Interviews
White Light White Heat
Interview by Bill Flanagan. Published in Musician no. 126 - April 1989
Lou Reed and John Cale remember Andy Warhol
MUSICIAN: But you and John do. Do you think Andy influenced that?
CALE: I don't know. From my childhood I just remember I'd hate going to sleep because somewhere in the world something amazing was going on, and I'd miss it.
REED: And to this day [laughter], to this day the poor man still can't be in seven places at once! Andy really did say that. When we shaped the lyrics we tried to make it so not only are they real, but they're effective in the song. So we can't say that those are verbatim quotes, but even if they are not, they should be. You know what I mean? Because the results should approximate what went on then from that point of view. I was very, very struck by his work ethic. I was always struck by the fact that Andy was the first one there at work, Andy was the last one to leave. And when he spoke to me he was always going on about the work, how incredibly lazy I was. Which I really enjoyed hearing, as you can imagine.
MUSICIAN: When Andy first approached the Velvets, did you worry about being swallowed up by his thing~ He was already famous; were you afraid of being overwhelmed by his Exploding Plastic Inevitable?
REED: Well, he didn't have it then. He just had pieces and fragments of an idea that was going to be put together and ended up being bigger than all of us. Including him. At a certain point it turned into people thinking Andy was the guitar player. So it depended on whose world you were in.
MUSICIAN: But did you two ever look at each other and say, "I dunno, we're a rock band working on something pretty original, do we really want to be part of Warhol's world?"
REED: No, I think we looked at each other and said, "This sounds like really great fun and a lot better than playing in this tourist trap in the Village."