Lou Reed Transforms His Priorities : With release of his album ‘New York,’ the Godfather of Punk delivers a biting sociopolitical message

Lou Reed’s “New York” album, which arrives in stores Tuesday, is a sobering state of the union address. Unlike anything we’ll hear on Inauguration Day, it’s an angry, disheartened reflection on a country that, Reed suggests, has lost much of its spirit and values.

In songs like “Dirty Blvd.” and “Endless Cycle,” the man who has often been called the Godfather of punk blames apathy and self-interest for a systematic plundering of society’s underclass and the environment.

While these are not new ideas in a time when pop music has become increasingly socially conscious, Reed’s combination of rage and sometimes acidic, R-rated language gives the tunes an unusually blunt, provocative edge.

In the impatient “There Is No Time,” he declares:

This is no time for optimism

This is no time for endless thought

This is no time for my country right or wrong.

Remember what that brought . . .

There are moments of wild imagination and humor in the album. In “Sick of You,” a whacked-out trucker drives into a nuclear reactor and ends up telling his story on the Morton Downey Jr. show, all “glowing and shining.”

But there are also times when Reed--whose “Walk on the Wild Side” has become as much an anthem of ‘70s decadence in pop as the Eagles’ “Life in the Fast Lane”--mirrors the latest headlines or TV news clips.

In the end, Reed challenges today’s priorities:

Does anyone really need a billion - dollar rocket Does anyone need a $60,000 car? . . .

Parts of “New York” seem clumsy and preachy (“Good Evening, Mr. Waldheim”), but there is an artful and compassionate edge beneath the rage that makes the album a galvanizing work.

In fact, “New York” represents in many ways, the artistic return to form for Reed that “Brian Wilson” and “Dream of Life” represented last year for Wilson and Patti Smith, respectively.

The difference is that Reed wasn’t away from the record business for nine years or more. Given the relatively low profile and sales of his ‘80s work, however, many people may have assumed he was.

“There is something different about this album,” Reed said recently. “I signed with a new record company (Sire) and that gave me the luxury of more time and money. I also sat down and tried to figure out what it was that I liked and didn’t like about all my other albums--the sound of the albums. I was never quite happy with most of them.

“I didn’t sit down and say, ‘I’m going to write about this .’ The songs are just what came out. But it shouldn’t be all that surprising. Just look around you these days. There is a lot going on that needs to be written about. I’m certainly not a passive person about this stuff. . . . It’s awful what’s going on.”

With John Cale and Nico in the Andy Warhol-endorsed Velvet Underground band in the late ‘60s, Reed helped define the shadowy, walk-on-the-wild-side tone that has been a model for punk/new wave and other challenging flirtations with urban decadence.

Reed’s solo career, however, has been highly uneven--moments of brilliance (notably the “Berlin” album in 1973) matched by bizarre, sometimes indulgent sidesteps.

The problems with the music was compounded by Reed’s turning to all sorts of freakish images (bondage clothes, psycho-ward stage mannerisms) as if to prove his street credentials were still equal to or beyond such newcomers as Bowie, the New York Dolls and, eventually, the Sex Pistols--all of whom owed him an enormous debt.

Coupled with intriguing stories about his personal life, this combination of hard-boiled themes and images made it difficult for people to know what was real and what was calculated.

Reed has done some interesting work in the ‘80s (notably 1984’s “New Sensations”), but only the faithful seemed to notice. The glow of “New York” should be enough to re-establish Reed as a vital contemporary figure.

Reed, 46, is not an easy man to interview. There was no warmth in his greeting as he stood in a conference room recently at Warner Bros. Records in Burbank, and he wasn’t shy about trying to set ground rules. He told a photographer that he wanted pictures taken before the interview because it distracts him to have the camera clicking while he’s talking.

After the photos, he asked the reporter if the Warner Bros. publicist could stay in the room during the interview--a rare practice. Reed relented when the reporter objected, but he remained wary during the early moments of the 90-minute session. He seemed especially touchy about his personal life and wild-side image.

A question about his surprise participation in the 1986 Amnesty International tour displeased him: What was Reed--a man known for his cynicism and sarcasm--doing on the tour? Would the Lou Reed of 1965 or ’70 or ’75 have been part of that? Would it have seemed too naive?

“Questions like that really annoy me,” he said firmly. “It’s like asking someone: ‘What did you believe in high school. . . . What did you think when you were 19,’ or ‘What did you think when you were 26?’ I don’t know. It wasn’t the same situation. . . .”

Pausing, he said, “Well, I guess I can understand how someone might be surprised (to see me on the Amnesty tour) . . . especially someone who may have been around since 1965. But they would be mistaken. . . . “

Reed spoke at length about the new album itself--how, for the first time, he did extensive rewriting on the songs before going into the studio and how he took pains to make sure he kept the focus of the record on his voice.

“Everything contributes to the feelings I have on this album. I’m a writer and I react to what I see and feel. I have a little house out of (New York City) and I’ve run into some environmental things that happen which are really disturbing.

“(And) there was the meeting of prisoners of conscience on the Amnesty tour, and the everyday experience of watching the city go down the tubes, so to speak, and the state of national politics.”

He’s clearly pleased with the new album and he enjoyed talking about it. Eventually, he even seemed willing to reflect on the contrast between the old “outcast” Reed and the socially responsible artist of “New York.”

At one point, he said, “Through all the changes and things, I’ve always thought of myself primarily as a writer and the guiding principle behind it was always, ‘Wouldn’t it be nice if you could make it for adults and have it treated that way.’

“Certainly the way I looked and acted in the past didn’t sometimes help people see what I was saying or try to say. It lent itself to the personality thing. I sometimes wish you could put out a record with no name, no picture, no nothing . . . so that it didn’t bring all that (personality) to play.”

The longer he spoke, the warmer and more natural he seemed. On the larger issue of his rebel/outcast reputation, Reed said, “It’s funny. I was so disappointed when people started refering to me as this ‘shocking artist.’ Here I was fresh out of college, where I was (used to) all these books and movies about serious subject matter, and I tried to put the same thing in a rock and roll song and people said it was ‘shocking.’ At first, I thought I must have landed on another planet or something.

“It seemed crazy to me. They had made that movie--’Man With the Golden Arm’--years before, so what’s the big deal about calling a song ‘Heroin?’ All you had to do was walk 2 feet in New York to find the situations in those songs.

“During the ‘60s when the whole Flower Power (movement) was going on, we were sitting around in New York, saying, ‘That’s not really a good take on reality.’ It wasn’t like we were these terribly negative people. It just wasn’t what we were seeing.”

By the end of the interview, Reed seemed comfortable enough to acknowledge he hopes the album does affect attitudes. “I would hope people would be touched and changed. I hope it does make them think in an x or y direction a little. My guess is a lot of people feel the way I do and it helps to know you’re not alone in your thoughts . . . that someone is on your side.”