From 1992, Neil Gaiman's smart, revealing interview with Lou Reed for Reflex Magazine, featuring things like, "I thought I'd earned the right; that I knew enough about Life at this point, and had gone through enough where I thought stating an opinion about a thing or two would not be soapboxy or preachy but was just hard-won experience trying to communicate to other people."
If there's one difference between the early work and the current stuff, it's in the persona of the singer. Previously Lou Reed was off on the sidelines: "I just don't care at all" "Makes no difference to me". More recently there's been a willingness to be involved and affected….
Yeah. I took a stance about a couple of things.
Why?
I thought I'd earned the right; that I knew enough about Life at this point, and had gone through enough where I thought stating an opinion about a thing or two would not be soapboxy or preachy but was just hard-won experience trying to communicate to other people.
In a lot of the stuff that I wrote about there's no overt moral position, but what's being described speaks for itself and I don't think it needed me to say anything about it — I don't take a superior view or any kind of elitist view toward any of these things: it's life, and that's what we're talking about.
But over the last couple of years there has been a change, in the sense that I think I am capable of taking positions that I'm not going to change my mind about.
I think I can justify my opinions. They're hard-won and heart-felt.
Waiting for the Man – Lou Reed
(via Wil Wheaton)
