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Focuses on the album that initiated Lou Reed´s commercial success and the ways that it demonstrates the artist´s position as an ambiguous cultural icon during this period.

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Transformer, Lou Reed´s most enduringly popular album, is described with varying labels: it´s often called a glam rock album, a proto-punk album, a commercial breakthrough for Lou Reed, and an album about being gay. And yet, it doesn´t neatly fit into any of these descriptors. Buried underneath the radio-friendly exterior lie coded confessions of the subversive, wounded intelligence that gives this album its staying power as a work of art. Here Lou Reed managed to make a fun, accessible rock´n´roll record that is also a troubled meditation on the ambiguities-sexual, musical and otherwise-that defined his public persona and helped make him one of the most fascinating and influential figures in rock history. Through close listening and personal reflections, songwriter Ezra Furman explores Reed´s and Transformer´s unstable identities, and the secrets the songs challenge us to uncover.

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Introduction
Lou the Queer
Lou the Failure
Lou and Bowie
Side One
"Vicious" - Lou & Hate
"Andy´s Chest" - Lou & Warhol
"Perfect Day" - Lou & Bettye
"Hangin´ Round" - Lou & Coolness
"Walk on the Wild Side" - Lou & the Underworld
Side Break: Lou in the Closet / Transformer in Code
Side Two
"Make Up" - Lou & Gender
"Satellite of Love" - Lou & Pop
"Wagon Wheel" - Lou & Laziness
"New York Telephone Conversation" - Lou & New York
"I´m So Free" - Lou & Freedom
"Goodnight Ladies" - Lou & Lonliness

Outro: The Man Himself
Enormous Thanks

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What Furman has written serves as more than a mere essay on Lou Reed; it´s also a consideration of how the notion of queerness has evolved over time and what Reed meant both to queer culture and to Furman as a person. In its exploration of the nature of art and the artist in its portrayal of marginalized communities, Transformer is a welcome addition to the ever-growing 33 1/3 library. Spectrum Culture

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Furman, Ezra
Ezra Furman is a singer, songwriter and recording artist, former bandleader of Ezra Furman & the Harpoons and current bandleader of Ezra Furman & the Boy-Friends. He has released six albums to critical acclaim and has sold over one hundred records. He lives in Oakland, CA.

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