John Cale Photos

The Sixties

Photo: © John Giuffre
On tour with The Primitives, 1965.
Left to right: Tony Conrad, Lou Reed, John Giuffre (a Pickwick studio musician), Walter de Maria, John Cale.

"When I first met Lou Reed a the beginning of 1965, he was a 22-year old songwriter at Pickwick Records in Long Island City, and I was a 22-year old avant-garde musician in La Monte Young's Theatre of Eternal Music. We were introduced by a Pickwick producer, Terry Phillips, who thought I was a pop musician because I had long hair. He asked me, Tony Conrad and a friend, the sculptor Walter de Maria, to form a band witht Lou called the Primitives. Phillips wanted to publicize a song had written and recorded in a back room and Pickwick has released as a single, 'The Ostrich', by a fictious band, the Primitives.

The pop programme American Bandstand wanted them to perform this on on TV, so Phillips was forced to put out an appropriate-looking band together. We thought it would be fun, and as a lark spent a couple of weekends playing the TV show and a few other East Coast gigs. Even though the record bombed, the experience of being in a rock band, however ersatz, gave Lou and me the opportunity to connect."

Thanks to Lau Buur Nielsen for identifying Mr. Giuffre.