Montrealer sells rare Velvet Underground recording on eBay

Last Updated: Sunday, December 10, 2006 | 10:27 AM ET

CBC Arts

The first recording by The Velvet Underground has sold for $155,406 US on eBay, earning a sizeable profit for the Montreal man who bought it at a flea market for 75 cents.

Bidding reached a fever pitch when the 12-inch acetate album was put on the online auction site on Nov. 28.  The first bids hit $20,000 US and climbed until the final bid — the equivalent of $179,876 Cdn — on Friday night.

Lou Reed speaks at The Velvet Underground's induction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in New York in January 1996. He's flanked by John Cale and Martha Morrison, Sterling Morrison's widow.
(Mark Lennihan/Associated Press)

The buyer is still a mystery, identified by the eBay name: "mechadaddy."

The new owner will not be able to re-release the music, which is protected by copyright.

Warren Hill, a collector from Montreal, bought the record — bearing the inscription "The Velvet Underground 5-25-66" — in September 2002 at a junk sale in Manhattan.  When he and a friend cued up the record to listen, they heard a version of the band's European Son they'd never heard before.

"It's in relatively good condition considering the age and fragility of acetate material," said Hill, who adds that he's not a fan of the experimental band.

Hill runs his own record store in Montreal and says that he has no desire to keep what some consider a vital piece of rock history.

The band — which included singer Lou Reed, John Cale, Sterling Morrison and Maureen Tucker — was known for its avant-garde influences. They were taken under the wing of artist Andy Warhol who suggested they use a German singer, Nico. 

The in-studio acetate was made during the Velvet Underground's first recording session over four days in April 1966 at New York's Scepter Studios. It is reportedly only one of two in existence. The other copy is said to be in the hands of the band's drummer Maureen Tucker.

"They re-recorded three songs at a later date at a studio in Los Angeles," said Hill, who notes the songs Heroin and Waiting for the Man as well as European Son are slightly different from what's on the official album.

The Velvet Underground and Nico was released in 1967, also featuring such classics as Venus In Furs, Femme Fatale and I'll Be Your Mirror.

The album only sold 50,000 copies at the time. Rolling Stone magazine has since named it the 13th greatest rock album of all time.