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Rating: I would like to identify, and therefore review, a beautiful album by Lou Reed in just one magnificent piece, the one that gives it its title, and not because the rest is inferior, but rather because this title contains the strength of the artistic and human rebirth of a man now on the brink of self-destruction.
After the dreadful "Sally Can't Dance", a work entirely highlighted by Lou Reed's drug-ridden condition, barely aware of what he was recording, he goes on to release "Metal Machine Music", the most absurd album of his career, even though he continued to fiercely defend it until the end: a double LP composed of four pieces that basically reproduce feedback on vinyl (the return of the speaker's sound into the microphone that the listener perceives as a shrill and unbearably annoying whistle) for about 80 minutes.
Stuff for suicide even for the experimental years that were indeed the seventies, although this record would become fundamental, years and years later, for the "noise" exploration of bands such as "Sonic Youth".
With "Metal Machine Music" however, he had played all his bonus earned with RCA thanks to "Transformer" and "Sally Can't Dance" which, despite its undeniable neglect, turned out to be the best-selling album of his career; the record label had deeply invested in him with heavy advances in US dollars only to have a troublesome, drug-addicted, unstable, and almost out-of-control character on their hands.
He was at loggerheads with everyone when suddenly he remembers being a New Yorker, tough, unsinkable, born in Brooklyn and a son of Coney Island and decides to propose perhaps his most intimate and personal album ever where the very song that gives the album its title, "Coney Island Baby", is a song of fierce affection, gratitude, stones in the shoe thrown beyond any obstacle... and of love... above all love.
Ken Glancy, RCA’s president, perhaps one of the few people he could rely on, made him promise never to replicate similar works like "Metal Machine Music" again, and Lou, undoubtedly reluctantly, agreed as the only possible way out. The sound becomes softer, and it flies back in time, like what he used to listen to in college campuses when the Velvet Underground were just an evolving dream, and in full doo-wop style he introduces his teenage days and devotion to the protective figure of the football team coach.
On the other hand, there is loneliness, the soul sold for commercial purposes, the false friends who were primarily the Katz brothers, Lou Reed's manager and producer, who had sued him for the copious returns of Metal Machine Music, the compromise to commercialism he hated, as he hated his fans at concerts who kept asking him for "Walk on the wild side" as if it were the only good thing he had ever written.
"Coney Island Baby" however had one extra gear, probably unexpected, that of love because alongside Lou Reed in those days is Rachel, a transgender partner who opens up his feelings, the deepest ones, the most unconfessable ones. We are in 1975 and the track "Coney Island Baby" which gives the title to the LP becomes a sort of anthem to homosexuality, but at the same time celebrates love 360° without compromises and without inhibitions in a city that if you're lucky is a circus and if you're unlucky is a filthy sewer.
"Coney Island Baby" would be the album of his definitive rebirth if not quite of his consecration, but there would be much space and a lot of time ahead to get there, with one, in my opinion, of the three best rock albums ever: "New York"; dedicated, for better, but especially for worse, precisely to that city of the boy born in Brooklyn and son of Coney Island.
Tracklist Lyrics and Videos
04 Kicks (06:06)
Hey man, what's your style
How you get your kicks for living
Hey man, what's your style
How you get your adrenalin flowing now
How you get your adrenalin flowing
Hey man, what's your style
I love the way, try to call now
Hey man, what's your style
I ain't jealous of the way you're living
I ain't jealous of the way you're living
When you cut that dude with just a little mania
You did it so, ... ah
When the blood comma' down his neck ...
Don't you know it was better than sex, now, now, now
It was way better than getting mean
'cause it was, the final thing to do, now
Get somebody to come on to you
and then you just get somebody to
to now, now, come on to you
And then you kill 'em, yeah
You kill 'em, now, now, cause I need kicks ...
I'm getting bored, I need, need, need, need now, now some kicks
Oh, give it, give it, give it, give it to me now, now, kicks
Hey man, what's your style
How you get your kicks for living
Hey man, what's your style
How you get your adrenalin flowing now, now, now, now, now
How you get your adrenalin flowing
Hey man, what's your style
You know, I love the way you drive your car now
Hey man, what's your style
I ain't jealous of the way you're living
Ain't jealous of, now, now, the way you're living
Hey, newspaper ...
