Waiting for the Man

Perfect Day

Heroin

Walk on the Wild Side

Men of Good Fortune

The Kids

Caroline Says II

The Bed

Sad Song

Vicious

All Through the Night

Street Hassle

I’ll Be Your Mirror

The Bells

Pale Blue Eyes/

Encore

Rock and Roll / Star-Spangled Banner / America / You Keep Me Hangin’ On

Cony Island baby

Sister Ray

Kicks