THE VELVET UNDERGROUND & NICO V-5008-MONO

$

1,252

THE VELVET UNDERGROUND & NICO V-5008-MONO Click picture to enlarge

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  Description THE VELVET UNDERGROUND &NICO ANDY WARHOL had never produced a record before. But he had the intutive good sence to leave well enough alone; the tapes rolled and the Velvets played. The Velvet Underground and Nico is essentially the live set that the band performed throughout 1966 and early '67 as the centerpiece of Warhol's madhouse film, dance and pop-art roadshow the Exploding Plastic Inevitable. Much of the album was recorded in eight hours, live in the studio. But for all of its intended avant-droll simplicity, Warhol's famous cover design - the peelable banana daubed phallic pink underneath - captured what was really going on in the music: the layers of sexual tension and confessional argument; Reed's matter-of-fact rendering of dead-end thrills and emotional alienation; the cut, thrust and caress of the music itself.
                                                                                                                                                                  

"One of the things that we didn't notice at the time but realized later was how very important those early rehearsals were," says Cale, "the way we bummed around on Friday nights and just played and played and played. We started detuning instruments, playing with gadgets, puttering about in general until we landed with something. We spent so much time looking for other ways of doing things.

"What Lou was singing was not what rock and roll was generally about. Yet there was no reason why this other hybrid could not exist. We were all of a single mind about that."

In the months leading up to the "Banana" sessions, the Velvets immersed themselves in Life With Andy, including their first round of shows with the E.P.I. It was a mutually beneficial arrangement. In the Velvets, Warhol had a house orchestra on call seven days a week. In Warhol, the Velvets had a patron of notoriety and considerable resources.

The Factory alone, with its merry-go-round east of outlaw artists, parasitic adventurers, sideline swingers and coltish debutantes with celebrity dreams, was "like landing in heaven" for a writer like Reed. "I kept notes of what people said, what went on," he remembers, "and those notes would go directly into songs. There would be a line, and I could go from there. It would suggest a title or a situation. I was writing everything in longhand in these notebooks." The immortal opening vision of the go-go Cinderella in "All Tomorrow's Parties" - "And what costume shall the poor girl wear/To all tomorrow's parties?/A hand-me-down dress from who knows where/To all tomorrow's parties/And where will she go, and what shall she do/When midnight comes around/She'll turn once more to Sunday's clown/And cry behind the door" - was "a very apt description of certain people at the Factory at the time," Reed points out. It was also Andy Warhol's favorite Velvet Underground song.

In his own benign way, Warhol was a brilliant manipulator, a specialist in subtley engineered collisions of people and ideas. Over strong initial resistance, he convenced the Velvets to take on an extra singer in Nico, and impeccable and unflappable beauty (born Christa Paffgen in Cologne) who made her film debut in 1960 in a small, stunning walk-on in Federico Fellini's La Dolce Vita. She'd also made a folk-pop single, "I'm Not Saying." produced by JIMMY PAGE and issued in Britian in 1965. Warhol encouraged Reed to write songs for Nico to sing with the Velvets; Reed came back with the tailor-made portrait of a drop-dead heartbreaker, "Femme Fatal," and a song of enduring and tender desire, "I'll Be Your Mirror."

                                                                                                                                   

"The only time friction came in was when [filmmaker and Warhol associate] Paul Morrissey thought Nico should sing everything," Sterling Morrison remembers with amusement. "The problem was not with what Nico sang when she did sing. The problem was what to have Nico do when she wasn't singing."

On record - "Femme Fatale," "I'll Be Your Mirror," her slow-burn-Dietrich delivery of "All Tomorrow's Parties" - "the results speak for themselves," says Morrison. "They are strange and Germanic but with a special charm to them." On stage, Nico was a startling presence, the blond eye of the E.P.I. hurricane, unflustered by the Velvets' corrosive sharge, Gerard Malanga's whipdancing or the strobe-like flicker of Warhol's films.

"We had been through so many changes as a band, we were just settling down and suddenly Andy throws us this red herring," says Cale. "But it worked. Sometimes she would love to be on stage in her white outfit, banging away an a tambourine. That had a certain je ne sais quoi about it," he adds, laughing. "Okay, we've got a statue in the band.

In "All Tomorrow's Parties," the repetitive, mesmeric chop of Cale's two-fisted piano motif - "maintaining the same chord intervals, regardless of the changes" - evolved from a personal keyboard warm-up, simply titled "Piano Exercise." The jangly, stuttering harmonic intervals in Reed's guitar playing were the result of tuning his strings all to the same note.

If The Velvet Underground and Nico had been released when it was completed, in 1966 when the media buzz on the Exploding Plastic Inevitable was at its peak, it would surely have benifitted commercially and promotionally even from the divesive public response to the band. Any vibe is better than no vibe. In a droll nod to their effect on audiences, the Velvets actually chose an all-negative selection of press blurbs to run on the album's inside gatefold spread. (A skittish Verve mixed in a few good quotes - without telling the group.)

