Another View

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  • Artist: The Velvet Underground
  • Rating: StarStarStarHalf Star
  • Release Date: 1986
  • Total Time: 36:21
  • Type: Compilation (best of)
  • Genre: Rock

Review

After 18 years of having little or no idea of what to do with the Velvet Underground, sometime in 1985 it seems to have suddenly dawned on Verve Records that they had the back catalog of one of America's greatest and most influential rock bands languishing in their vaults, and they began to act accordingly; remastered (and budget-priced) versions of the group's first three albums were released, as well as VU, a superb collection of unreleased Velvet Underground tracks, most of which were recorded for a fourth Verve album that never saw the light of day. Commendably, the label went back to their tape archives a year later looking for more VU goodies, and Another View was the result. One thing that's obvious from the outset is the cream of the band's unreleased material had already been skimmed off for VU, and several of the tracks on Another View are rough demos for which the group never even recorded vocals ("Guess I'm Falling in Love," "Ride Into the Sun," and "I'm Gonna Move Right In" all have lyrics, but you don't hear 'em here). And while the non-bootleg emergence of "I Can't Stand It," "Foggy Notion," and "Temptation Inside Your Heart" made VU a major addition to the Velvet Underground's catalog, it's unclear how many fans were clamoring for an authorized release of second-string tunes like "Ferryboat Bill" and "Coney Island Steeplechase." But if Another View is marginalia, it's marginalia from a truly great band; the rough but rocking takes of "We're Gonna Have a Real Good Time Together" and "Rock & Roll" are great fun, and the two versions of "Hey Mr. Rain" are beautiful explorations of the band's psychedelic undercurrent. Another View isn't essential Velvet Underground, but it's still well worth a listen. ~ Mark Deming, Rovi

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Another View
Compilation album by The Velvet Underground
Released September 1986 (1986-09)
Recorded 1967–69, New York City, New York
Genre Rock
Length 36:21
Language English
Label Verve
Producer The Velvet Underground
The Velvet Underground chronology
VU
(1985)
Another View
(1986)
Peel Slowly and See
(1995)

Another View is an outtakes compilation album by The Velvet Underground. It was released in 1986 by Verve Records and is composed of material recorded between 1967 and 1969.

Composition and collection

When the Velvet Underground moved from Verve Records (who had released their first two albums) to parent company MGM Records, they signed a two-album deal, releasing their third and eponymous album The Velvet Underground in March 1969. Later that same year, however, there was a management change and MGM Records' new CEO, Mike Curb, was brought in to try to rescue the financially struggling label. He decided to purge the record company of its many controversial and unprofitable acts. The Velvet Underground quickly became one of the groups blacklisted and were released from their contract. The band had, however, in the meantime recorded fourteen tracks for possible release as their second MGM album. All of these were shelved and forgotten by their record company until the early Eighties.

As Verve (by then an imprint of Polygram) prepared to re-release the band's three Verve/MGM albums on vinyl and, for the first time, on CD, they found nineteen previously unreleased tracks: five Cale-era tracks and the fourteen "lost album" tracks, some of them in two-track mixdown format, some of them even on multitracks. The cream of the nineteen tracks was released in February 1985 on VU; the rest remained for the time being in the vaults.

In 1986, Polydor decided to prepare a vinyl box set for European release. Simply titled The Velvet Underground, this box, which was released in June, consisted of the band's first three albums, VU, and an untitled bonus album containing the remaining nine tracks from Polygram's vaults. That untitled album was later separately released on vinyl and CD as Another View.

An acetate-sourced alternate mix of this album's version of "Ride into the Sun", featuring vocals by Lou Reed, has appeared on bootlegs and on the Australian box set What Goes On.

As the Velvet Underground moved from MGM to Atlantic, they re-recorded two of the songs on Another View, "Ride into the Sun" and "Rock and Roll", for possible inclusion on Loaded. Only "Rock and Roll" made the grade, but two of the Another View songs would be recycled by Lou Reed during his early solo career: "Ride into the Sun" (on Lou Reed, 1972) and "We're Gonna Have a Real Good Time Together" (on Street Hassle, 1978).

Professional ratings
Review scores
Source Rating
Allmusic 3/5 stars link
Blender (magazine) 3/5 stars link
Robert Christgau A− link

Track listing

All songs written and composed by Lou Reed, John Cale, Sterling Morrison and Maureen Tucker, except where noted. 

Side One
No. Title Original Recording Date Length
1. "We're Gonna Have a Real Good Time Together" (Reed) September 30, 1969 2:56
2. "I'm Gonna Move Right In"   September 27, 1969 6:30
3. "Hey Mr. Rain"   May 29, 1968 4:56
4. "Ride into the Sun"   September 5, 1969 3:20
5. "Coney Island Steeplechase"   May 6, 1969 2:20
Side Two
No. Title Original Recording Date Length
6. "Guess I'm Falling in Love" (Instrumental version) December 5, 1967 3:35
7. "Hey Mr. Rain"   May 29, 1968 5:16
8. "Ferryboat Bill" (Reed, Morrison, Yule, Tucker) June 19, 1969 2:10
9. "Rock and Roll" (Reed) June 19, 1969 5:18

Personnel

The Velvet Underground
Technical staff

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Mentioned in

Best Evidence: The Research Video (1989 History Film)
Benedict, Ruth (Science)