Well, it appears that the extremely rare acetate Velvet Underground record that was found at a NYC flea market years ago is now up on eBay. The highest bid at this moment is at $20,099. Goldmine Magazine has the story behind the record in its December issue.
In September of 2002 Warren Hill of Montreal Canada was perusing a box of records at a Chelsea, New York street sale when he happened upon a nice Leadbelly 10" on Folkways, a water damaged copy of the first Modern Lovers LP on Beserkely, and a brittle 12" piece of acetone-covered aluminum with the words "Velvet Underground. 4-25-66. Att N. Dolph" written on the label. He purchased the three records for 75 cents each... ...It took awhile for Warren to visit, but when he did he brought along the acetate. We cued it up and were stunned -- the first song was not "Sunday Morning" as on the "Velvet Underground & Nico" Verve LP, but rather it was "European Son"- the song that is last on that LP, and it was a version neither of us had ever heard before! It was less bombastic and more bluesy than the released version, and it clocked in at a full two minutes longer. I immediately took the needle off the record, and realized that we had something special. Between the two of us we had heard many Velvets outtakes on both official and less than official releases, but the present material had never been heard by either of us. The next few days found us scrambling for clues and information about what to make of this find; calling every record collector/historian we knew and reading everything we could find concerning the early recordings of the VU. We pieced together that this was probably a surviving copy of the legendary Scepter studios recordings which had been regarded as lost (hence the epic moniker "the lost scepter studios recordings" applied to these unheard sessions over the years). The recording is comprised of the primitive first "finished" version of the LP that Andy Warhol had shopped to Columbia as a ready-to-release debut album by his protege collective "The Velvet Underground". This acetate, which is possibly the only surviving copy, represents the first Velvet Underground album as Andy Warhol intended it to be released.
This is amazing, thanks for covering it. Oh, and the current bid is now $100,100.00! Wow. While 'Loaded' is their watermark in my opinion, the first VU was the one that got me into them. What are the chances of the bidding going so high because someone wants to publish it? I'd buy it on cd (not for 100k though ;))f
December 3, 2006 at 4:08 p.m.
jamestown
i surely hope this sees some sort of release. hopefully whoever is dishing out all this cash is not just some yuppie ass-hole collecter intending to impress his friends rather than sharing what sounds like a really interesting listen with all us vu fans.
December 4, 2006 at 12:36 a.m.
John
I'm releasing it right now:http://rapidshare.com/files/4227587/The_Velvet_Underground_and_Nico__Acetate_.ziphttp://rapidshare.com/files/4235098/The_Velvet_Underground_and_Nico__2_.ziphttp://rapidshare.com/files/5292357/The_Velvet_Underground_and_Nico__3_.zipIt's in FLAC format (meaning the audio-quality isn't compromised like with MP3) so you'll need a program like foobar2000 to play and convert it for burning (convert to WAV for burning)http://www.foobar2000.org/
December 4, 2006 at 3:13 p.m.
AJ Wolosenko
Is the above "release" for real?
December 5, 2006 at 8:30 a.m.
fak3r
@JohnThank you for posting the FLACs, this is very cool. Can you give us the lineage of the files? Is this the previously mentioned the Japanese bootleg of the sessions, or is this taken from the acetate we're talking about? Either way, thank you very much.f
January 5, 2007 at 3:38 p.m.
» Velvet Underground Acetate (MP3s) »
[...] Granted someone was nice enough to give the flac files in the comments in the original Prefix post, but it’s Friday and I wanted to give something out for free. Also, those flac files have long been removed. [...]
January 18, 2007 at 7:55 a.m.
Ultra-rare Velvet Underground Vinyl on eBay for ov
[...] UPDATE2: I’ve found more info on the original recording (and the likely source of the FLAC posted for download here - which while it has plenty of surface noise is still very, very cool) plus a full listing of this record on a VU archives site. Check it after the jump. [...]
February 13, 2007 at 9:03 a.m.
Aiel
THe links don't work.Have someone alternative mirrors?
Well, it appears that the extremely rare acetate Velvet Underground record that was found at a NYC flea market years ago is now up on eBay. The highest bid at this moment is at $20,099. Goldmine Magazine has the story behind the record in its December issue.
This is amazing, thanks for covering it. Oh, and the current bid is now $100,100.00! Wow. While 'Loaded' is their watermark in my opinion, the first VU was the one that got me into them. What are the chances of the bidding going so high because someone wants to publish it? I'd buy it on cd (not for 100k though ;))f