Chords for Lou Reed - rare NZ interview (1984)

[A] _ If we just go back 10 years, back in 1975, on the line of notes to Metal Machine Music, and I'll quote this,
you said that you hoped [Db] the intelligence that once inhabited novels and films would ingest rock.
Now on the new album, New Sensations, the song called Doing the Things That We Want To,
you say that there's not much to hear on the radio today, but you can still see a movie or a play.
Does that mean that your hopes haven't been fulfilled? _
[Ab] _ _ My personal hopes [G] haven't been fulfilled? _
Oh, I don't know, it's a long ballgame.
[N] You never know what's going to happen.
I'd been interested more or [G] less in what would happen if Raymond Chandler _ wrote a rock and roll song.
I [E] tried to do that [Eb] with a thing called [G] Street Hassle.
It's just my own private ambitions I'm concerned with.
I'm not interested _ in [F] wish fulfillment [N] in other areas for other people.
It's just my own personal [Em] ambitions.
So when you ask a [F] question like that, the [Bb] real question is, [G] do I think it's worked for me?
And the answer to that is yes.
_ _ _ Around the time of Blue Mask, it seemed that your touring days were [Abm] pretty well over,
which certainly were heavy touring days.
But here you are back on a world tour and you've reached a new high profile.
You've appeared on Late Scent Entertainment This Week and so on.
_ What's brought that change around?
Well, I mean, high profile for me, not for other people necessarily.
What brought that around?
The records sold.
But you obviously enjoy playing too.
Yeah, but it's hard to get a tour together when you don't sell many [Gm] records.
_ What do you listen to in your leisure time?
I listen to the radio like everybody else.
Do you buy records?
Yeah, [G] a lot of records.
Anybody in particular?
CDs now.
It's gotten even more expensive.
I can listen to [Ab] almost the worst thing in the world on a [Eb] CD.
It's amazing what it sounds like.
For all you [G] people out there, a CD is really worth it.
[Ab] Do you listen to your own records?
Even when they're not on CD, I [G] listen to them.
_ What's your favorite at the moment?
Oh, my favorite is always the last one.
Always.
Because I always feel the last one _ went a little bit further than the ones before it.
People staying at home watching video movies and more teenagers going out to see movies.
Are you [F] asking me this [Gb] as an older people or as a teenager?
[G] No, not at all.
[Eb] _ As a teenager. _ _
The sites of movie makers are being lowered.
We get movies that are really popular but maybe aren't that good like [Ab] Police Academy or [A]
Porky's.
[G] I like Police Academy.
_ _ [A]
Everything has its place.
One day we wanted to see something really gross and stupid and Police Academy was perfect.
When you're in that kind of mood, you don't want to think.
You don't want to even have to follow the jokes too well.
You want something really that's just right in your face and that's what [Abm] Police Academy was.
I don't know if they teach it at film school but _ Thursday afternoon at 2 was okay. _
Do you think that the sites of rock music have been lowered in the same way?
I don't know [Eb] that it ever had any sites.
_ _ [N] It's not a_
using a generic term, [Ab] rock music.
Who is rock music?
It's just individual people and bands and their own private [Dbm] ambitions.
I don't know anyone [Eb] else's except my own.
I can't _ speak for anybody else other than me.
Who do you aim your records at?
I like to aim it at everybody.
I would like to hope that you could at the very least get [G] a good laugh out of me.
And then if you wanted [Ab] more than that, that it would be there too.
I mean I've always hoped to combine [G] the_
a certain literate thoughtfulness that _ wouldn't [Gbm] put people [G] off rock records.
That you [B] could still have fun with the guitars and drums but if you leaned in,
[Eb] there would be, not [G] Dostoyevsky, [Eb] but there would [Abm] be something of substance [Eb] there
that you might find, if not illuminating, at least [G] interesting.
[Eb] At the very least I would hope I would be good [G] for a laugh.
I've always been impressed by your sense of humor actually.
_ [N]
That's obviously important to you.
Yeah, it's dry.
I've been [Bb] told I should smile when I tell a joke so I've been [G] practicing.
_ _ [Bb]
Before we came [Ab] up from Wellington to do the interview,
we were watching a night with Lou Reed and as a [Fm] fan I was really impressed by your guitar work.
Do you feel that's been overlooked [Ab] by a lot of [G] people? _ _ _ _
[Bb] That's a good answer.
[G] _ I _ _ [Eb]
just haven't thought of it that [G] way.
_ _ I've [F]
been working [Ab] harder at it lately.
It's only a few things I'm interested in.
[Eb] I don't have a big complex of interests, it's just very specific interests.
And I put basically everything [A] into that.
_ [Ab] I've been working on making the guitar [Eb] playing, like the writing, more simple.
[N] More simple.
Simpler.
Simpler.
Why are you in rock and roll rather than any other sort of art form?
It seems to me that you could equally be a short story writer or perhaps even a novelist.
Because I really like rock and roll and I love the idea [Eb] of combining the two interests [Gm] of writing [Eb] and doing rock and roll.
[D] It's like [Gb] putting [G] together two things I like best.
_ In the minds of many people, you're _ very much the rock and roll animal.
That [Bb] seems to me to be a brief phase of a very long career.
Well, see, by rock and roll animal [Ebm] I meant [Eb] somebody who is very passionate about rock and roll, really likes rock and roll.
I didn't mean a rock and roll [Gm] man.
But, [Eb] you know, each to their own.
_ I don't run around saying to people, well, that's not what I meant.
[G] _ _ _ [Ab] You've said in the past that your songs aren't necessarily autobiographical, that you assume a role in the songs.
It seems that [N] the last three albums, particularly Blue Mask and Legendary Hearts, were more personal.
Would [Eb] that be true? _
Maybe.
_ I'm a great one for exaggerating.
_ [E] I [Ebm] take a small thing and make it as though it [Eb] was a big thing.
Or I combine something that happened to me with something that happened to somebody I [E] know, and I make it all happen [G] to one person.
[Ebm] So it is, but [Ab] it isn't. _ _
_ You've played, as I just said, other roles on record.
[G] Have you ever thought of getting into acting?
_ [Abm] Yeah, I was in a [Eb] couple of movies.
I was kind of interested in seeing how they made movies more than actually [G] being in it.
[Ebm] And I [G] needed the money at the time.
_ [Abm] It's really [Eb] boring making movies.
It's not like rock and roll where you just get out there and do it.
You just sit around for hours doing nothing.
_ [Ab] _ But, [Eb] I don't know, acting without a guitar is a lot of [G] fun.
_ [Eb] The next clip that we're going to play on the show is Red Joystick.
Have computer games replaced pinball [G] for you?
_ Well, it's [Ab] just I don't have a place big enough to put pinball games [Db] in.
Lots of pinball [G] games.
_ _ _ [Eb]
There's some interesting computer games.
No, [Ab] they don't replace pinball. _
[Eb] I hadn't believed that if pinball hadn't been invented after computer games,
it would be [G] this incredible new _ tactile game where you could shove it around and people would be really amazed.
It's just that they break so easily compared to video [Eb] games when you take up so much space.
Have you ever retired? _
I've never thought about [G] that.
_ _ _ What do you do from here then?
[N] What do I do?
I'm going to Hawaii and running this evening. _