Editing Lou Reed (section)

===1964–1970: Pickwick and the Velvet Underground===
[[File:Velvet Underground 1968 by Billy Name.png|thumb|upright=0.75|The Velvet Underground, 1968 (left to right: Reed, Tucker, Yule, Morrison)]]
Reed moved to New York City in 1964 to work as an in-house songwriter for [[Pickwick Records]]. He can be heard singing lead on two cuts on ''The Surfsiders Sing The Beach Boys Songbook''.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.discogs.com/The-Surfsiders-The-Surfsiders-Sing-The-Beach-Boys-Songbook/release/2066726|title = The Surfsiders – the Surfsiders Sing the Beach Boys Songbook (1967, Vinyl)|website = [[Discogs]]| year=1967 }}</ref> For Pickwick, Reed also wrote and recorded the single "The Ostrich", a parody of popular dance songs of the time, which included lines such as "put your head on the floor and have somebody step on it". His employers felt that the song had hit potential, and assembled a supporting band to help promote the recording. The ''ad hoc'' band, called the Primitives: Reed; Welsh musician [[John Cale]], who had recently moved to New York to study music and was playing viola in composer [[La Monte Young]]'s [[Theatre of Eternal Music]], on bass; [[Tony Conrad]], violinist in the Theatre of Eternal Music, on guitar; and sculptor [[Walter De Maria]] on percussion. Cale and Conrad were surprised to find that for "The Ostrich", Reed tuned each string of his guitar to the same note, which they began to call his "[[ostrich guitar]]" tuning. This technique created a [[drone (music)|drone]] effect similar to their experimentation in Young's [[avant-garde]] ensemble. Disappointed with Reed's performance, Cale was nevertheless impressed by Reed's early repertoire (including "[[Heroin (The Velvet Underground song)|Heroin]]"), and a partnership began to evolve.<ref name=documentary/>

Reed and Cale (who played viola, keyboards and bass guitar) lived together on the [[Lower East Side]], and invited Reed's college acquaintance Sterling Morrison and Cale's neighbor and Theatre of Eternal Music bandmate [[Angus MacLise]] to join the band on guitar and drums respectively, thus forming [[the Velvet Underground]]. When the opportunity came to play their first paying gig at [[Summit High School (New Jersey)|Summit High School]] in [[Summit, New Jersey]], MacLise quit because he believed that accepting money for art was a [[sellout]] and did not want to participate in a structured gig. He was replaced on drums by [[Moe Tucker]], the sister of Reed and Morrison's mutual friend Jim Tucker. Initially a fill-in for that one show, she soon became a full-time member with her drumming an integral part of the band's sound, despite Cale's initial objections. Though it had little commercial success, the band is considered one of the most influential in rock history.<ref name="nrr-loc">{{cite web |title=News from the Library of Congress |url=https://www.loc.gov/today/pr/2007/07-039.html |website=National Recording Registry |publisher=Library of Congress |date=March 6, 2007 |quote=For decades this album has cast a huge shadow over nearly every sub-variety of avant-garde rock, from 1970s art-rock to No Wave, New Wave and Punk. Referring to their sway over the rock music of the '70s and '80s, critic Lester Bangs stated, 'Modern music starts with the Velvets, and the implications and influence of what they did seem to go on forever.'}}</ref><ref name=rrhallbio>{{cite web |title=The Velvet Underground Biography |url=https://rockhall.com/inductees/the-velvet-underground/bio/ |website=Rock & Roll Hall of Fame |quote=The influence of the Velvet Underground on rock greatly exceeds their sales figures and chart numbers. They are one of the most important rock and roll bands of all time, laying the groundwork in the Sixties for many tangents rock music would take in ensuing decades.}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.bbc.com/culture/story/20131125-do-the-velvets-beat-the-beatles |title=The Velvet Underground: As influential as The Beatles? |last=Kot |first=Greg |publisher=BBC |date=October 21, 2014 |access-date=November 25, 2016}}</ref> Reed was the main singer and songwriter in the band.<ref name="bio">{{cite web |last1=Unterberger |first1=Richie |title=The Velvet Underground – Biography & History |url=https://www.allmusic.com/artist/the-velvet-underground-mn0000840402/biography |website=[[AllMusic]] |access-date=March 26, 2017}}</ref>

