When the Velvet Underground moved from Verve Records (which had released their first two albums) to parent company MGM Records, they signed a two-album deal, releasing their third album The Velvet Underground in March 1969. Later that same year there was a management change and MGM Records' new CEO, Mike Curb, was brought in to try to rescue the financially struggling label. He decided to purge the record company of its unprofitable acts. The Velvet Underground quickly became one of the groups targeted and were released from their contract. The band had in the meantime recorded 14 tracks for possible release as their second MGM album. All of these were shelved and forgotten by their record company until the early 1980s.
Mo Tucker later said, "We didn’t say we'll just go in and lay down anything and screw 'em. There was a sense that it probably wouldn't be released by them. I think I figured it would just get picked up by the next record company, not realizing that MGM would own it. But when we switched labels, MGM wouldn't give up the tapes."[1]
As Verve (by then an imprint of Polygram) prepared to re-release the band's three Verve/MGM albums on vinyl and CD, they found nineteen previously unreleased tracks: five Cale-era tracks and the 14 "lost album" tracks, some of them in two-track mixdown format, some of them even on multitracks. The cream of the nineteen tracks was released in 1985 as VU; the rest was released as Another View in 1986.
VU is a selection from the 1969 tracks as well as two previously unreleased Cale-era songs—"Temptation Inside Your Heart" and "Stephanie Says". Since most of the material was available on multitrack (only "Ocean" is included in its original 1969 mix), engineers were able to clean up and remix the tracks.
As the Velvet Underground moved from MGM to Atlantic, they re-recorded two of the songs on VU, "Ocean" and "I'm Sticking with You", for possible inclusion on Loaded. Neither made the cut, but six of the VU songs were recycled by Lou Reed during his solo career: "I Can't Stand It", "Lisa Says" and "Ocean" on Lou Reed, 1972; "Andy's Chest" on Transformer, 1972; "Stephanie Says" (as "Caroline Says II") on Berlin, 1973; and "She's My Best Friend" (which was originally sung by Doug Yule),[2] was included on Coney Island Baby, 1976.
VU peaked in the US at #85, the band's best placing.[3] As of October 2013 it had sold 90,000 copies according to Nielsen Soundscan.[4]
VU was ranked number 3 among the "Albums of the Year" for 1985 by NME.[9]Village Voice rock critic Robert Christgau wrote, "It's goofy, relaxed, simultaneously conversational and obscure, an effect accentuated by the unfinished feel of takes the band never prepared for public consumption. As a result, especially given PolyGram's state-of-the-art remix, it's their most listenable record."[6]
Mick Farren of Spin wrote of the recordings, "As a piece of rock archeology, they are clearly invaluable, filling a crucial gap in the Velvet Underground canon. As a piece of entertainment — even a period piece — they provoke the feeling that, if it had been released in sequence, the album probably would have been greeted as an almost unqualified dog."[1]
Track listing
All tracks written by Lou Reed except where noted.
*The CD issue of VU omits the first few seconds of "Foggy Notion", which includes a practice guitar lick and the band members talking.
All tracks appear on the box set Peel Slowly and See, except "She's My Best Friend", "Ocean" and "Andy's Chest". "Ocean" on Peel Slowly and See is a later version, recorded during the Loaded sessions April – June 1970.
Doug Yule – bass guitar, keyboards, lead vocals on "She's My Best Friend", backing vocals on "I Can't Stand It", "Lisa Says", "Foggy Notion", "One of These Days", "Andy's Chest", piano and backing vocals on "I'm Sticking with You", lead guitar on "One of These Days"
VU is The Velvet Underground's highest charting album in the US, peaking at number 85 in the US Billboard charts on April 13, 1985. It remained in the Charts for 13 weeks.[3]
