Posts Tagged ‘The Velvet Underground’

Watch: ‘House of 70s’ by Chris Connelly

Posted: 20 August 2026 in Recommended Streams and Videos, Singles and EPs
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Chicago-based alternative music legend Chris Connelly is back with the sensational single ‘House of 70’s’, the invigorating first offering from his new album Doo Wop In The Dark: A Portrait of Lou Reed, out in October via Shipwrecked Industries with distribution by Virtual Label.

Produced by Connelly and his Sons of the Silent Age bandmate Alan Berliant, the adrenaline-fuelled video was produced by Someoddpilot Studios and directed by Chris Eichenseer, originator of the Chicago-based creative force Some Odd Pilot, and features artists Kira Leadholm (Madame Reaper) and Jay Drenkula.

Doo Wop In The Dark echoes Connelly’s critically acclaimed 2022 album Eulogy to Christa: A Tribute to the Music & Mystique of Nico, a colossal 20-track collection exploring one of the most unique, tragic and misunderstood female artists in the history of modern music.

This new record presents a unique mix, including Lou Reed’s own compositions, spanning his career from the Velvet Underground onwards, and songs penned by Connelly, detailing the creative and often turbulent path of Reed’s life from his teenage years through to his death in 2013.

Chris Connelly explains, “’House of 70s’ is Lou Reed’s New York of the early- to mid-70s distilled into a rock song. The 1960s hippy dream burned out, Altamont in the rear-view mirror — while the queens, the uppers, the downers, and the streets are brought to life by Lou’s pen and guitar, a remorseless sarcasm cutting down the competition with a switchblade, Taxi Driver in drag, chain-smoking and blasting the radio at 3 am."

While Connelly and Berliant produced most of the album, four tracks (‘Babyface’, ‘Bye Bye Johnny Viola’, ‘Doin’ The Things That We Want To’, ‘One Too Many Mysteries’’) were produced by Chris Bruce (Meshell Ndegeocello, Seal, Aaron Neville, Bob Dylan, The Waterboys, Sheryl Crow).

Mixed by Berliant and Bruce in Chicago and New York from 2023 to 2026, and mastered by James Scott at Populist Recording & Mastering, this album is dedicated to Chris’ dear friend Zak Boerger (1973 -2025) and also the wildfire, tempestuous spirit of Lewis Allan Reed.

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Connelly’s latest release was for Fini Tribe in 2025 for their colossal 3-disc anthology The Sheer Action of Fini Tribe: 1982-1987. That same year, Connelly also released The Lives and Loves of the Serial Homesick, Vol. 1, a personal album rooted firmly in his hometown of Edinburgh, his second recent album dedicated to his beloved Scotland. Prior to that he also released The Birthday Poems, which features Monica Queen (Belle and Sebastian, Thrum).

As of August 18th, ‘House of 70s’ is available everywhere digitally, including Apple Music, Spotify, Amazon and Bandcamp. On October 16th, Doo Wap In The Dark will be released digitally and as a limited edition two-CD set, with a selection of tracks also being made available on vinyl.

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Listen: ‘Eulogy to Lenny Bruce’ by Chris Connelly

Posted: 16 September 2022 in Recommended Streams and Videos
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Alternative music legend Chris Connelly has announced he will be releasing a long-player paying tribute to the iconic Nico. Originally planned as 10 tracks featuring Connelly’s versions of her songs, once recorded, he decided to write a parallel album of his own compositions, spanning the life of one of the most unique, tragic and misunderstood female artists in the history of music. The result is the 24-track Eulogy to Christa: A Tribute to the Music & Mystique of Nico, to be released in late autumn.

Ahead of this, the Chicago-based Scottish counter-culture artist presents the album’s first single ‘Eulogy to Lenny Bruce’, heralded by some as Connelly’s finest vocal performance. Appearing on Nico’s 1967 album Chelsea Girl, this song was penned by the tragic Tim Hardin about the equally tragic Lenny Bruce with the lyrics slightly altered, Nico describing her sorrow and anger at Bruce’s death.

Listen to ‘Eulogy to Lenny Bruce’ here:

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Connelly once again worked with producer and long-time Connelly collaborator Chris Bruce, a band member of Meshell Ndegeocello, who has also worked with Seal, Aaron Neville, Bob Dylan, The Waterboys, My Brightest Diamond, Cheryl Crow and Sam Phillips.

Eulogy to Christa sees Connelly purposefully adopting the personas of Nico, Lou Reed and John Cale – even Andy Warhol makes a cameo!

Connelly speaks of these early influences: “I was not a stranger to her music, I had been playing The Velvet Underground & Nico to death for about a year, but knew nothing of her solo work until Cosey Fanni Tutti played me ‘Desertshore’ whilst I was visiting her in London in the summer of 1980… Nico’s output was spartan, at that age, I didn’t know why, but I was drawn in deep to the myth, as well as the myth of Lou Reed, The Velvet Underground and the concentric rings of influence in their wake, like so many musicians.”

The album was inspired by the brilliant book You Are Beautiful and You Are Alone by author Jennifer Otter Bickerdicke, who contributed to the liner notes for the album. She writes, “This is a record to be played at full blast, all the way through, as a commemoration not just to Nico the person, the musician, but to art for art’s sake, for making something because it is important and needs to be done – an idea that is as rare and precious as Nico herself.”

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