But The Velvet Underground and Nico sat on Verve's shelf for nearly a year, scuttled by the company's inability to cope with the music, in-house competition from Verve's other major freak-rock signing the Mothers of Invention and manufacturing problems with the peelable banana. The label did issue two singles in 1966 - an edit of "All Tomorrow's Parties" (in a boosted radio-potent mix) backed with "I'll Be Your Mirror," and Sunday Morning" with "Femme Fatale" and the flip. The Velvets' only appearance on long playing vinyl that year was on the iconoclastic ESP-Dick label. A teaser just called "Noise," less than two minutes of exactly that, was buried on a protest-collage LP, The East Village Other Electric Newspaper. Then, just as the "Banana" album was finally released in March, 1967, came "the crowning moment of doom," as Morrison puts it.

The back cover of the album showed the Velvets at an E.P.I. show playing against a backdrop still of Warhol's film Chelsea Girls featuring ERIC EMERSON. According to Morrison, Emerson got busted for possession of acid and, in need of money for his legal defence, told MGM that the picture had been used without his permission. He demanded payment; MGM respondeed by cutting further distribution of the record until he could be airbrushed out and new covers printed. The "Banana" LP, which had reached 171 on the Billboard album chart in mid-May (in Cashbox, it peaked at 102), suddenly disappeared from stores. By the time it reappeared, the sales momentum was gone - the album never recharted - and the rock audience was too wrapped up in the frenzy over the BEATLES new record, Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band.

Undone by circumstance, reviled by the love-and-peaceniks, exiled from the mainstream, the Velvets were now genuinely alone in their work. They had no peers, no rivals and no one to answer to. In the face of almost total rejection, THE VELVET UNDERGROUND had just released the most incisive, uncompromising debut record in rock history.

                                              WARHOL BANANA COVER The gatefold cover is cataloged as v-5008 (mono) both on the spine, and rear lower-left-hand corner. This is the very hard to find TORSO variation with the censorship sticker. These are actually fewer in number than copies with the uncensored torso image.How many of these sticker do you see?? very few!  Like the Beatles infamous "butcher cover", the "BANANA COVER", as it was coined by the industry- Is coveted by collectors all around the world-due to extreme scarcity, and novelty, as well as historical significance of the particular title. This record has it all, and is possibly the first "gimmick" cover- not to mention it's early ties with artist ANDY WARHOL, whose art designs and works continue to increase in value as the years pass.

 The top of the banana's stem looks to have been taken down at one time to glimpse the pink phallisc underside, then re-stuck back down, showing evidence at the tip, but remains glued solidly to the cover. The thick-spine gatefold cover has strong seams and spine. slightly offcentered spine description. NO splits or corner creases. Minor rubbing can be seen at 2 of the corners. This is a very solid and clean cover, still with an original verve inner sleeve from 1967. Very nice glosssy disc with some light sleeve scuffing and a few light needle marks. This can be seen when examined closely under the scrutiny of bright lighting.I played this copy on my Dual turntable with an Ortofon cartridge, and  the playback is excellent plus-with almost ZERO noise, and no pops or skips. Clean YELLOW AND BLACK Verve special pressing D.J. labels with no writing or markings. All too many of these ended up having the radio station stamp on the labels, this one does NOT! Clean splidle hole on both sides with no signs of spindle trails . The Velvet Underground & NICO- MONO Yellow label D.J. pressing is easily one of the most significant, sought after and rare titles in the relm of 60's psych/garage due to the very limited numbers available, not to mention that this was the album that created and launched alternative rock and roll. Overseas shipping is 15.00/ Domestic ships Priority 6.50/ 3.00 media. Sturdy record mailing  boxes are used, with additional support to prevent damage.
NO zero fehedback bidders may bid on this item unless proir request to place bids are emailed, and permission given. Bidders with multiple non-payment negatives are also not welcome to place bids on this item. Bids placed by such bidders may, at my disgression be cancelled. This policy is now in effect, due to past bidders who place bids with no serious intention to follow through the auction after winning. This policy is rapidly becoming the norm for sellers who are tired of the waiting period, numerous emails and re-listing associated with these user types, and the cost of insertion and final value fees sometimes lost as a result. Details Payment and Shipping info Payment Options Money Order/Cashier's Check
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Sales Tax 5% for In-State Residents Customer Service & Shipping Policy Payment is due and payable within 14 days after auction end date. Checkout or personal email from winning bidder should come within 3 days from auction ending, or I may assume the winning bid was placed in delinquency and may not be valid. Personal checks for U.S. buyers only are accepted, however please allow adequate time to clear. PAY PAL payments from bank or checking accounts (no credit card) /postal money orders/cashiers checks also accepted. overseas sales require pay pal or Western Union bid pay payments. No wire transfers. Insurance is highly recommended, however is optional. I will not be responsible for items lost or damaged during shipment on any uninsured item. Quantity Available 1 About audiofixx
Welcome to my auction. All items are described to the best of my ability. I welcome reasonable questions, and will answer them when time permits. Please ask any pertinant questions at least 12 prior to the end of the listing. thanks!

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