You did it so, wow, crudely, now
With that blood coming down his chest
It was way better than sex, now, now
It was way better than getting mean
It was the final thing to do
Get somebody to came, come on to you, then
Get somebody to, ah, come on to you
Better kill them now
Better kill him now, now
Yeah, yeah, yeah, kill him now, now
'Cause I need kicks
I need some kicks
I'm getting bored
I need, need, need, need, need, need, need some kicks
Yeah, need, need, need, need, need, need, need some kicks
Oh, give it now, kicks
Yeah, need some kicks
Yeah, need some k-k-k-k-k-k-k-k-k-k-k-k-k-k-k-k, kicks
Oh, give it me now, now
Kicks, kicks, kicks, kicks ...
05 A Gift (03:47)
I'm just a gift to the women of this world
I'm just a gift to the women of this world
Responsibility sits so hard on my shoulder
like a good wine, I'm better as I grow older, and now -
- I'm just a gift to the women of this world
I'm just a gift to the women of this world
I'm just a gift to the women of this world
It's hard to settle for second best
after you've had me, you know that you've had the best
and now you know that -
- I'm just a gift to the women of this world
(I'm just a gift to the women of this world)
(I'm just a gift to the women of this world)
Responsibility sits hard on my shoulder
like a good wine, I'm better as I get older, and now -
- I'm just a gift to the women of this world
You know that I'm just a gift to the women of this world
just a gift now
(I'm just a gift to the women of this world)
(I'm just a gift to the women of this world)
(I'm just a gift to the women of this world)
(I'm just a gift to the women of this world, just now)
(I'm just a gift to the women of this world, just a gift)
(I'm just a gift to the women of this world)
I'm just a gift to the women of this world
I'm just a gift to the women of this world
....
07 Nobody's Business (03:41)
Hey, if you're moving too fast
don't you want this thing last
But if you start moving slow and -
hey, pretty mama, you just will have to go, because -
It's nobody's business but my own
It's nobody's business but my own
No-no-no-no-no-no-no, no-no-no-no, no-no-no
No-no-no-no-no-no-no-no, no-no-no-no, no-no-no
But if you start acting mean
then I'll have to mess up the scene
But if you start treating me nice
hey, now baby, I'm gonna have to raise your price
Because it's nobody's business but my own
It's nobody's business but my own
No-no-no-no-no-no-no, no-no-no-no, no-no-no
No-no-no-no, no-no-no, no-no-no
Nobody's business
nobody's business, come on now
Hey, nobody's business, yeah, but my own
nobody's business, oh, my, no-no-no
Nobody's business, no-no-no-no-no
hey, nobody's business, yeah, but my own
Nobody's business, my own
no-no, no-no-no
No-no-no, no-no-no
Nobody's business
nobody's business
Nobody's business
nobody's business, but my own, now
...
08 Coney Island Baby (06:36)
You know, man, when I was a young man in high school
you believe in or not I wanted to play football for the coach
And all those older guys
they said he was mean and cruel, but you know
wanted to play football for the coach
They said I was to little too light weight to play line-backer
so I say I'm playing right-end
wanted to play football for the coach
'Cause, you know some day, man
you gotta stand up straight unless you're gonna fall
then you're gone to die
And the straightest dude
I ever knew was standing right for me all the time
So I had to play football for the coach
and I wanted to play football for the coach
When you're all alone and lonely
in your midnight hour
And you find that your soul
it's been up for sale
And you begin to think 'bout
all the things that you've done
And you begin to hate
just 'bout everything
But remember the princess who lived on the hill
Who loved you even though she knew you was wrong
And right now she just might come shining through
and the -
- Glory of love, glory of love
glory of love, just might come through
And all your two-bit friends
have gone and ripped you off
They're talking behind your back saying, man
you're never going to be no human being
And you start thinking again
'bout all those things that you've done
And who it was and what it was
and all the different things you made every different scene
Ahhh, but remember that the city is a funny place
Something like a circus or a sewer
And just remember different people have peculiar tastes
and the -
- Glory of love, the glory of love
the glory of love, might see you through
yeah, but now, now
Glory of love, the glory of love
the glory of love, might see you through
Glory of love, ah, huh, huh, the glory of love
Glory of love, glory of love
Glory of love, now, glory of love, now
Glory of love, now, now, now, glory of love
Glory of love, give it to me now, glory of love see you through
Oh, my Coney Island baby, now
(I'm a Coney Island baby, now)
I'd like to send this one out for Lou and Rachel
and all the kids and P.S. 192
Coney Island baby
Man, I'd swear, I'd give the whole thing up for you
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Other reviews
By cece65
The lightness is immediately felt in the first two tracks of the album, 'Crazy Feeling' and 'Charley’s Girl', two excellent easy-listening songs.
'Coney Island Baby' is the Stroke of Genius, an autobiographical and effective slow song that leaves you stunned for its intensity.
