You wonât read it on Pitchfork, but Lou Reed was about as straight as a pigâs tail. The rock legend endured gay-curing electroshock therapy as a teenager and was widely rumored to have slept with both men and trans women in his Warhol years. He preserved the lost, dirty New York on vinyl and filled those long-collected discs with its denizens.
In honor of his passing â on a Sunday morning, no less â here are seven of Lou Reedâs queerest songs from his six years with the Velvet Underground. They are taken from the bandâs first four studio records before Reedâs 1970 departure. Though all are over 40 years old, Reedâs skill was to take the universal outsider experience and frame it in terms that stay relevant to each new generation that presses play.
Brian Eno famously said that only 30,000 people bought the first Velvet Underground record when it was released, but they all went on to start rock bands. So if youâre unfamiliar with the magic of Velvet Underground, or a long term acolyte that didnât know how gay it all was, take a listen. Who knows what youâll go on to start.
(Note: Louâs best solo album, Transformer, is gayer than Tim Curry getting a pedicure at the Castro St. Starbucks. If youâre interested in a rundown of that one, holler at me in the comments and weâll see about a followup.)
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7. âSweet Janeâ (Loaded, 1970)
On their final album, the avante-garde band finally followed a studio directive to have their new LP come âloaded with hits.â Hence the title, and the bandâs most immediate collection of tracks. Itâs easy to miss behind âSweet Janeâsâ scream-along chorus and DIY guitar riff, but right there in the second line, âJack is in his corset and Jane is in her vest.â This bit of cross-dressing is amplified later in the song when Lou rallies against being defined by âevil mothersâ Â making generalizations about those who can speak for themselves.
Following track âRock & Rollâ  â a tale of salvation by radio âwould be on this list if it wasnât such a universal rebelâs anthem.
6. âVenus in Fursâ (The Velvet Underground & Nico, 1967)
This track from the bandâs first record is the rare song about sex that one can actually have (decent) sex to. Named after a 19th century Austrian novel about girl-on-guy domination, âVenus in Fursâ Â reads like a mumblecore S&M film. âKiss the boot of shiny, shiny leather.â âTaste the whip, now plead for me.â
Though not gay in the traditional sense, this song still is a bold take on underground sexuality and, frankly, a night out in Vienna this author wouldnât turn down. As a plus, this song is directly referenced in the films Short Bus and Velvet Goldmine.
5. âNew Ageâ (Loaded)
Some say this song is a crack at Shelly Winters, and nothing about a âfat blonde actressâ with a Robert Mitchum past suggests otherwise. However, this is one of VUâs gentlest and least sarcastic songs in itâs presentation.Thereâs a real admiration from the anonymous fan to the washed up screen idol he approaches for an autograph.
His familiarity with her career and romantic past, in combination with his fawning and tolerance of her faded physical stature, suggests a sheltered gay boy geeking out over meeting his childhood screen idol.
The songâs hopeful coda suggests theyâve both been changed by the meeting, as she anticipates a new age of camp icon-hood and he of coming public tolerance.
4. âIâll Be Your Mirrorâ (Velvet Underground & Nico)
While unreliable source Wikipedia says this songâs title comes from something Nico said to Lou backstage, itâs impossible not to associate it with Sartreâs 1944 existentialist drama No Exit.
Still fresh in the public consciousness at the time of this songâs recording, the play features a scene where a woman offers to be anotherâs mirror as a means of seducing her in hell. The VU track stands alone as an affirming, classic love song. Frame it in terms of Sartre, though, and itâs a sad attempt to woo a straight girl in an inescapable hotel room.
My husband likes to tell me that The Primitivesâ cover of this song is superior, but Iâd like to put it on the l record that I disagree.
3. âLady Godivaâs Operationâ (White Light/White Heat, 1968)
The weirdest rock song this side of Lunaâs âIHOP,â âLady Godivaâs Operationâ is still one of the only listenable moments on the bandâs blessedly brief and regrettably experimental second record. (Which is a sentiment Iâm going to pay for in the comments section.)
The track starts out as a fairly conventional psychedelic number about a sexually empowered Lady Godiva, strutting her stuff naked and seducing boys away from their mothers. There is a shift in the second half, though, and things get very Fassbinder. Lady Godiva is revealed to be a man, and forced to go through a hideous surgery that ends in his death.
This public exhumation of gender identity mirrors Reedâs own experience with electroshock and informs the extremely trans-friendly themes of his upcoming work. (See number 1 on this list.)
2. âSome Kinda Love (Velvet Underground, 1969)
âSituation arise, because of the weather/
And no kinds of love are better than others.Some kinda love, Margarita told Tom/
Like a dirty French novel, the absurd court the vulgar.
And some kinds of love, the possibilities are endless/
And for me to miss one would seem to be groundlessâ
This is the definitive anthem for freeing sexuality from identity constraints, and the song explains why better than I ever could.
Though I will say that âSome Kinda Loveâ ends with a pretty strong insinuation of girl-on-guy buttsex, unless thereâs another way to read âPut jelly on your shoulder/ and do what you feel most⌠that from which you recoil but which still makes your eyes moistâŚlie down upon the carpet.â Who needs Fifty Shades of Gray?
