Velvet Underground Loaded CD

Velvet Underground: Lou Reed (vocals, guitar, piano); Doug Yule (vocals, acoustic & electric guitars, piano, organ, bass, drums); Sterling Morrison (guitar); Moe Tucker (drums).
Additional personnel: Tommy, Bill Yule, Adrian Barber (percussion).
Producers: Geoffrey Haslam, Shel Kagan, The Velvet Underground.
LOADED (THE FULLY LOADED EDITION) is a greatly expanded version of the Velvet Underground's 1970 album LOADED. Disc 1 includes the original album along with outtakes, demos and alternate mixes. Disc 2 - the "Alternate Album" - repeats the sequence of songs from the original album using demos and alternate versions, and adds more demos and outtakes from the same sessions.
The Velvet Underground: Lou Reed (vocals, guitar, piano, harmonica); Doug Yule (vocals, guitar, piano, organ, bass, drums, percussion); Maureen "Moe" Tucker (vocals, percussion); Sterling Morrison (guitar).
Additional personnel: Tommy Castanaro, Bill Yule, Adrian Barber (percussion).
Producers: Geoffrey Haslam, Shel Kagan, The Velvet Underground, Adrian Barber.
Reissue producers: Bill Inglot, Patrick Milligan.
Principally recorded at Atlantic Recording Studios, New York, New York in spring and summer 1970. Originally released on Cotillion (9034). INcludes liner notes by David Fricke.
The Velvet Underground: Lou Reed (guitar); Doug Yule (bass instrument, background vocals); John Cale, Maureen Tucker, Sterling Morrison.
Personnel: Doug Yule (vocals, guitar, piano, organ, drums, percussion); Lou Reed (vocals, harmonica, piano); Maureen Tucker (vocals, percussion); Sterling Morrison (guitar); John Cale (organ); Adrian Barber, Billy Yule (percussion).
Additional personnel: Tommy Castanaro (percussion); Adrian Barber, Billy Yule.
Audio Remixer: Bill Inglot.
Recording information: Atlantic Recording Studio, New York, NY (04/15/1970-04/16/1970).
Illustrator: Stanislaw Zagorski.
Photographer: Jim Cummins.
After The Velvet Underground cut three albums for the jazz-oriented Verve label that earned them lots of notoriety but negligible sales, the group signed with industry powerhouse Atlantic Records in 1970; label head Ahmet Ertegun supposedly asked Lou Reed to avoid sex and drugs in his songs, and instead focus on making an album "loaded with hits." Loaded was the result, and with appropriate irony it turned out to be the first VU album that made any noticeable impact on commercial radio -- and also their swan song, with Reed leaving the group shortly before its release. With John Cale long gone from the band, Doug Yule highly prominent (he sings lead on four of the ten tracks), and Maureen Tucker absent on maternity leave, this is hardly a purist's Velvet Underground album. But while Lou Reed always wrote great rock & roll songs with killer hooks, on Loaded his tunes were at last given a polished but intelligent production that made them sound like the hits they should have been, and there's no arguing that "Sweet Jane" and "Rock and Roll" are as joyously anthemic as anything he's ever recorded. And if this release generally maintains a tight focus on the sunny side of the VU's personality (or would that be Reed's personality?), "New Age" and "Oh! Sweet Nuthin'" prove he had hardly abandoned his contemplative side, and "Train Around the Bend" is a subtle but revealing metaphor for his weariness with the music business. Sterling Morrison once said of Loaded, "It showed that we could have, all along, made truly commercial sounding records," but just as importantly, it proved they could do so without entirely abandoning their musical personality in the process. It's a pity that notion hadn't occurred to anyone a few years earlier. ~ Mark Deming
This does include the original Loaded album, with full-length versions of "Sweet Jane," "Rock & Roll," and "New Age" replacing the earlier edited ones. But that's less than half of the package; the rest of the two-disc, 33-track set is comprised of alternate mixes, alternate taRolling Stone (12/11/03, p.120) - Ranked #109 in Rolling Stone's "500 Greatest Albums Of All Time" - "[A] record that highlights the R&B/doo-wop roots and Sun Records crackle deep inside the Velvets' noir-guitar maelstrom..."
Rolling Stone (12/24/70, p.51) - "...LOADED is merely a refinement of the Velvet Underground's music as it has grown through the course of their past three albums....[it's] a celebration of the spirit of rock 'n' roll..."
Entertainment Weekly (4/4/97, pp.81-82) - "...the rejiggered LOADED makes the original CD sound like it was mixed by monkeys. On the new disc, the guitars are as crisp and up front as the vocals..." - Rating: B+
Q (7/93, p.115) - 4 Stars (out of 5) - "...a laudable album. 'Sweet Jane' and 'Rock & Roll' are the pivotal tracks but the lovely harmonies of 'I Found A Reason' and the extended workout of 'Oh! Sweet Nuthin" stand proud as peak Velvets..."
Q (6/97, p.142) - 4 Stars (out of 5) - "...LOADED was Reed's celebration of his Bril Building-style pop apprenticeship (albeit shot through a warped, jaded filter)....Extra non-album outtakes, sleevenotes by David Fricke and a snazzy 3-D sleeve complete an exemplary package."