"The Man is never on time," William Burroughs typed in 1959's Naked Lunch. "First thing you learn is that you always got to wait," Lou Reed complained eight years later on The Velvet Underground & Nico. Buffeted by krautrockist guitar blocks and insatiable jackhammer drums, Reed's deadpan vocals makes a delinquent of early rock ‘n' roll piano and urban-twang lead licks. Dude takes the present-day 4/5/6 to East Harlem (that's "SpaHa" for the noobs), $26 in hand not adjusted for inflation, then oh look at the time splits cause hey I'm running late. To think in Jamaica they'll just plop heaping bags in your palm for a mere Andrew Jackson (I'm told)-- though context suggests it's probably the junk Reed's really on about. Whatever, he's feeling good, he's gonna work it on out, and that brownstoned walk home is easy to imagine even if most of us have never experienced it. Oh, also many people heard this and then formed bands.
(Marc Hogan)