They (UM) asked life long enthusiast and a pretty decent authority on the Velvet Underground, Richard Metzger to pick a track to preview on their soundcloud page.
Metzger did a good job too and chose the little heard recording of "I’m Not a Young Man Anymore". A track which has previously appeared on bootlegs but was never actually studio recorded or released on album. An odd thing in itself as the song compares extremely well with other 1967 White Light White Heat recordings.
Reed himself never said anything about the track or was never asked, and it was only until after his recent death Rolling Stone was asking Thurston Moore (Sonic Youth) for a memory of Lou.
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"I was at South by Southwest in 2008, playing at a Lou Reed appreciation concert. I’d just heard “I’m Not a Young Man Anymore,” which had just surfaced on a Velvet Underground bootleg. It was this powerful song I’d never heard before. Before we went on, I was talking to Lou and told him about it and he said, “How the hell do you know about that song?” I said, “It just surfaced on a bootleg on the Internet.” I said I thought it would be a good song to play since I just turned 50. And when I said that, he looked at me, half smiled and embraced me. It was wonderful and completely unexpected."
With it's insistent riff and classic Reed vocal it embraces all the chaos and experimentation that was Velvet Underground in 1967.
VIA DANGEROUS MINDS