{{quote box|width=30em|align=right|quote=Had he accomplished nothing else, his work with the Velvet Underground in the late sixties would assure him a place in anyone's rock & roll pantheon; those remarkable songs still serve as an articulate aural nightmare of men and women caught in the beauty and terror of sexual, street and drug paranoia, unwilling or unable to move. The message is that urban life is tough stuff—it will kill you; Reed, the poet of destruction, knows it but never looks away and somehow finds holiness as well as perversity in both his sinners and his quest. ... [H]e is still one of a handful of American artists capable of the spiritual home run.|source= —''[[Rolling Stone]]'', 1975<ref>Nelson, Paul. ''[[Rolling Stone]]'', June 5, 1975. p. 60.</ref>}}

The band soon came to the attention of [[Andy Warhol]]. One of Warhol's first contributions was to integrate them into the [[Exploding Plastic Inevitable]]. Warhol's associates inspired many of Reed's songs as he fell into a thriving, multifaceted artistic scene.{{sfnp|Reed|1991|pp=22, 38, 42}}{{sfnp|Thompson|2009|p=18}} Reed rarely gave an interview without paying homage to Warhol as a mentor. Warhol pushed the band to take on a [[chanteuse]], the German former model and singer [[Nico]]. Despite his initial resistance, Reed wrote several songs for Nico to sing, and the two were briefly lovers.{{sfnp|Bockris|1994|pp=104, 106, 107}}

''[[The Velvet Underground & Nico]]'' was released in March 1967 and peaked at No. 171 on the U.S. [[Billboard 200|''Billboard'' 200]].<ref name=rrhallbio /> Much later, ''Rolling Stone'' listed it as the 13th greatest album of all time; Musician [[Brian Eno]] once stated that although few people bought the album at the time of its release, most of those who did were inspired to form their own bands.<ref>{{cite web |author=Jones, Chris |url= https://www.bbc.co.uk/music/reviews/fq4h |archive-date= April 30, 2012 |archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20120430223626/http://www.bbc.co.uk/music/reviews/fq4h/ |title=Review of The Velvet Underground - The Velvet Underground & Nico (Deluxe Edition) |work=BBC Music |year=2002 |access-date=October 28, 2013 |url-status=live}}</ref> [[Václav Havel]] credited the album, which he bought while visiting the U.S., with inspiring him to become president of [[Czechoslovakia]].<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.businessinsider.com/lou-reed-and-vaclav-havel-vs-communism-2013-10|title=The True Story Of How Lou Reed Helped Overthrow Communism In Eastern Europe|date=October 27, 2013|work=Business Insider|access-date=September 28, 2014}}</ref>

By the time the band recorded ''[[White Light/White Heat]]'', Nico had quit the band and Warhol had been fired, both against Cale's wishes. Warhol's replacement as manager was [[Steve Sesnick]]. In September 1968, Reed told Morrison and Tucker that he would dissolve the band if they did not let him fire Cale; they agreed, and Reed had Morrison inform Cale of his firing.{{sfnp|Bockris|1994|p=160}} Morrison and Tucker were discomfited by Reed's tactics but remained in the band. Cale's replacement was [[Boston]]-based musician [[Doug Yule]], who played bass guitar and keyboards and would soon share lead vocal duties with Reed.{{sfnp|Bockris|1994|pp=164, 167}} The band now took on a more pop-oriented sound and acted more as a vehicle for Reed to develop his songwriting craft.{{sfnp|Bockris|1994|pp=164, 166}} They released two studio albums with this lineup: 1969's ''[[The Velvet Underground (album)|The Velvet Underground]]'' and 1970's ''[[Loaded (The Velvet Underground album)|Loaded]]''. Reed left the Velvet Underground in August 1970.{{sfnp|Bockris|1994|p=177}} The band disintegrated after Morrison and Tucker departed in 1971, and their final album [[Squeeze (The Velvet Underground album)|''Squeeze'']] was almost entirely Yule's work.{{sfnp|Unterberger|2009|pp=307, 317}}