by André Depienne

Lou Reed was born in Brooklyn, and be- longed to a conservative Jewish family, called originally “Rabinowitz”. Already at school he discovered his interest into music with a preference for Rock’N’Roll and Blues. Due to problems with his family he left home early. He studied English at the “Syracuse Univer- sity”, wrote songs for the Label “Pickwick Re- cords” and had a little hit with “the Ostrich” in 1964. This raised the attention of some pro- ducers. The same year he met John Cale and they founded the group “The Primitives”. In 1965 Sterling Morrison and Angus MacLise joined and they had a first appearance with “The Velvet Underground”. With this band Lou Reed had a big success until the early 70ties. In 1972 he released his first solo-album called “Lou Reed”, but without any success. Still the same year he made an internatio- nal breakthrough with the Glamrock-album “Transformer”, due to the title “Walk on the Wild Side”. The producer of this song was no one else than David Bowie. Lou Reed success lasted his whole life. He died in his house in Long Island, October 27th, 2013. Half a year prior to his death he received a new liver.