Review: "Why Don't You Smile Now: Lou Reed at Pickwick Records 1964-65"

Finally, Reed's wild, pre-Velvet Underground bargain bin rock'n'roll records get a proper historical reissue. Plus: a handsome new paperback edition of my biography "Lou Reed: The King of New York"

Photo courtesy of Matthew Kloss

I’m excited to unpack Why Don’t You Smile Now: Lou Reed at Pickwick Records 1964-65, a beautiful new set from the archivists at Light In The Attic Records, who worked in cooperation with Laurie Anderson and the Lou Reed Estate. But first, some related news: the U.S. paperback edition of my biography Lou Reed: The King of New York is out October 3, with a tight new cover design from Brooklyn’s No Ideas crew, who did the handsome hardcover. You can pre-order from your local bookstore via bookshop.org, or via Amazon. And I’ve got some West Coast launch events next month, including 10/22 at Pegasus Books in Berkeley CA w/ my pal and fellow author/historian Pat Thomas.

The Washington Post called it “the only Lou Reed bio you need.” You be the judge.

I discuss Reed’s Pickwick years in some length in the book. To set the stage, here’s an excerpt (with streaming links added):

Reed’s lucky break came via his Syracuse band manager, Don Schupack, who’d begun doing business with Philip Teitelbaum, a Brooklyn-born kid who’d worked his way into the songwriting business. After a stint in Jerry Leiber and Mike Stoller’s song mill, working alongside up-and-comers like Phil Spector and Paul Simon, Teitelbaum (pen name Terry Phillips) signed on with Pickwick Records, a label specializing in reissues and discount knock-offs of popular styles.

Pickwick marketed LPs at around $2 each—standard LPs were $3.98—in supermarkets and discount stores like Woolworth’s and Korvettes. They made money; by 1964, they had deals with major labels to press and distribute budget “Best Of” reissues by major acts. The “original” music Pickwick recorded, however, was disposable schlock, but it shifted units. Philips needed hungry songwriters who could work fast and cheap; Schupack thought Reed might be a good fit.

So, like thousands of his suburban neighbors, the newly minted college graduate rode the LIRR from Freeport Station to Penn Station. Then Reed took the subway back across the East River to Long Island City, a desolate industrial enclave on the lip of Queens, across from midtown Manhattan. Pickwick had a primitive studio—basically a concrete bunker with some tape recorders—and its own pressing plant, at 8-16 Forty-third Avenue.