Rebel With A Cause: Why Lou Reed was expelled from the army reserves
To call the life of Lou Reed multi-faceted would be a considerable understatement. Although best known for his work forming pioneering DIY outfit The Velvet Underground alongside John Cale, and creating an expansive and incredibly successful solo career, his music only reflects a small portion of Reed’s life and personality. Particularly during his early life, Reed’s existence seemed to be punctuated by odd occurrences, strange coincidences, and unbelievable events, such as the time he was booted out of the army reserves.
It is no secret that Reed’s early life was fairly tumultuous, but the exact details of those years is rarely afforded the spotlight within Reed’s biography. His college years, in particular, seemed to define a lot of the songwriter’s later character traits and troubles. Initially, the New York native enrolled at New York University, but his time at NYU was cut tragically short after he returned home one day suffering from a mental breakdown.
This experience led to Reed undergoing electroconvulsive therapy, which was incredibly traumatic and caused lasting mental damage to the songwriter. In fact, he wrote about the occasion multiple times, most notably in the 1974 song ‘Kill Your Sons’. Upon recovery, however, Reed then enrolled in a journalism course at Syracuse University in 1960. During his studies, Reed also became a platoon leader for the Reserve Officers’ Training Corps, a university program meant to train future officers of the US Army.
If you know anything about Reed’s outlook on life, his involvement with the US Army certainly seems odd. The songwriter himself never fully revealed why he was involved in the corps, although many universities during the 1950s into the 1960s required all male students to take part in the program in some form. What’s more, the army reserves were often omitted from serving during the Vietnam War or, at least, they were used less frequently in frontline combat roles.
Whether Reed was forced to take part in the program or saw it as an easy way out from dying in a jungle halfway across the world, he soon found that the army was not for him, and he wanted out. Unsurprisingly, though, the US Army — even at a low level during university extracurricular activities — is not easy to wriggle free from. With the protest movement against Vietnam rapidly increasing during Reed’s time at Syracuse, he would have to find a guaranteed way out, either honourably or dishonourably.
So, in a fashion which would come to typify his ‘Rock ‘n’ Roll Animal’ persona, Reed held a gun to the head of his commanding officer. The gun was not loaded, of course, and Reed never intended to go full Private Pyle on anybody, but the risky stunt was enough to see Reed kicked out of the Army reserves program for good.
For many people in the US, being discharged from the ROTC would be a cause of great shame, but for Reed, it was a cause of celebration. Not only was he free from his extra-curricular responsibilities and any ties to the increasingly unpopular US Army, but he was also free to complete the rest of his studies at Syracuse in relative peace. In 1964, he graduated with a bachelor’s degree in the summer of 1964, a few months prior to forming The Velvet Underground alongside John Cale.
Although his time at Syracuse University might be a simple footnote in the incredible story of Lou Reed’s life, his actions during that time echoed his later persona and reputation within the world of rock and roll. He might not have held many more guns to the heads of US Army officers, but that defiant attitude always remained.
