‘Metal Machine Music is a masterpiece!’ David Holzer has played it 1,000 times

About this episode

David Holzer was a Lou Reed fan from the moment he saw Walk On The Wild Side on Top Of The Pops but avoided Metal Machine Music for 42 years as it was supposedly unlistenable. He was transfixed when he finally heard it, began playing it daily and felt so strongly about “the most radical rock record ever made” he tracked down 60 fellow obsessives and wrote the enthralling ‘Lou Reed: Metal Machine Mystic’. And talks to us here from his home in Mallorca about … … why Reed released MMM. To escape a ruinous contract? To boost his avant garde status? To torpedo his career? … how it was made with two guitars feeding back and a one-note ‘Ostrich’ tuning … the multiple rumours – “Part 4 is Part 1 played backwards!” … its inspirational ingredients – Judaism, spirituality, Alice Bailly and Iannis Xenakis … how he hated the reviews of its forerunner Sally Can’t Dance and the people who bought it (and made it his biggest album) … the vindication of its first live performance, in Berlin in 2002 … its brutal reception by rock critics who “thought they were hipper than Lou” … “Reed spent money like a sailor on shore leave” … and what the record reveals when you’ve heard it 1,000