Walk on the Wild Side

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Walk on the Wild Side is a song by Lou Reed from his second solo album Transformer , released in 1972 . It was produced by David Bowie . The song tells about five New York transvestites and homosexuals from Andy Warhol's factory .

music

The song is sparingly orchestrated with acoustic guitars (played by Reed), electric bass and double bass ( Herbie Flowers ) and drums (John Halsey). In two places there is a choir of background singers, the “Thunderthighs”. In the outro there is a saxophone solo by Ronnie Ross . The song ends in a fadeout .

Walk on the Wild Side is based on a scheme with only four chords : Mostly C major and F major sixth chord alternate, for which the bass glissandi plays between the notes g and a. Other chords are D major and F major. Everything is played very “laid back”, even the spoken vocals with which Reed recites the five verses is relaxed. This creates a musically cool, but at the same time lascivious, erotically highly charged atmosphere.

text

The starting point for the song was Nelson Algren's novel A Walk on the Wild Side (German: Wilderness of Life ) from 1956. Reed turned down the request to turn it into a musical : “Are you kidding? I'm supposed to be the one best suited to writing a musical about cripples ? ”After all, he wrote a song in which, when the big project was canceled, he replaced the fictional characters with people he knew from Andy Warhol's Factory .

Each of the five stanzas is dedicated to a protagonist of the so-called Warhol superstars : New York transvestites and homosexuals of the 1960s and early 1970s: Holly Woodlawn , Candy Darling , Joe Dallesandro , Jackie Curtis and Joe Campbell (in the song under his stage name Sugar Plum Fairy , the English equivalent for the "sugar fairy" from Tchaikovsky's Nutcracker - translated almost literally by Diederichsen as "sugar plum tunte "). Holly is reported to dress up as a woman on the trip from Miami to New York; Candy, known from the song Candy Says that Reed wrote for Velvet Underground , performs fellationes in a back room; Little Joe is portrayed as the hardworking hustler he played in Paul Morrissey's 1968 film Flesh ; the "Sugar Fairy" celebrates success in the Apollo Theater in New York's Afro-American Harlem district ; Jackie finally collapses in the amphetamine intoxication , which Reed comments laconically: "Valium would have helped that bash" - "That wouldn't have happened with Valium ". At the end of each stanza, the refrain follows with the request: "Take a walk on the wild side" - "Take a walk on the wild side". Despite the offensive lyrics, the song was played on the radio frequently. In the United States, RCA released an edited version of the song that eliminated the reference to oral sex .

  • Holly Woodlawn

  • Joe Dallesandro

reception

The single Walk on the Wild Side reached number 16 on the Billboard Hot 100 singles chart in early 1973. It reached number 10 in the British charts in 1972. It was Reed's only chart success for many years, which is why it was listed as a one-hit wonder . After Reed's death on October 27, 2013, the song returned to the charts via iTunes . In Germany it was the first and only listing for a song by Lou Reed in the singles charts.

Walk on the Wild Side ranks 223 on the list of the 500 best songs of all time , published by Rolling Stone in 2004 . The song has been used as a score in numerous films , such as The Knight of Misfortune , Georgia and Guess Who - You Won't Get My Daughter! . The title of the film Wild Side , a drama about a transsexual prostitute filmed by Sébastien Lifshitz in 2004, is derived from Reed's song.

Versions

The American hip-hop -Formation A Tribe Called Quest used the melody of the song in their first hit Can I Kick It? from 1990.

live

Reed played Walk on the Wild Side on many of his tours, which is why it is featured on four of his live albums . For example on Live from 1975 (recorded 1973), on Live: Take No Prisoners from 1978 in a more than 16-minute version, on Live in Italy from 1984 and on American Poet from 2001 (recorded 1972).

Cover versions

Walk on the Wild Side has been covered many times by other artists , including Robbie Williams , Rolf Harris , Zeltinger Band , Vanessa Paradis and Züri West . The German actress Gerty Molzen recorded the song in 1984 at the age of 78 and became known as a "rock grandma". She appeared with it on Late Night with David Letterman in the United States and on Gay Byrne 's Late Late Show in Ireland. There is a parody by Mr. Stumpfes Zieh & Zupf Kapelle with the title Hond weg .

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Thundertights at discogs.com. Retrieved February 2, 2013 .
  2. ↑ Olaf Benzinger: Rock Hymns. The encyclopedia. Bärenreiter, Kassel 2002, p. 346.
  3. ↑ Olaf Benzinger: Rock Hymns. The encyclopedia. Bärenreiter, Kassel 2002, p. 345.
  4. ^ Lou Reed: Texts. From the American by Diedrich Diederichsen . Kiepenheuer and Witsch, Hamburg 1992, p. 92.
  5. ^ Lou Reed: Texts. From the American by Diedrich Diederichsen. Kiepenheuer and Witsch, Hamburg 1992, p. 93.
  6. ^ Lou Reed: Texts. From the American by Diedrich Diederichsen. Kiepenheuer and Witsch, Hamburg 1992, p. 92 f.
  7. ↑ Lou Reed to have posthumous hit with 'Walk On The Wild Side' ? on the New Musical Express website of October 28, 2013, accessed November 8, 2013.
  8. ^ Karl Bruckmaier : Fuck Andy. Fuck Nico. Fuck Cale. A life with Lou Reed. In: taz of October 28, 2013 ( online , accessed November 2, 2013).
  9. ↑ Lou Reed to have posthumous hit with 'Walk On The Wild Side' ? on the New Musical Express website of October 28, 2013, accessed November 8, 2013.
  10. ↑ German chart blog on November 8, 2013
  11. ↑ 500 Greatest Songs of All Time. Retrieved January 20, 2013 .
  12. ↑ Lou Reed Filmography beiimdb.de. Retrieved February 2, 2013 .
  13. ^ Robbie Williams - Take a walk on the wild side. Retrieved February 2, 2013 .
  14. ^ Rolf Harris Cover Songs. Retrieved January 20, 2013 .
  15. ↑ Kölner Bock at SPIEGEL.de. Retrieved January 20, 2013 .
  16. ↑ Vanessa Paradis: Walk on the Wild Side at allmusic.com. Retrieved January 20, 2013 .
  17. ↑ Züri West - Lue zersch woär that dr wind wääit - hitparade.ch. Retrieved February 16, 2019 .
  18. ↑ Gerty Molzen's Walk on the Wild Side at discogs.com. Retrieved January 26, 2013 .

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