The BIZARRE Story of How The Velvet Underground Met Andy Warhol
The Velvet Underground is one of the most influential bands in rock history, and their collaboration with pop art icon Andy Warhol has a lot to do with that.
Fired! Hired! Wired! This is the BIZARRE story of how The Velvet Underground met pop artist and cultural icon Andy Warhol and went on to transform rock music.
Welcome back to Poetic Wax: Music History Hidden in the Grooves, where we dive into the stories behind the records that have shaped music history — records you’ll find in the collection I’ve been building since the 1990s. I'm Andy Fenstermaker, host of the channel, podcast, and this substack.
Today we're dropping the needle on a pivotal moment in rock history: the fateful meeting between pop art icon Andy Warhol and the avant-garde band The Velvet Underground. A band I’ve heard at least one music historian dub the first true alt rock band.
The Velvet Underground is one of the most influential bands in rock history, and their collaboration with pop art icon Andy Warhol has a lot to do with that.
To set the scene, we must travel back to New York City in 1965.
The art scene is exploding, and underground music is pushing boundaries like never before. In this episode, we'll explore how a chance encounter at a Greenwich Village café set the stage for one of the most influential collaborations in rock history.
So grab your favorite drink, settle into your listening chair, and let's flip back through time to the mid-60s, when two revolutionary forces in art and music were about to collide and change the cultural landscape forever.
The Cafe Bizarre Residency
Our story begins at Café Bizarre, a dimly lit, bohemian hangout in the heart of Greenwich Village. It's December 1965, and The Velvet Underground have just scored a regular gig at this eclectic venue. Exposed brick walls adorned with abstract art, mismatched furniture, and a tiny stage barely big enough to fit Lou Reed's amplifier.
Here’s a quote from a book called The Downtown Pop Underground
In late 1965, the Velvet Underground began performing at Café Bizarre, which had fake cobwebs, candles, and waitresses in fishnet stockings who looked like Morticia from The Addams Family. “I walked by Café Bizarre a hundred times but I never went in,” said Peter Crowley, who managed another coffeehouse. “It was absolutely another tourist trap, so I never bothered going.” The Velvets’ dissonant droning and sordid tales clashed with the Greenwich Village folk crowd’s more conventional tastes.
The band – Lou Reed, John Cale, Sterling Morrison, and Angus MacLise – had been making waves in the underground scene with their unconventional sound. But it was at Café Bizarre where their fortunes would change dramatically. By the time they landed the residency, MacLise had been replaced by Maureen Tucker — or, as she’s more commonly known, Moe Tucker.
Their residency was, to put it mildly, tumultuous. The VU’s raw, experimental sound often clashed with the expectations of the café's patrons and management. One night, they'd be the talk of the Village; the next, they'd get fired. Then re-hired. And maybe fired again.
Again, here’s The Downtown Pop Underground:
“One night at the Café Bizarre,” Sterling Morrison recalled, “we played ‘The Black Angel’s Death Song’ and the owner came up and said, ‘If you play that song one more time you’re fired!’ ” The Velvets began their next set with a ferocious version of “The Black Angel’s Death Song” and were promptly fired.
What a legend! So Lou Reed stares the manager down and when the band steps back up to perform the next steps, immediately launched back into the very same song but kick it up a notch with a sneer.
As fate would have it, it was this precise night that a new patron was visiting Cafe Bizarre.
When Warhol Met The Velvet Underground
Earlier that evening in late December of 1965, Andy Warhol, already a somewhat famous figure in the New York art scene, walked into Café Bizarre with his entourage. Among them was filmmaker Barbara Rubin, who had heard whispers about this provocative new band and told Andy he should check them out.
This is from The Music Settlement:
Andy Warhol had been looking for a rock band to manage, and when he first saw The Velvet Underground, it fired his imagination. John Cale’s droning viola betrayed his classical music training with John Cage and LaMonte Young; Moe Tucker’s primordial drumming and androgynous vibe defined the group’s feel; Sterling Morrison’s primitive guitar stylings and facility on bass and keyboards fleshed out the sound of The Velvet Underground. But it was vocalist and songwriter Lou Reed who attracted Warhol instantly with his streetwise sneer, odes to casual drug use (Heroin, I’m Waiting For The Man), sacrificial death (The Black Angel’s Death Song), sadomasochism (Venus in Furs), and his boyish downtown charm paired with a nonchalant attitude the two shared.
Impressed by their audacity and unique sound, Warhol approached the band after their impromptu final performance. He saw in them the musical embodiment of his artistic vision – abrasive, challenging, unapologetic, and entirely new.
As the January chill settled over New York, The Velvet Underground bid farewell to Café Bizarre for the last time.
But this ending was just the beginning. With Andy Warhol now in their corner, they were about to embark on a journey that would revolutionize both music and art.
Andy Warhol Manages The Velvets
Impressed with their music and their attitude, Warhol offers to manage the band. They would ultimately move to a new residency. Warhol installed The Velvet Underground as the house band at his studio, The Factory, where their raw sound became the soundtrack to Warhol's experimental films and happenings.
Here’s a quote from Drew Bufalini:
The Factory was Warhol’s studio but so much more. It was a hotbed of artistic experimentation, sixties pop stars, vamping models waiting to be discovered, weird poets trapped in the moment, sex shows including homosexuals (illegal in those days), all of them enjoying the best drugs 1960s Manhattan had to offer. Patrons ranged from Hollywood stars like Edie Sedgewick and Marilyn Monroe and wealthy New York society to people living on the street. When he discovered The Velvets, Warhol was already recognized as one of the fathers of Pop Art and the godfather of any avant-garde New Yorker with an original artistic bone in their bodies.
Warhol's influence extended beyond mere patronage. He introduced the band to German singer Nico, whose haunting vocals would become an integral part of their debut album. Speaking of which, let's take a moment to appreciate this record right here – The Velvet Underground & Nico, released in March 1967.
My copy is a 1968 pressing. And here’s what makes this special. The sleeve is famed for original art by Warhol himself. The classic pop art banana, but on early pressings the yellow banana was a sticker. Peel it back and it revealed a pink banana. This copy has a fully-intact banana, which isn’t that easy to find.
This record, with its iconic Warhol-designed banana cover, may not have topped the charts at the time, but its impact on music cannot be overstated. From the pulsing “I'm Waiting for the Man” to the delicate “Sunday Morning,” to one of Warhol’s (and my) favorites, “All Tomorrow’s Parties.” This album pushed music in ways few had dared before.
The Legendary Legacy of The Velvet Underground and Nico
You cannot deny the influence of The Velvet Underground And Nico on music. Rolling Stone ranked it the 13th best album of all time and Spin placed it atop their list of the most influential albums of all time. Brian Eno famously said that while their first album may have sold only 30,000 copies in its early years, “everyone who bought one of those 30,000 copies started a band.”
And the band’s legacy extends far beyond this single album. Their unflinching exploration of taboo subjects, their fusion of art rock with avant-garde sensibilities, and their disregard for commercial appeal paved the way for countless artists to come.
You can hear echoes of the Velvets in the glam rock of David Bowie, the punk revolution of the mid-70s, and even in the alternative and indie scenes of the 80s and 90s.
And their influence on culture extends beyond music. The Velvet Underground embodied a spirit of artistic freedom and experimentation that continues to inspire creatives across all mediums. They showed that art could be dangerous, provocative, and still profoundly beautiful.
As we lower the needle and those first notes of “Sunday Morning” fill the room, we’re not just listening to a piece of music history. We're experiencing a moment when art, music, and culture collided to create something truly revolutionary.
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