The title was printed in Roman numerals, a small act of stubbornness from a band that never did things the easy way. Live MCMXCIII, the concert album by The Velvet Underground, arrived on October 26, 1993, and it carried the weight of one of rock's unlikeliest reunions. The group's classic lineup had come back together barely a year earlier, after more than two decades of silence and bad blood. Three nights at the L'Olympia theatre in Paris, recorded in June of that year, became the official document of that reunion. But the record itself would become a source of fresh friction.
How the reunion came together
The reunion had been a shock. Lou Reed and John Cale, the band's two most forceful personalities, had clashed since the late 1960s, and their relationship remained poor for years. Things briefly thawed in the mid-1980s during royalty negotiations, then soured again after work on Songs for Drella in 1990. What finally pushed them back together was an impromptu performance at an Andy Warhol exhibition in Jouy-en-Josas, France. By 1993, the full lineup was rehearsing for a world tour, and Sire Records, Reed's label at the time, agreed to put out a concert album from the European part of the tour.
For a band that had often played to small, indifferent rooms in the 1960s, the European tour was a different experience. The reunion drew praise from the mainstream rock press and enormous public interest, and many shows sold out or nearly sold out. The Paris concerts were recorded over three consecutive nights, with producer Mike Rathke overseeing the album. John Cale later said the band 'hit the bullseye' on the second night. The setlist leaned heavily on songs from the group's first three albums, with only two pieces from Loaded making the cut.
New songs and long explorations
There were also glimpses of something new. Two previously unheard songs appeared on the recording: 'Velvet Nursery Rhyme', a short joke song in which Reed introduces the band members, and 'Coyote', a collaboration between Reed and Cale. The double album stretched well past two hours, making room for long, exploratory versions of songs like 'Venus in Furs', 'All Tomorrow's Parties', 'Heroin' and 'Pale Blue Eyes'. One track, 'Hey Mr. Rain', was a long, exploratory piece.
But the reunion was fragile. During the six-week European tour, old tensions resurfaced, and by the end of it all further plans had been cancelled. An MTV Unplugged appearance and a new studio album were abandoned. The final collapse was confirmed when Sterling Morrison died in the summer of 1995. The live album, then, was not the beginning of a new chapter but the last full stop. It captured a band that could still generate noise and tension, but could not sustain its own peace.
Reviews of Live MCMXCIII were mixed, and the harshest critic came from inside the band. John Cale expressed disappointment with the album's mix, saying the recording did not convey the group's real sound. He argued that some bootlegs from the tour sounded closer to the truth than this professionally recorded album. The problem, as he saw it, was that the mix had not used the atmosphere of the hall. The band had tried to fill the room with noise, and on the record that physical, enveloping quality was missing.
He argued that some bootlegs from the tour sounded closer to the truth than this professionally recorded album.
So the album stands as a paradox: a document of a reunion that proved the band could still command a stage, and a recording that, in Cale's view, failed to capture what made that stage performance special. The music was there, the songs were there, the four original members were there. But the air in the room, the thing that made a Velvet Underground show feel like an event, did not survive the mixing desk. What remains is a record of a band at the end of its road, still capable of brilliance and still unable to agree on what it had just done.