Someone posted this ludicrous, but highly entertaining, deadpan 1974 interview with Lou Reed on Facebook not long ago, and it reminded me of an anecdote related to me many years ago (1995 is my guess) by Memphibian friend and former musical collaborator, Joseph Pegram, now resident in Jakarta.
Joey, as we all knew him then, had gotten a gig with Hot Monkey (Grifter Scott Taylor's side project, which at that point consisted of Scott, Memphis artist and percussionist David Hall, and Joey. Coincidentally, the first Linda Heck release, "Dig My Own Hole," was on the flip-side of the "Sain" single.) as one of the opening bands for Laurie Anderson at The Knitting Factory in New York City.
The band had already played and were outside getting some fresh air, when Laurie and partner Lou Reed were seen approaching the club. Joey's roommate at the time was an artist and Laurie Anderson fanatic, who wanted to give her one of his very large prints, and he had entrusted Joey with a letter and photo of the print to be hand-delivered to her. Dutifully, Joey made his way back to the dressing room, letter and photo in one hand, beer in the other, to wait until the crowd thinned enough to approach her. Finally his moment came, and he delivered the precious consignment, explaining that he was in the opening act (apparently Laurie Anderson liked the name "Hot Monkey") and that his friend had put him up to approaching her in this way. She listened graciously and patiently, taking it all in.
At one point, Joey turned to see that Lou Reed had walked into the dressing room. Now, Joey was a big Laurie Anderson fan, but did a good job of keeping it cool in her presence, unlike some of the stream of shamelessly fawning hangers-on that had preceded his audience with her. But this was Lou Reed, and I remember Joey saying that he was standing there thinking something along the lines of, "It's Lou Reed, one of my absolute biggest heroes, and now he's walking towards me. I bet he's going to say something amazing."
Lou walked straight up to Joey and said, "Hey, where did you get that beer?"
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1 comment:
That was fun. But isn't that the bass player from U2?
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