What's your top 3 favourite Lou Reed (studio) albums?

I'm heartened to see appreciation for Set The Twilight Reeling. Adventurer, Hang On To Your Emotions and Riptide are perfection, and most of the others are important tracks with really evocative lyrics. Except for that one song you have to hit skip on, especially if anyone else is around (and I don't mean Egg Cream).

I was reading Mary Woronov's book around when this came out and she recounts an experience from her childhood involving a riptide, although to me the Riptide song is mostly about the cycle of being hooked on a substance.

 

Berlin---which my girlfriend said was "The Dark Side of the Moon of Lou Reed."
The Blue Mask---came out when I was 21, hit me like a 2 x 4 between the eyes.
Magic and Loss---played in my car for a year after my Dad died.

I also love Take No Prisoners and Coney Island Baby.

 

Sally
Hassle
Magic

 

I wrote a chapter about Lou Reed’s Lulu in my book Pop Life. To me, the album is criminally dismissed and deserves a far better reputation. It’s one of Reed’s finest works and a capstone to his career. Oh, well, Bowie recognized its brilliance. Not for everybody, but it’s Lou Reed, the guy who gave us Metal Machine Music and Berlin and White Light/White Heat.

Oh, well.

 

I wanted to like Lulu a lot more. Kirk Hammett is one of the all time greats. Maybe I wanted it to be something more and it's a case of high expectations, or simply expectations period? I will keep at it, but I don't have a use for MMM so far (though my bf seems to).

I wonder if it helps though to have read Richard Calder fiction? He wrote Dead Girls where a virus is turning girls into 'dolls'.

 

I don't think that Lulu is a terrible record as it's made out to be and while I'm somewhat disappointed that this seems to be Lou's final recording(studio, as far as I know, anyway), I do have mixed feelings about it. It's not something that I reach for often when listening to Lou, and perhaps it still hasn't registered because of it's vast and expansive material offered. Having Metallica doing the musical backing is still an odd pairing, in my book, but I can't fault Lou for following his musical instincts and abilities.

I haven't checked out Animal Serenade yet, anyone like that one? I know it's a live album, but for latter day Lou, is it up to scratch?

 

Tough decision but I went with Sally Can't Dance ("Ennui", "NY Stars", "Billy", "Ride Sally Ride" etc are all top drawer to me and rank with his best solo work IMO), Street Hassle ("Gimme Good Times", "Shooting Star", title track/basic vibe of the album) & third is a tie between Berlin & Growing Up In Public, so I went with Growing.., because it has one of my absolute favorite deep cuts of his, "So Alone"

 

Top 3:

Lou Reed
Transformer
Coney Island Baby

 

Animal Serenade is definitely worth a listen.

 

The only album I have is The Blue Mask, which is terrific! Great sounding guitars, and intimate vocals.

 

I love "The Bells". I listen to it all the time.
I don't like his singing a lot, but the band rocks, and it has it's own unique sound, doesn't sound like other albums.
Crank it !

I also like Street Hassle about as much, and then after that, probably Berlin, though it seems a shame that Rock N Roll Animal can't be up there as well, truly an album that works as an album....

 

I voted Transformer, Berlin and The Blue Mask. I also love Self Titled, Coney Island Baby, Legendary Hearts, Rock 'n' Roll Heart and well, I love Lou.

 

Self titled way more rocky than Transformer.

 

1. Transformer
2. Coney Island Baby
3. New York

 

A tune from Street Hassle just played via streaming/song shuffle. The audio quality sounds kind of you're sitting next to someone who has their headphones really loud. I don't recall the production sounding so wonky. Great album, though.

 

Production is weird on that album.

 

1 Street Hassle

2 Berlin

3 Lulu or New York, but I pressed Lulu to give it a (futile) push

 

1. Coney Island Baby
2. Sally Can't Dance
3. Legendary Hearts

 

Street Hassle
Blue Mask
Legendary Hearts

 

Looking at the poll results I guess I'm not the only one with a limited taste for Lou Reed's solo catalog. Though I think I need to revisit the New Your album and maybe Berlin.

 

1) Berlin
2) Coney Island
3) Ecstasy

Favourite song has to be Street Hassle

I don't really get the love for Transformer

 

Three is torture:
- Berlin
- The Blue Mask
- New York

 

I think the latest remaster is a huge improvement and does the album justice. Much better than the original CD.

 

1 Magic And Loss - heavy On The subject But So Well written
2 Berlin - same as above But more frutsels
3 Transformer - Great Songs collaboration with Bowie

 

Magic & Loss
New York
Berlin