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BOOK REVIEW! MY WEEK BEATS YOUR YEAR --- ENCOUNTERS WITH LOU REED, COMPILED BY MICHAEL HEATH & EDITED BY PAT THOMAS (Hat & Beard Press)

Well yuh, I can take a hint. One that was so ever-tenderly laid upon me by none  other'n devoted BLOG TO COMM reader Michael Layne Heath, a chap who urged, no, practically begged me to review this rather recent effort of his which gathers under one nice li'l hardcover a whole slew of Lou Reed articles and writeups from the seventies and beyond which show Our Hero at his best, his worst and his most entertaining whether he be rattling off about people he says he loved then hated within a few short months or the Alice Bailey "Moon Meetings" he participated in shortly before calling EL TOPO "hippie shit"...a contrarian to make even myself look like a rank amateur that's fer sure!

Yeah there's a lotta material that should be here that's MIA like that one interview with I believe THE LA FREE PRESS where Lou gets all hyper when the interviewer dismisses the Byrds, but that was done during them Velvet Underground days so that would be out of this book's not-so-narrow scope. The one with Peter Laughner woulda fit in snugly here and is rather conspicuous in its absence as the ol' album title once stated but since it pops up in the box set it ain't like yer gonna hafta live the rest of yer life without it. But hey, if you wanna read about your favorite deaf mute inna telephone booth you can't afford not to snuggle this 'un in the decadent washup section of your bookshelf. 

Fer me the best portion of the book was the one documenting the early/mid-seventies hostile and put on Lou, the one with the venom oozing outta him like pus outta a pimple holding his own (and maybe other things) against the likes of Lester Bangs and the Australian press corp which doesn't seem to understand what it got itself into. Some pretty good stuff here from that aforementioned one with THE AQUARIAN WEEKLY mentioning Reed's infatuation with the whole Bailey/Lucus Trust proto-gnu age dabble to a pretty good one that Glenn O'Brien and the mysteriously-named "June Jade" did for INTERVIEW in praise of graffiti art and London nightlife. It's almost like having the best moments of the Golden Age of Rock Screeding right at your very fingertips!

Like I said the second portion featuring the more "mature" and get along Lou doesn't quite measure up to the mind-addled bleached blond bugger(er) who preceded, so if you wanna skip over it its yer cherce as Iggy mighta put it.  Personally I myself wouldn't even if the likes of Dave DiMartino never could fill the CREEM-y shoes of Bangs, and for the life of me I would prefer to avoid such affronts as MAGIC AND LOSS not to mention NEW YORK 'n LULU especially when there is so much unheard music, mostly inspired and influenced by Lou and his more cathartic Velvet Underground moments, that my ears are just beggin' for. But even these later on efforts have some specs of information can be discerned and digested sorta in the same way those starving kids in India sort through horse manure for tasty bits of undigested oats so it ain't like any of us are gonna go hungry.

Good 'un here, and I only hope that such fans of this blog as Heath will keep up the good work and continue to plop such great reading on a usually barren rock 'n roll reading market. Might be remaindered by now, so keep an eye out when yer at the local flea market.