The Velvet Forum

thanks for the replies. I have the companion already and 'all yesterdays partys'. I am writing on the vu's connection to the 60's counterculture and how they fit into it. Also the influence they had/have on modern bands. I don't really know how to categorize them though. They are like the counterculture to the counterculture. When the hippies were singing about peace and love, the velvets were talking about drugs and deliquency, which is an 'out there' topic to explore in this time period. Im trying to connect them more to the beat writers and writers like hubert selby jr. Any tips are appreciated....Thanks

brmc wrote:Im trying to connect them more to the beat writers and writers like hubert selby jr. Any tips are appreciated....Thanks

Hey BRMC, good luck w/ your thesis! However, you shouldn't really worry about OUR tips and opinions when it is YOUR thesis you are writing and will have to defend. It looks like you are giving yourself a pretty tough topic!

As far as being the "counterculture to the counterculture," how would you explain soft, pretty songs like Candy Says, I'll Be Your Mirror, Femme Fatale, and Sweet Jane?! They were as much against the counterculture as they were a part of it.

From where I stand, only the White Light/White Heat LP is 100% aggression. The rest of the catalog is littered with just as many pretty, elegant ballads as it is with shredding guitars as it is with incisive pop songs! And if Jesus ain't a hippie song, I don't know what is!

Read Lou's biog, "Transformer," his passages in books like "No One Waved Goodbye," and in poetry journals. You'll get a good idea where is ideas came from.

I think it would be more interesting to write a thesis on The Stooges!

Maybe I am getting too cynical, but I tend to snicker when people write academically about Rock 'N' Roll. It is just guitars, magnetic tape, and words, man!!

I just got another year older along with "The Velvet Underground" by Richard Witts (ISBN 1-904768-27-X). The book is academic in style. Witts wrote a Nico biog in the nineties.

The blurb says "Witts places the band and its genesis in the cultural context of Manhattan?s beatnik bohemianism, its radical artistic environment, and the city?s negative reaction to California?s ?Hippie? counterculture."
http://www.equinoxpub.com/books/showbook.asp?bkid=20

This could be helpful, I've only dipped in so far but I like Witt's insight. There are 10 pages on the beat sub-culture.

Good luck with your thesis from me too. I think there's plenty to say about what created the VU. I'd like to hear a convincing argument about the balance of sweet to radical songs, is this just the balance of humanity? Despising hippiedom doesn't mean you don't fall in love.

Rob

brmc wrote:Im trying to connect them more to the beat writers and writers like hubert selby jr. Any tips are appreciated....Thanks

In that case, Witts' book is for you, as he does the same. See also this thread on his book: http://www.velvetforum.com/viewtopic.php?t=1333

I was going to recommend the 33 1/3 books too.

It really depends on what sort of information you are looking for.
Have you tried reading other people's thesis on the VU? Do a search online to see what turns up as many students allow their work to be read like this.