Loaded is the fourth studio album by American rock band the Velvet Underground, released in November 1970 by Atlantic Records' subsidiary label Cotillion. It was the final album recorded featuring Lou Reed, who had left the band shortly before its release.
In 2003, Loaded was ranked 109 on Rolling Stone magazine's list of the 500 greatest albums of all time.
Reissue on 180gram vinyl – single sleeve.
Review
“After The Velvet Underground cut three albums for the jazz-oriented Verve
label that earned them lots of notoriety but negligible sales, the group signed
with industry powerhouse Atlantic Records in 1970; label head Ahmet Ertegun
supposedly asked Lou Reed to avoid sex and drugs in his songs, and instead focus
on making an album "loaded with hits.” Loaded was the result, and with
appropriate irony it turned out to be the first VU album that made any
noticeable impact on commercial radio – and also their swan song, with Reed
leaving the group shortly before its release. With John Cale long gone from the
band, Doug Yule highly prominent (he sings lead on four of the ten tracks), and
Maureen Tucker absent on maternity leave, this is hardly a purist's Velvet
Underground album. But while Lou Reed always wrote great rock & roll songs
with killer hooks, on Loaded his tunes were at last given a polished but
intelligent production that made them sound like the hits they should have been,
and there's no arguing that “Sweet Jane” and “Rock and Roll” are as
joyously anthemic as anything he's ever recorded. And if this release generally
maintains a tight focus on the sunny side of the VU's personality (or would
that be Reed's personality?), “New Age” and “Oh! Sweet Nuthin'” prove
he had hardly abandoned his contemplative side, and “Train Around the Bend”
is a subtle but revealing metaphor for his weariness with the music business.
Sterling Morrison once said of Loaded, “It showed that we could have, all
along, made truly commercial sounding records,” but just as importantly, it
proved they could do so without entirely abandoning their musical personality in
the process. It's a pity that notion hadn't occurred to anyone a few years
earlier." M Deming – Allmusic.com