ATN: Oh yeah. Like I say, it sounds great on a portable CD player with headphones.

Reed: Oh yeah. It's supposed to and it really ought to because we had a little mono rat speaker to check that out, you know. All the way up to big guys out there. It can sound monumental. There are things going on in there that are truly... Keep in mind everything except one, the vocal is being done at the same time the guitar is being played. It's all being done live in The Roof, my home studio, available to only me. There was a problem in the studio. I just didn't want to go back in the studio until I could cure this problem. It has to do with the recording in professional studios--the disconnection that you can feel. I knew I'd gone as far as I could go with New York and Magic and Loss, as far as using those techniques to record. That it had to be something that went past there. There was no way I could do better than that. I would do just another one of those, but I couldn't do better than that sonically and performance-wise. I think this is a new level of sound and that I guarantee you. Which you may or may not pick up over headphones. But the guiding principle here was really simple. And it's very hard to do. You can go ask other musicians when you talk to them. This is the question. Say to them, are you happy with the sound you got on your album? Is that the sound that you had? Are you happy with the mix on your album? Just hear what they say. And say, are you happy with the sound of your instrument? Is that what it really sounds like? OK? The guiding principle on the recording of this album was really simple. And that was: Whatever you hear, that's what I heard. Not almost. Not sort of. Not constructed at the console. If you hear a sound, that's what it sounded like for real, starting with my voice which you can hear right here. I'll guarantee you that. 100 percent successful transfer from point A to point wherever it is. Total. That's very, very...

Somewhere between point A and point wherever,
you gotta stop to play.
Photo by Jay Blakesberg

ATN: That live in the studio thing....There is a looseness or spontaneity and it certainly comes across listening to it.

Reed: Well yeah. But I mean it's also a very sophisticated recording of raw. It's not so easy. Because think about it. If you want to get that raw thing, you've got to get it while people are playing it, while it's there. I was listening to a record today that just showed how sad it is what's going on as far as music that you don't get to hear. But I don't want to sound like one of those old people saying "oh, the music was better than it is now." I was listening to this CD that you must, you owe it to yourself to get, The Loma Records Story which contains the soul records of Loma Records. In that collection is one of my favorite records of all time ever. If I had the top three records, this is in there. Of anything available on the planet Earth as we know it. And it's called "Stay With Me" by Lorraine Ellison. Came out in the late '60s They did a magnificent job in the transference from analog to digital. They really worked on it. Whoever did it Lee Hirshberg--this guy must be real serious. What a transference. And then, if you've heard "Stay With Me, Baby," go to "Heart Be Still" and there you will get an example of what it was all about. And to me, that's the inspiration. To try to get that on a record. It's the most amazing thing I've ever heard. I was thinking of carrying it with me so when people say, what do you like, what do you listen to, what turns you on, I just play this and say this turns me on. Amazing.

Reed, Lou, "High_On_Life" from interview 2/96
(45 second excerpt)

Mono MPEG (563k)

Mono Sun-AU (375k)

RealAudio 28.8k

ATN: How did you feel about the Velvets finally getting into the Hall of Fame?

Reed: Better late than never. I was very honored by it. Nice to be included among some of the people who are my idols, also my peers. I just wish Sterling Morrison had been alive to experience it.

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