(TV) OT But who cares - from this week's Portland Mercury

["Michael Olcsvary" <olcsvary@verizon.net>]

http://www.portlandmercury.com/2004-11-25/feature3.html

THE VELVET UNDERGROUND PLAY PORTLAND
by Ryan Dirks



How an Original Velvet Underground Acetate Wound Up in Portland (And Could
Be the Most Expensive Record in the World!)

Yard sales are like junior high dances. You show up full of anticipation,
bump into a lot of people, and then leave disappointed. But in both cases,
an ineffable sense of possibility spawns return, over and over. Maybe this
time I'll slow dance with Tiffany Pfeiffer. Maybe this time I'll find a
first edition of Thomas Pynchon's The Crying of Lot 49. Maybe my life will
change within the hour. 

And so earlier this year, with flickering expectation, Warren Hill picked
through some old records at a yard sale in Chelsea, New York. They seemed
out of place compared with the rest the junk, like a box that had been
forgotten in the attic and left untouched by a string of disinterested
tenants. He pulled out a soggy copy of the Modern Lovers' first LP and then
he saw it, a record with no sleeve and only a few hand-written words on the
label: "Velvet Underground... 4/25/66... N. Dolph." He bought it for $0.75. 


N STANDS FOR NORMAN 


Back in the spring of 1966, Bonanza was lighting TV sets and John Lennon was
declaring the Beatles "more popular than Jesus," but at a Polish Community
Hall called the Dom in New York City's East Village, a modern myth was
created. The Exploding Plastic Inevitable, a music-art-freak-out-happening,
was the collaborative effort of Andy Warhol, his Factory followers, and the
Velvet Underground. Epic versions of songs like "All Tomorrow's Parties"
were played at deafening volumes, dancers cracked whips, colored strobe
lights flashed, and projected films drenched the audience, the walls, and
the band in broken images of Edie Sedgwick's face. 

Warhol was keen to capitalize on the buzz surrounding the events. In hopes
of maintaining the band's abrasive sound and seedy subject matter, he saw
the need for a completed record, one that could be given to record labels
without allowing them creative control. In exchange for one of his
paintings, Warhol asked a sales executive at Columbia Records to oversee a
one-day recording session at the dilapidated Scepter Studios. He would not
be credited as a producer, but he would play an integral part in the Velvet
Underground's earliest studio recordings. That man's name was Norman Dolph. 

On a single day in April, Dolph sat behind Scepter's mixing boards as the
band recorded what they thought would be their first record. Dolph had an
acetate (a metallic "master" record) pressed after-hours at Columbia and
sent it to the executives at the label. He still has the handwritten
response he received when the acetate was returned, one he has paraphrased
as, "You have to be fucking kidding!" 

After the initial rejection, the band would enlist another "ghost" producer,
Tom Wilson, re-recording some of the songs and adding others. Eventually,
all the master tapes would be re-mixed by Wilson and the final product would
be released as The Velvet Underground and Nico. 

THREE CHORDS, THE TRUTH, AND ONE EXPENSIVE RECORD 


Before returning home to Montreal, Warren Hill went to other sales and
bought more records, but when he called longtime friend, Portland's
Mississippi Records' owner Eric Isaacson, the mysterious Velvet Underground
record seemed like the biggest find. 

"We assumed it was a test pressing at first," recalls Isaacson. "I told
Warren we could put an $800 price tag on it and put it on the wall at the
store." 

Once Hill brought the record to Portland, the two began to realize they were
in for a bigger payday. The track list was different than the official
record released by Verve, and a few songs were missing. The sound mix seemed
weird and versions of some of the songs were markedly different than
anything either had heard before. 

"You can damage acetates by playing them too much," says Isaacson, "But I
put it on anyway and right away we were like 'Holy shit!' We knew it was
really important." 

Hill tracked down the phone number for Norman Dolph and, after verifying the
serial number, the former producer confirmed that it was the record he had
pressed for Columbia executives. Because the original master tapes of the
Scepter session have been lost or destroyed, it remains as a one-of-a-kind
testament to the band's first studio session, containing "lost" versions of
"Venus in Furs," "I'm Waiting for the Man," and "Heroin." The last time
Dolph saw the record, it was collecting dust in Warhol's estate. How it
ended up in a Chelsea attic remains a mystery, as does its future. 

"We're petrified and don't really know how to sell it" says Isaacson. "We
got an offer right away for $10,000, but we turned it down." 

Not bad for a $0.75 investment. It now seems likely that the record will
become the most expensive ever sold, exceeding the sale of Bob Dylan's
Blonde on Blonde acetate and topping $40,000. Like finding the U.S.
Constitution behind a painting, it's the kind of event that will drive yard
sale attendance for years to come. 

The record now resides comfortably in a safe house at significant distance
from Mercury readers. 
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