Lou Reed grew up in Long Island, New York. During his teens, he received electroshock treatment for depression, and would later cite the experience as damaging and transformative. He formed the Velvet Underground in the mid-1960s with multi-instrumentalist John Cale, guitarist Sterling Morrison, and drummer Maureen Tucker.

After being discovered by Andy Warhol and performing in his multimedia happening Exploding Plastic Inevitable, the band, now with the German model Nico sharing lead vocals, released its debut The Velvet Underground and Nico in 1967. Reed’s songs about the dark side of sex and drugs and the band’s dissonant sound had an enormous influence on punk, glam, metal, and indie music. The Velvets released three more LPs – 1968’s howling  White Light/White Heat, 1969’s gentler The Velvet Underground, and 1970’s poppier Loaded–each exerting a deep impact on future artists, despite selling poorly at the time. 

Reed’s solo career in the 1970s went from the David Bowie-produced glam of 1973’s Transformer (which had the hit “Walk On the Wild Side”) to the grim rock opera Berlin to the pure-noise experiment Metal Machine Music. His excessive drug use and genderqueer sexuality made him an icon of punk experimentation and decadence, but he toned down his wild side in 1980s and 1990s, marrying twice (to the dancer Sylvia Morales, and musician-performance artist Laurie Anderson), and becoming a student of tai chi. In the 2000s, he worked with the trans artist Anohni and hard-rock icons Metallica.

Reed of liver cancer in 2013. —Jon Dolan