Pitchfork interviews a kinder, gentler Lou, who speaks of Germans covering Metal Machine Music, his own music’s influence on himself, and his quest for the perfect sound. Mad props to Oats for passing this along.
Pitchfork: …And then this year, you released Hudson River Wind Meditations, which many have described as both antithetical to and an extension of Metal Machine Music. Are you finding yourself less and less interested in traditional verse-chorus-verse songwriting?
Reed: Funny you should ask that. “Fire Music” came after 9/11, and I was [living] just a couple of blocks from [Ground Zero]. And I was talking to some gearheads, some tech guys– I wanted to know if you could do certain things that I was able to do on Metal Machine because it was analog. In digital, they said, “You can do this, you can do that, but you can’t do that, it will lose punch. You could technically do that, but it wouldn’t sound too great.” I thought that was kind of fascinating. So I wanted to do this little piece with a Metal Machine approach. It’s only two or three minute long. That’s “Fire Music”.
“Fire Music” just kills me. We mastered it…if you ever get to hear it on a big system, cause it’s only two or three minutes long, but that thing, about two-thirds of the way through, rises up and advances out of the speakers, and I swear to you, it is amazing. I was up at [producer] Bob Ludwig‘s where he listening on these huge, God knows what…and that thing just rises up like this huge sonic wave, it’s amazing. If there wasn’t a wall to catch you, you’d still be heading south! It’s just so astonishing. I started doing this other kind of music, and I was running these programs through guitar pedals. And it wasn’t meant for guitar pedals. I found out lots of people do that.
But that’s what I was doing, and that led into what became Hudson River Wind Meditations. That happened because I started getting this sound, and I’ve tried to get the sound back, but I can’t get it back– it’s the one on the record, but I can’t reproduce it. I was using some stuff by Line 6, and I don’t know, coupled with a virus. I’m not sure what exactly did it, but I’ve never been able to get it back, because I didn’t write it down and it wasn’t MIDIed. But I had this thing and I really loved it and it was really good for meditation, it was really good for doing certain physical workouts, like Tai Chi. I took it to my class and the class liked it so we kept it there and used it. I would practice my routine to it. And I also did meditation to it. And then some people said, “Can we borrow that thing?” and I thought OK, I will move out of the rock thing because I don’t want rock people thinking that there are rock’n’roll songs here, like they did with Metal Machine Music. It’s for someone who wants it and knows what it is.
But you know, “Fire Music”, I hadn’t gone back to Metal Machine in a long time, but on The Raven, there are all these little electronic pieces in between the songs, and that built up to “Fire Music”. I’ve got another one that I’ve got that I haven’t released. It’s the other side of the meditation music, it’s called Purity. It’s really amazing.
I also saw this yesterday and forwarded it on to a fellow Lou-loving friend of mine, but why didn’t I think to pass it on to you, Mr. Mod? Anyway this is one of the best interviews with him that I’ve ever had the pleasure of reading. He seemed way more comfortable talking to Amanda Petrusich than he normally does talking with anyone.
There’s a segment towards the end where he’s talking about what’s on his iPod and he mentions Okervill River. It’s cool that he keeps up with new music, but it makes me wonder if he actually uploads the stuff himself or if ones of his handlers (or someone else) does it for him.
Given the content of most of the interview, though, I’m curious to hear other townspeople’s thoughts on Metal Machine Music. Personally, I like it, though it’s best a side at a time.
I’m curious to see what RTH Labs thinks of Lou’s technological innovations. Perhaps we could run some of his most innovative and “amazing” recordings through the Lab one day?