the velvet underground velvet underground

The all-time rarest version, of which just two copies are known to exist, is an April 1966 acetate containing alternate takes and mixes that was purchased at a New York sidewalk sale in 2002 for 75 cents - and eventually auctioned off for $25,200. (Anyone seeking more detailed info, knock yourself out.). the ones with his photo airbrushed out ('The Airbrushed Cover'). the ones with a sticker pasted over Emerson's photo after he sued ('The Lawsuit Cover'). the covers featuring a shirtless Warhol acolyte Eric Emerson in the background of the group photo on the back ('The Torso Cover'). Original U.K., Canadian and New Zealand editions that don't that doesn't even have a banana on the cover? Yup. The 'Close Cut' 1972 edition with an alternate printing of the banana sticker, without the border? Over there. Promo copies - both the version with the yellow label and the much rarer, white-label edition? Natch. A first mono pressing, still in its shrink wrap? Check. They account for an estimated 1 percent of all copies manufactured in the U.S. He owns more than 800 of them – he's actually not sure exactly how many – which are neatly filed on shelves in his study.

Yet the most atypical obsession of those five decades may be that of veteran music publicist and longtime Velvets fan Mark Satlof, who collects original pressings of the album. His collection of roughly 800 records features rare pressings, signed copies and a variety of alterations original owners made the the banana decal on the cover. Mark Satlof at his New York City home with his collection of Velvet Underground Records. Despite his solo success, The Velvets' catalog gradually slipped out of print over the next few years. But that certainly wasn't the only challenge to its commercial prospects the group's ensuing albums met an even more dismal commercial fate, and a disillusioned Reed left the band in August, 1970. This was due partially to a legally induced (more on that shortly) factory recall that removed the album from shelves just as its Warhol-driven publicity was peaking. Still, it was initially considered a commercial failure, selling approximately 60,000 copies in its first two years - not bad, but no More of The Monkees. (who covered three songs from the album in their early days) and alt-rock titan Beck (who covered the entire album with some friends in 2009). Ensuing generations of The Velvet Underground and Nico's spiritual progeny have included punk pioneer Patti Smith (who covered at least two Velvets songs in her early days), R.E.M. Upon his rise to fame five years later, Bowie paid back his vast Velvets influence by producing Reed's Transformer that album's single, 'Walk on the Wild Side,' jump-started the grumpy bard's solo career and remains his biggest-ever hit. Pitt returned to London with a test pressing of TheVelvet Underground and Nico that his young charge promptly appropriated in every sense of the word. Among the first was a young David Bowie, whose early manager Ken Pitt had art-world connections and met with Warhol and Reed at the former's famous studio The Factory during a November 1966 trip to New York. It has spawned multiple generations of obsessives and influencees. It's the first album to truly combine a novelist's gritty realism with equally confrontational rock music, yet it's also a fount of soft, vulnerable songs like 'Femme Fatale' and 'I'll Be Your Mirror' - songs that are all the more poignant because you can sense, somehow, that the sensitive soul who wrote them is also kind of an asshole.Ī detail of Satlof's collection of Velvet Underground records and ephemera. 13 on Rolling Stone's 2012 '500 Greatest Albums of All Time' tally. But the world eventually caught up with it, and for the past 30 years it's had perennial placement on best-ever lists, including No.

171 on Billboard's albums chart in December 1967. With a near-peerless collection of songs - nearly all written by frontman Lou Reed - and an iconic, banana-sticker cover designed by band benefactor Andy Warhol, this jarring and innovative collection was initially a cult success at best, with no hit singles and a 'peak' of No. The Velvet Underground and Nico, released 50 years ago tomorrow (there is actually some disagreement on the exact date), is the definitive way-ahead-of-its-time album. This was Mark's first collected record, and it features a signature from Lou Reed. A record from Mark Satlof's collection of Velvet Underground records and ephemera.

The velvet underground velvet underground