A demo of Men Of Good Fortune, recorded by Lou Reed in 1965 has been uncovered.
The previously unreleased track offers us some rare and early insight into the evolution of the song that would eventually appear, in its finalized form, on Reed’s 1973 Berlin album. It folows on from last onth's unveiling of the earliest known demo of Velvet Underground’s 1967 classic, Heroin was shared. See below.
READ MORE: LISTEN TO LOU REED’S EARLIEST DEMO OF THE VELVET UNDERGROUND CLASSIC, ‘HEROIN’
This latest demo features alternate lyrics and compositions that weighs Men Of Good Fortune more heavily in the folk arena than the psychedelic rocker it would ultimately transform into.
Listen to the track below.
Lou Reed | ‘Men of Good Fortune’ [May 1965 Demo]
"Men of Good Fortune has every trademark of one of the traditional Child Ballads from England and Scotland dating back for centuries and passed on from person to person," Reed's archivists Jason Stern and Don Fleming said in a press release.
"They had rarely been documented in print but were finally compiled in Francis James Child’s landmark book, The English and Scottish Popular Ballads, published between 1882 and 1898. The Child Ballads were a great source of inspiration for folk artists in the early 1960s, with Joan Baez, Bob Dylan, Paul Simon and Fairport Convention borrowing heavily from the book. ... It’s notable how the words to this version of Men of Good Fortune could seemingly fit right in as a variant of a Child Ballad, but it doesn’t appear to borrow lines from the book or other songs, traditional or popular. Reed sings and plays the song alone."
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