1. âCandy Saysâ (Velvet Underground)
Written by Lou Reed but sung by John Cale â perhaps to avoid the songâs naked sincerity â âCandy Saysâ takes our number one slot. An ode to trans Andy Warhol starlet Candy Darling, the track is a stark reminder of the rigid 60s gender norms that Reed and his contemporaries worked so hard to destroy.
âI hate my bodyâ is a harsh first sentiment from one of art sceneâs brighter stars, and her alienation and discouragement only spreads from there. Candy longs for the smallest taste of the kind of love and acceptance that comes easily to her peers and seems almost whistful about the possibility of death, which came from lymphoma at age 29.
âWhat do you think Iâd see if I could walk away from me?â is a veiled desire for death over confinement, but it also serves as the bandâs unofficial motto. Lou Reed rose to prominence in a time when people like himself were still considered officially sick by the DSM.
By giving a voice to all the freaks and weirdos, his music encourages listeners to look at life from someone elseâs perspective and never stop asking Candy Darlingâs eternal question.
LadyL
My childhood is passing before my ears.
____
And yes, please do tell us about Tim Curry.
Yiannis
Lovely article and btw, John Cale is gay, too. Great of you to mention “Sweet Jane”. Actually, your analysis sheds new light (for me) on the song’s climactic lyrics: “And, everyone who ever had a heart, They wouldn’t turn around and break it, And anyone who ever played a part, Oh wouldn’t turn around and hate it!” I realize that it’s about the role-playing and self-hatred most of us experienced before the 80’s (also evident in the sarcastic last verse of Tom Robinson’s “Glad To Be Gay”). Lou Reed was saying “love yourself and embrace the part you’re playing, since it’s what you need do to survive”. For 1970, that was definitely a revolutionary message. It would be great if you write another article – on Lou’s solo projects: “Transformer” is all gay from the opening bars of “Vicious” to the closing bars of “Goodnight Ladies”. Not always in meaning,but always in feeling. After all, it was produced by David Bowie art his gayest period.(Another artist who was vital to anyone coming out in the 70’s, the scene in “C.R.A.Z.Y.” is characteristic of this). Returning to Lou, there are many gay moments in many of his other albums too (especially, “Berlin”, “Coney Island Baby”, “Street Hassle” and “New York”. Let’s not forget that the imagery of “Caroline says” was used in that very important play “Angels in America”.
jimbryant
Back in the 70’s, the idea of male-male sexuality was far more integrated into the music mainstream than it is today. Today, we are segregated away into a tiny compartment call “gay music” and don’t figure in the mainstream music charts at all. In a sense, we’ve gone backwards.
jimbryant
It really is fascinating to see how the idea of gay male sexuality has receded from the position it once had in the music scene. Back when Lou Reed and Bowie were hitting big, the idea of gay male sexuality permeated the popular music scene. Today, it’s completely absent. Even today’s dance music scene has been taken over by straights.
This is my theory: as we’ve become more and more segregated into the “gay male scene”, we’ve become less and less influential in the mainstream. Thus, although today we have a thriving gay male scene, our “withdrawal” into this scene has effectively diluted our influence in the arena where influence really matters – ie Main Street.
As gay men, we’ve basically ceded control of the mainstream to straight guys and their bisexual female enablers, hence the abundance of fake-bisexual women in the music charts.
kpj558
Listening to Reed do a duet with Antony Hegarty on ‘Candy Says’ really hammers home how fantastically queer that song is.
You’re wrong about White Light/White Heat, though your thoughts on that album explain ‘Sister Ray’s absence from this list.
p.s. I miss the new gay
stranded
thanks to my older sister i got into the velvet underground. I loved them so much. I listened to Candy Says over and over again.
GeriHew
@Yiannis: John Cale gay?
He has been married three times – always to women.
Yiannis
@GeriHew: You may be right about Cale’s sexuality. Then again, David Bowie is married to a woman, Tom Robinson too, Elton John was married to a woman for about 10 minutes and even Lou Reed himself was an official couple with Laurie Anderson. So, I’m not sure how indicative show biz marriages were at a time when being an out gay carried a heavy price tag. I will be honest however and say that I don’t have any hard evidence of Cale’s sexuality, just Internet rumors and the feeling I get by some of his songs.
GeriHew
@Yiannis:
David Bowie – bisexual man who prefers women. Probably not bi-romantic i.e. hes never fallen in love with a man, has only ever experienced seriously romantic feelings for women.
Elton John – bisexual man who prefers men and now publicly identifies as gay. He has said that he loved his ex-wife and enjoyed the sex he had with her.
Tom Robinson – bisexual man who is generally more sexually attracted to men than women but fell in love with a woman nonetheless. His wife is fairly butch & may well be bi as well.
Lou Reed – queer man who was attracted to women and transgender and androgynous people. Laurie Anderson is a rather androgynous woman.
John Cale? I don’t know what his sexuality is. I just know he’s had three wives and at least one child. So it seems unlikely to me that he’s gay.
Yiannis
@GeriHew: I won’t argue anymore, you seem to know your stuff, so I’ll trust you on this đ