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ECSTACY
Lou Reed
(Warner)
Listening to this, one can imagine a 58-year-old Lou Reed sitting in some ultra-hip New York coffee shop with his rhyming dictionary - a sad, solitary poet writing down whatever pops into his head.
He's been around, this guy, so you can be sure to get some evocative and disturbing tales on the offbeat and hypnotic Ecstacy. As he warbles in Mad, "Dumb, you're as dumb as my thumb. In the wistful morning you throw a coffee cup at my head. Scum, you said I'm scum," and so on. Reed's latest walk on the wild side goes on in this vein for more than 77 minutes. The grungy guitar workout Like a Possum - the musical equivalent of going cold turkey from a heroin jag (or could it be an outtake from Metal Machine Music?) - is 18 minutes long on its own. Egad!
This isn't always pleasant, but even the most cacophonous moments are like World's Dumbest Motorists - you can't help but tune in.
Framed in either loosely arranged mellow folk or thrashy, sloppy noise, this is stream-of-consciousness poetry as rock 'n' roll.
Prepare to be challenged.
Track Listing
1.Paranoia Key Of E
02.Mystic Child
03.Mad
04.Ecstasy
05.Modern Dance
06.Tatters
07.Future Farmers Of America
08.Turning Time Around
09.White Prism
10.Rock Minuet
11.Baton Rouge
12.Like A Possum
13.Rouge
14.Big Sky