Up-Tight: The Velvet Underground Story by Victor Bockris

Author:Victor Bockris [Bockris, Victor]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: C429, Extratorrents, Kat
ISBN: 9780711952232
Publisher: Music Sales Corporation
Published: 1996-04-01T00:00:00+00:00

EVERYBODY BECOMES PART OF THE EPI EXIT NICO

CUTRONE: “The last time we played as The EPI (without Nico, who had returned to Ibiza) was in May 1967 at Steve Paul’s Scene where Tiny Tim used to hang out and Jim Morrison played. Before this people came to watch The EPI dance and play, they were entertained, and got a show. But when we played at the Scene I remember Gerard, Mary and I were dancing and the audience came on stage with us and totally took over. Mary and I looked at each other and had this look on our faces. It was half desperation-half relief that finally everybody was part of it. I looked at her as if to say, ‘Okay, Mary, looks like this is it.’ And she looked at me like, ‘Yeah, this is it.’ Everybody became part of The EPI. It was a bit sad, because we couldn’t keep our glory on stage, but we were happy because what The EPI intended to do had worked – everybody was liberated to be as sick as we were acting! From that standpoint it was interesting socially that it happened that way. All of a sudden there were no dancers, there was no show; the music had just taken everybody at that point. That was the last time I danced, and I think the last time Mary and Gerard danced. I mean maybe they tried futilely after that, but it didn’t work.”

After the failed attempt to find a home at the Gymnasium, and the couple of performances already mentioned, The Velvets didn’t play much around the release of their album, confounding the accepted laws of the situation and doing the exact opposite of what was expected. It seems a tremendous loss that they played to so few audiences and didn’t record their shows.

MORRISON: “The unanimous opinion was that we were ten times better live than on records. We never played a song the same way twice – never wanted to, maybe never could. And Lou changed lyrics all the time. One of his great talents is that he can spontaneously generate lyrics on stage – just like the old blues singers, Lou can go on forever rhyming.”

Their decision not to promote the record may also have been partially due to the changes everybody was going through. In May Andy, Paul, Gerard and Eric Emerson went to Cannes to show Chelsea Girls. They were out of town for a month. Steve Sesnick asked The Velvets if they’d play at the Boston Tea Party (on the weekend of May 26-27) which, unbeknownst to everybody, he owned. It was a ballroom with high ceilings and a very high stage that could easily accommodate a couple of thousand people and boasted a very large dance floor. The Velvets, who were glad to be offered a forum at the time, accepted.

They informed Nico of the upcoming date and she was faced with a dilemma. She still had some time to go on her latest Dom engagement and she needed the money.

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