In 1971, David Bowie, a trier with years of flop singles behind him (of 13 single releases, only one, Space Oddity had charted) went to New York and met Lou Reed, singer with the Velvet Underground, hugely influential but unknown outside the industry and the clubs of NYC (one album at no 43 in 1967, nothing since).
The two men hit it off and became lifelong friends. I don’t know if the story’s true, but it’s suggested that each thought the other was, at the time, far more well-known and far more influential in their home country than they were in reality. By the time this album, produced by Bowie and sidekick, Mick Ronson, was released, Bowie was a bona fide pop star in UK with a string of hit singles and a couple of albums behind him, and had introduced Reed to the UK at a charity gig he headlined earlier in the year. It’s a matter of conjecture whether Reed would have risen to stardom without his friend, but this album is clearly the start.
I knew it well when I bought the CD, inexplicably for sale in HMV for 99p in one January sale. Had RCA discovered a warehouse full of them just off the M4 and flooded the market? “Hey, George, was that order for a hundred copies or a hundred thousand CDs of Transformer?” “A hundred? Ah, we might have a problem”.
It’s a collection of musically quite simple songs, skillfully arranged by Ronson, who also played guitar and arranged, Vicious is a classic Velvets riff with Ronson’s screeching guitar lighting it up, and he does a similar job on piano and with the string arrangements on Perfect Day. Before too long, we’re at the hit single, Walk On The Wild Side, a top ten hit possibly due to the naivety of the BBC censors. The second half opens with the delightful Satellite Of Love, before Reed’s tribute to the ever contracting marshmallow chocolate snack, Wagon Wheel. And three more top tunes leads us to the completion of a fine album, a real meeting of minds which influenced so much that followed.
4* - a great album, rightly recognised as a triumph for Reed and Bowie, but owing so much to Mick Ronson’s musicianship.
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