Lou Reed

A sympathetic portrait of a vastly talented but difficult man

Mojo

No matter how well you know the man and his music, there’s so much more to him that’s never been revealed until now. This book has the menace and allure of Reed’s finest work

Rolling Stone

Plenty has been written about Reed, but only Hermes, to my mind, has gotten Reed’s peculiar balance, of person and poseur, exactly right . . . This biography is as beautifully researched as it is written

The Washington Post

Fans will likely devour many of these stories and want to live inside of them

The Atlantic

Through his all-encompassing focus on Lou, Will Hermes serves up a big slice of late 20th-century New York art history. This is an extraordinary achievement.

Michael Imperioli, author of THE PERFUME BURNED HIS EYES

There have been many biographies of Lou Reed, but Will Hermes has written the definitive life. He has probed into every corner, talked to people the others overlooked, dug up every last clipping and tape, but above all he has brought to the assignment a sharp eye, a clear head, a lucid prose style, and a determination to let Lou be Lou, without judgement

Lucy Sante, author of LOW LIFE

Can literature change your life? Yes ... along came Will Hermes, who cost me several hundred pounds on iTunes and ruptured my relationship with guitars

Nick Hornby, Believer magazine

As in his magisterial Love Goes to Buildings on Fire, Will Hermes again tracks the traces of time in New York City, but now focusing in on one pulse, the scorching light that was Lou Reed. He chronicles the past that made this artist and the future he helped call into being our own, especially the expansive senses of gender and sexuality that Reed longed for and sang about, but never got to benefit from fully. Hermes's empathy for the pain behind his subject's notoriously difficult personality is worthy of the humanity of Reed's songs, and I couldn't offer higher praise

Carl Wilson, author of LET'S TALK ABOUT LOVE

Hermes shrewdly probes Reed's complex personal and professional life . . . Hermes' strength is in identifying and articulating the transformational brilliance of Reed's songwriting and performances within the context of the 1960s and '70s music scene. Reverent about his artistry, he's also discerningly cognizant of Reed's temperamental shortcomings . . . An engrossing, fully dimensional portrait of an influential yet elusive performer

Kirkus Reviews, Starred Review