Notes

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Valleydale Ballroom
Columbus, Ohio
November 4, 1966

Source: "Beautiful Friend" 4 CD Nico set

Disc One
1. Melody Laughter *
2. Femme Fatale
3. Venus In Furs
4. The Black Angel's Death Song
5. Lou Says
6. All Tomorrow's Parties
7. I'm Waiting For The Man
8. Heroin
9. Run Run Run
10. The Nothing Song

* This track has been removed as it has been released, though in a different form (17 minutes shorter), on Disc 2 of "Peel Slowly & See."

1966. The Velvet Underground are on the road, and this night the road leads them to Columbus, Ohio, where the gig is at the Valleydale Ballroom. The first and last tracks, "Melody Laughter" and "The Nothing Song," are the only two complete EPI sets ever recorded (indeed, this gig is the only complete VU gig with Nico known to exist). This show was booted many, many times until the definitive, unedited version, entitled "If It's Too Loud for You, Stand Back!" The title comes from the track "Lou Says," where Mr. Reed speaks to the stunned-into-silence crowd. This version of the show was reportedly made in preparation of the 5-disc VU box set Peels Slowly and See (Polydor, 1995). We've heard this show on everything from Nth generation tapes to scratchy vinyl to lesser quality CD's and believe us, this sounds best.

Other folks disagree...

November 4, 1966
Valleydale Ballroom, Columbus, Ohio
Review: Something Was Inevitable by Doug Snyder with photos by Al Brandenberger in WGO#5.

Photos: by Al Brandenberger. 4 shots available in WGO #5.

Tape: audience, 105 mins. Taped by Dick Felton. It also circulates under false pretenses as "Lawrence, Kansas, 1966" or "Cleveland, 4/11/66". The best source is the Move Back! 2-CD set which offers an unedited version of this legendary recording. Some versions of that tape have one minute edited out in the middle of Waiting For The Man. Also at the end of that song you can hear two barkings which are not on the original version. My opinion is that this version was dubbed "through the air" with a microphone in front of a speaker playing the original tape with some bonus noises: the barking dog...

Doug Snyder: "This time one of us - Dick Felton - took a tape recorder. (...) Their equipment manager Dave Faison helped us with an extension cord for our mono recorder. (...) The tape Dick made of the concert ends with him saying, "I'm scared to play it back. I really am." Dick's tape has been bootlegged many times over the years - but never by him. The best known boot is Velvet Underground 1966, which was put out by Bernd Baierschmidt. The LP had Melody Laughter on one side, and The Nothing Song on the other - but were just called "side one" and "side two". Bernd's girlfriend was the mysterious cover girl. Bernd died as the result of a motorcycle crash a couple years later, so I can tell this about him. He had been the one to see the Velvets before the rest of us- probably before anyone else in Ohio, and for years was the cultural arbitrer of Cincinnati from his perch at Kidd's Books. (...) A few months after the EPI came to Ohio, Bernd Baierschmidt and Dick Felton took the Valleydale tape to New York. They called the Factory and asked for Andy. The voice said, "This Is Andy." They took Andy Warhol the tape, and he made a copy."

John Cale: "We worked a huge place in Columbus, Ohio, filled with people drinking and talking. We tuned up for about ten minutes, tuning, fa-da-da, up, da-da-da down. There's a tape of it. Played a whole set to no applause, just silences."

Claimed to be a digital mix of the original tape. The tape isn't edited as on previous released forms. 'Lou Says' is Lou Reed talking to the audence: "If it's too loud for you, move back! Another thing... you have a big space here, and you don't have to stay seated. You know you can do things on the floor." The booklet offered rare photographs and a reprint of an EPI review from Cincinnati Sunday Pictorial Enquirer, Nov. 3, 1966.

vinyl versions came out in 81 & 87. Those records did not include 'Femme Fatale' and the drop-outs were very bad, tape speed was wrong, and a number of other reasons the records can't hold a candle to the 'Move' CD. One of the records named 'Velvet Underground 1966' is the Bernd Baierschmidt version only had ML & TNS on it, aprox 53min. The other record called 'The Warlocks' on the front cover and 'The Falling Spikes' on the back cover on the (Fantastic Plastic 1966 label) came out aprox 6 yrs later. The second record with six songs was less than 35min.

DOUG SNYDER/BOB THOMPSON info from his web site:

1966 Starts writing/performing "folk" songs.

Andy Warhol's Exploding Plastic Inevitable with The Velvet Underground and Nico comes to Cincinnati Music Hall. Likes what he sees/hears (Thompson there that night, too, also with college art class). Finds out Exploding Plastic Inevitable will be in Columbus, Ohio the next night. Drives 100 miles north to find them at Valleydale Ballroom (old, swing-era ballroom). Takes a tape recorder. Velvets equipment manager loans extension cord. Tape becomes much bootlegged "Valleydale Tape." Goes down in Velvets history as only audio documentation of Exploding Plastic Inevitable. A portion (uncredited) on official Velvet Underground box set.

November 3, 1966
Topper Club, Cincinnati, Ohio

Reviews: Something Was Inevitable by Doug Snyder in WGO fanzine #5. Also in
Cincinnati Sunday Pictorial Enquirer, Jan. 8, 1967:

"THE SCENE: The room is huge, dark, crowded. Pinpoints of colored light dart from around the walls, reflected from a mosaic-mirrored ball that hangs from the ceiling. At the far side of the room, on stage, is the Velvet Underground, polka-dotted, pinstriped, booted, wide-belted, dark-spectacled musicians. With them, twisting, turning, leaping, getting the message, is dancer Gerard Malanga. Walking among the tables toward the stage is Nico, tall, casual, stunning in black velvet pea jacket and loose-legged lavender pants. THE SCREEN: Behind the Underground, three films are projected simultaneously on the same screen. Sharing the screen at various time, are members of the Underground sitting at tables and standing along a wall, a pair of lips, Nico's profile, Gerard's staring face, two men binding another to a chair, an ear. Like most home movies, the films are intimate, jerky from the hand-helded camera, and made up of disconnected images. Unlike most home movies, they are way out. THE SOUND: At first it is the amplified throb of single, disconnected guitar notes. Thirty minutes later these have been resolved to a rhythm. Soon after come drummer, guitarist, singer and violinist, and the result is a resounding folk rock. MAKING IT HAPPEN: Feeling the beat, casting his gyrating shadow on the screen behind, giving off his own light flashes from a rhinestone necklace, making it all happen, is Gerard. He works with a bullwhip, sliding it along the floor, cracking it in the air with a choreographic frenzy. HAPPEN?: What happened at the happening was a high gear bombardment of sound, lights, movement, and constantly changing images. ...Whether anyone was turned on or off by the event, whether anything happened besides the happening itself is beside the point. Dig?"