The Raven: POEtry Album

by Lou Reed

Dopo le fortunate pubblicazioni delle opere letterarie dei grandi protagonisti della musica moderna (Chet Baker, Miles Davis, Susanne Vega, Pete Townshend) un altro grande evento editoriale minimum fax. In esclusiva per l’Italia, abbiamo pubblicato i testi integrali della più ambiziosa opera di Lou Reed, una delle voci eminenti del rock mondiale: The Raven, un album che sconfina in qualcosa di diverso dalla sequenza di tracce musicali per assurgere a piena rivisitazione in chiave moderna e con lo stile che contraddistingue il musicista, di alcuni dei racconti e delle poesie di Edgar Allan Poe. Avvalendosi tra l’altro della collaborazione di altri grandi nomi della musica e del cinema, come David Bowie, Willem Dafoe, Laurie Anderson, Steve Buscemi, Ornette Coleman.
Sulla scia di POEtry, un musical rappresentato lo scorso anno dallo stesso Lou Reed e Robert Wilson, il maestro del gotico del diciannovesimo secolo viene riscritto e suonato da Reed che non esita – con il coraggio dei suoi sessant’anni – a manipolare e ad “arrangiare” le parole di Poe, saltando, elidendo e aggiungendo pezzi propri, così da lasciarsi indietro il possibile anacronismo a favore di una forte sensazione di “qui e adesso”. Al di là della indiscutibile qualità musicale, i versi di The Raven, all’interno di una sfida importante come quella di ricontestualizzare le opere di uno scrittore del calibro di Poe, perdono i contorni del “testo canzone” sviluppando un unico flusso continuo e restituendoci la struttura e la complessità dei concept album - anche attraverso la contaminazione della scrittura di Poe con i versi delle canzoni vecchie e nuove di Lou Reed. La passione del musicista per il grande scrittore, la condivisione di un romanticismo oscuro e dello scandagliare i recessi più bui della psiche umana, danno vita a qualcosa che va letto, ascoltato, goduto tutto d’un fiato.

Genres: Poetry, Music, Dyscalculia, Art, The United States Of America, Comics, Classics

240 pages, Hardcover

First published August 10, 2003

About the author

Lou Reed was an influential American rock singer-songwriter and guitarist. He first came to prominence as the guitarist and principal singer-songwriter of The Velvet Underground (1965-1973). The band gained little mainstream attention during their career, but in hindsight became one of the most influential of their era. As the Velvets’ principal songwriter, Reed wrote about subjects of personal experience that rarely had been examined in rock and roll, including bondage and S&M ("Venus in Furs"), transvestites ("Sister Ray" and "Candy Says"), drug culture ("Heroin" and "I'm Waiting for the Man"), and transsexuals undergoing surgery ("Lady Godiva's Operation"). As a guitarist, he was a pioneer in the use of distortion, high volume feedback, and nonstandard tunings.

Reed began a long and eclectic solo career in 1971. He had a hit the following year with "Walk on the Wild Side", though for more than a decade Reed seemed to willfully evade the mainstream commercial success its chart status offered him. One of rock's most volatile personalities, Reed's work as a solo artist has frustrated critics wishing for a return of The Velvet Underground. The most notable example is 1975's infamous double LP of recorded feedback loops, Metal Machine Music, upon which Reed later commented, "no one is supposed to be able to do a thing like that and survive." By the late 1980s, however, Reed had won wide recognition as an elder statesman of rock.

Reviews

[Laurent De Maertelaer · Rating 3 out of 5]

Lou Reed bloemleest Poe. Dit is Bob Wilsons rockopera ‘POEtry’ (https://robertwilson.com/poetry) in boekvorm, gebaseerd op Reeds bewerkingen en songs. Die bewerkingen zijn niet altijd even geslaagd. Evenmin als de vertalingen van Thé Lau, die heel erg vrij en intuïtief zijn. Subliem als altijd zijn de bij momenten verbluffende illustraties van grootmeester Lorenzo Mattotti. Merci @anncatteeuw voor het cadeau 😘

[Michael · Rating 5 out of 5]

By turns beautiful and disturbing, Lou Reed has adapted the poems and stories of Edgar Allan Poe as a musical, presented here as a book of lyrical poetry and prose. The illustrations by Mattotti are by turns dream-like and nightmarish, in both stark monochromes and vividly febrile colour.

This is the first time I've seen Mattotti's artwork, so I can't compare it to any of his others, but as an isolated example I have to say he's able to brilliantly express Reed/Poe at both their most wistful and most morbid.

Whether you're a fan of Reed, Poe or Mattotti, I don't see where you can go wrong with this book.

Second Reading : I enjoyed it even more thoroughly than the first time - add an extra half-a-star. I miss Lou Reed.

[Catalina · Rating 3 out of 5]

El corazón delator,
el aliento sofocado;
el deseo…

[Michaël Van Caeneghem · Rating 4 out of 5]

Mijn waardering geldt vooral de schitterende tekeningen van Lorenzo Mattotti. De teksten, gebaseerd op het werk van Edgar Allan Poe, zijn pseudo-mystiek en willen een een duistere sfeer oproepen, maar zijn uiteindelijk erg oppervlakkig.

[Thomas · Rating 3 out of 5]

A multi-format melange of poetry, song, theatre and visual art that is not quite the sum of its diverging parts but is nevertheless a fascinating exploration of both Poe's and Reed's work. The language the use compliment each other, showing the effect the imagery of writers such as Poe has had on the gothic and romantic elements of modern pop and rock, from Reed through the Cure and Placebo. It throws some fresh light on Poe's characters, and Reed's modernisation of the language adds a new twist, a more obvious eroticism and violence, to Poe's creations. The illustrations were not really to my taste but they complete the collection nicely. 5

[Lbkyle · Rating 3 out of 5]

Gloomful and Doomtownish
If your into Mr. Poe, then you shall enjoy this little script of poetry

[Nina · Rating 5 out of 5]

szalone

[Stay Fetters · Rating 4 out of 5]

If you love Poe and Reed, then this is definitely for you. The illustrations are terrifying and mesmerizing. Sometimes very disturbing. But, they speak to you in a big way. Makes the poems so much more intriguing.
" I'd like to solve the mysteries of life...
by cutting someone's throat or removing their heart"
You can't get more imaginative then that.
RIP Lou Reed!

[Bettina · Rating 3 out of 5]

There are two different books made in to one.

The first book published in 2003 contains only the lyrics of the album the Raven.

The second edition is illustrated and translated. Even in Dutch.
Great book

But again two different books where made in to one

[Bernard Pauwels · Rating 3 out of 5]

Een beetje overbodig boek, ware het niet van de illustraties van Matotti.
Wie haalt het in zijn hoofd om een tekstbewerking te maken van een meesterwerk van Egard Allan Poe? Lou reed beter tegen een boom.

[Simon Sweetman · Rating 4 out of 5]

A good meeting of minds - Poe/Reed/Mattotti - makes me (almost) want to give the double-album another chance. Almost...

[Kayren mosurinjohn · Rating 2 out of 5]

Maybe I just don't get it.

[800GecsLover · Rating 4 out of 5]

I love lou reed

[Simon Sweetman · Rating 4 out of 5]

I like this a lot more now than I did when released. And I liked it quite a bit then — love the audacity of it.