“He takes the piss”: Weyes Blood’s favourite Lou Reed album
Natalie Mering, more commonly known as Weyes Blood, has honed one of the most distinctive voices in contemporary music. This statement stands true for her both literal singing voice and her wider artistic vision. Her vocals hark back to the 1970s, reminiscent of Karen Carpenter or Kate Bush in the way they swing high and low with ease, but there’s more to her sonic singularity than her singing.
Mering somehow carves entire worlds out of albums. Her fourth record, Sonic Rising, is perhaps the greatest example of this. It’s a collection of impossibly coherent chamber pop, full of ethereal synths and bold keys, straddling the past and the present. Lyrically, she tackles her love for the movies, her struggles with modern dating, and even climate change, inviting us into her mind with each soaring sentence.
Even outside of the music, Mering executes a distinctive artistic vision. The cover art for Titanic Rising saw her delving into an underwater bedroom, surrounded by an ethereal light. She’s a truly all-encompassing artist, so it’s no surprise that she looks up to her predecessors, who exercised a similar level of control over their sound and style.
While picking out some of her favourite albums during a conversation with Tidal, Mering shared her love for The Velvet Underground leader and lyricist Lou Reed, and for one of his solo records in particular. Mering considers Reed’s 1979 record The Bells to be one of the records that changed her life, though she admits that it’s “so freaking weird.”
The Bells isn’t quite as well-known as some of Reed’s other full-length solo offerings, such as 1972’s Transformer, which spawned iconic tracks like ‘Perfect Day’ and ‘Walk on the Wild Side’, but it endeared itself to Mering through its weirdness. “He takes the piss,” she explained, “and it’s also really ‘fuck you.’”
There are certainly some silly moments on the record, such as the squelching synths at the opening of second single ‘Disco Mystic’ and the jazzier influences, but Reed somehow pulls it all together seamlessly. It’s a record that doesn’t take itself too seriously – at least until its lengthy final track – which struck a chord with Mering.
Despite the prominence of what she considered to be “weird sound effects” on the record, she surmised that the record really “resonated with [her] as an art piece.” It’s also a record that particularly resonated with Reed himself – he has stated that the titular, closing track, ‘The Bells’, contains his favourite lyrics from his own catalogue.
The Bells certainly is a strange record, a strangeness that has been largely reflected in responses to the album, as critics and audiences struggle to know what to make of it. But Mering clearly appreciates fellow artists who opt to lean into their sonic experiments to give into strange sound effects and genre-blending.
While the sound Mering has honed as Weyes Blood is a far cry from the jazzy rock of The Bells, and even a far cry from Reed’s more subdued solo work and his avant-garde creations for The Velvet Underground, the songwriter still wields a mammoth influence over alternative artists of all genres. Mering’s baroque style isn’t comparable to Reed’s sound, but her devotion to her artistry is.
