The Velvet Underground: Velvet Underground Live With Lou Reed (Mercury)

THE GREATEST thing about Lou Reed is that, until recently, his lyrical vocabulary was the perfect compliment to his music. His capacity in both depts. was limited, derivative and full of spunk. Which made for some of the most ideosyncratic, thoroughly unaffected rock 'n roll music this side of, say, Ray Davies. The fact that Reed's lyric talent has by now eclipsed his fundamental musical approach makes him somehow less interesting than in 1969, when he fronted the Velvet Underground.