The Velvet Underground & Nico — 1967

Background

The Velvet Underground & Nico was released in 1967 under the patronage of Andy Warhol, who is credited as producer though his role was largely one of enabling the band's own vision rather than shaping the sound directly — Warhol's main creative contribution was insisting the German singer Nico join the band for several tracks, a decision the band reportedly resisted before ultimately agreeing. The album's iconic banana cover, designed by Warhol, became one of the most recognisable images in album art history.

Sound

'Heroin' addresses drug addiction with a directness almost unheard of in popular music at the time, its tempo accelerating and decelerating to mimic the physical sensations it describes; 'Venus in Furs' draws on sadomasochistic themes over a droning viola line played by John Cale, a former student of experimental composer La Monte Young whose avant-garde background pushed the band's sound into territory far removed from contemporary rock. 'I'm Waiting for the Man' documents a drug deal in blunt, unromanticised detail over a driving two-chord rock structure.

Nico's role

Nico's detached, accented vocal on 'Femme Fatale', 'All Tomorrow's Parties' and 'I'll Be Your Mirror' gave those songs a cold, distant quality that contrasted with Lou Reed's more expressive delivery elsewhere on the record — a tension between warmth and alienation that runs through the whole album. The band's willingness to explore explicitly transgressive subject matter, paired with Cale's avant-garde instincts and Reed's literary, deadpan songwriting, made the record unlike anything else being released by a rock band in 1967.

Legacy

The album sold poorly on release and received a mixed critical reception at the time, overshadowed commercially by the psychedelic rock dominating the same year. Its reputation has grown so dramatically since that it's now near-universally cited as one of the most influential rock albums ever made — musician Brian Eno's oft-repeated observation that everyone who bought a copy went on to start a band has become one of the most quoted lines in rock criticism, and its DNA runs directly through punk, alternative rock and virtually every subsequent underground music movement.