Lou Reed’s just played a famously confrontational show at London’s Hammersmith Odeon that gets off to a bad start when he insists the theatre’s house lights are kept on during his set, which makes large sections of the audience feel uncomfortable, exposed and nervous. Lou then plays most of his new album, The Bells, which hardly anyone here has heard – Lou standing with his back to the room, conducting the band, the crowd growing impatient for something a bit more familiar. There are calls for “Heroin”, “Sweet Jane”, “Walk on the Wild Side” and other signature Lou tunes, which Lou announces he won’t be playing, so anyone who’s come to hear them might as well leave now, which a good part of the crowd does. Lou watches them leave, a disgruntled exodus, and “Heroin” is the first song he plays after the last of them is out the door. The set ends after an interminable version of “You Keep Me Hanging On”, which is sung by Lou’s bass player Ellard “Moose” Bowles and played at excruciating volume.
People on the way out look dazed, deafened by the recent cacophony, drifting towards the exits like they’ve just survived a plane crash. Among them, I notice Lou’s record company PR, Howard Harding, who’s been sent by Lou to find me, with an invitation to meet Lou backstage for a drink. When we get to the backstage bar, however, there’s no sign of Lou. Howard goes off to look for him and returns moments later. Lou’s already on his way with David Bowie for dinner at the Chelsea Rendezvous, a restaurant in South Kensington, where he’d like us to join him. Dinner with Lou and The Thin White Duke? I’m off like a shot.
This is what we find at the restaurant when we arrive: Lou and David in a chummy huddle at the head of their table. Lou’s got his arm around David’s shoulder. David is smiling. Lou’s laughing, slapping the table, dangerously boisterous. Lou sees me, calls me over.
David looks up at me.
“Allan, nice to see you,” he says, extending a hand. “How are you?”
His charm is unnerving.
“ALLAN!” Lou roars, grabbing my hand, nearly breaking a couple of fingers. He yanks me across the table. I almost end up in Bowie’s lap, an elbow in what’s left of Lou’s dinner.
“Do you know Allan?” Lou asks Bowie.
“We meet occasionally,” Bowie tells Lou.
“Did you see the show tonight?” Lou wants to know. I tell him I’m still recovering, which makes him laugh.
“Good,” he says. “What did you think?”
I tell him I felt like I was being given a good pistol-whipping.
“You probably deserved it,” Lou says, snappily.
I decide to leave them to the rest of their supper.
“Yeah,” Lou says. “Go.”
I go. Lou turns back to Bowie. They get their heads down together, an old pals’ act well under way. Lou gets up and waddles down the restaurant to talk to some people at a nearby table. He grabs a chair for Bowie, who’s followed him. There’s a great deal of mutual backslapping, good times remembered. Lou orders Irish coffee, Lou and David raise their glasses in a toast. “To friends.” It’s all rather touching.
They now return to their original places, resume their conversation, getting deep into something, foreheads almost touching over the table. Five minutes later, the place is in uproar. Bowie’s said something to Lou that clearly hasn’t amused him. Lou replies by smacking Bowie in the face, a real clout. Fists are quickly flying. Most of them are Lou’s and they’re being aimed at Bowie, all of them landing with percussive force. Bowie flaps at Lou, uselessly. He ducks, trying to protect himself. Lou’s on his feet, screaming furiously at Bowie, still lashing out. “Don’t you EVER say that to me!” he bellows hysterically. “Don’t you EVER fucking say that to me!” About nine people pile on Lou and wrestle him away from Bowie. There’s an arm around Lou’s throat. He continues to spit insults at Bowie, who sits at the table staring impassively, clearly hoping Lou will go away, just fuck off, calm down, whatever.
Lou shrugs off his minders. There’s a terrible silence – a heavy-hanging thing, ominous. People are watching, open-mouthed, frozen in mute surprise. Lou sits down next to Bowie, whispers something. They embrace. There’s a collective sigh of relief. Lou and Bowie kiss and make up. Meals are resumed, more drinks delivered. It looks like the tiff or whatever it was has blown over. But the next thing I know, Lou is dragging Bowie across the table by his shirt and smacking him in the face. The place explodes in chaos again. Whatever David said to precipitate the first frank exchange of conflicting opinions, he has rather foolishly repeated.
“I told you NEVER to say that,” Lou screeches, batting David about the top of his head. David cowers. Lou gets in a few more solid punches before he’s hauled off the whimpering Bowie. Lou struggles with his minders, tries again to launch himself at Bowie. The silence that follows is this time ghastly. Lou’s people decide to get him out of the place before he blows again. He’s escorted out of the room by an especially burly minder, who frogmarches him to the exit, a restraining arm around his shoulders. Lou’s face is set in a demented dead-eyed scowl. He doesn’t look back. Bowie’s at the head of the table, alone in the evening’s debris. He’s sitting with his head in his hands and appears to be sobbing. I wander over. Bowie asks me to join him.
“There isn’t a chair,” I tell him.
“Then sit on the fucking table,” he says, a little testily. I sit on the table, tell him I’m sorry his reunion with Lou seems to have gone somewhat disastrously awry.
I mention as casually as possible that while I couldn’t quite hear what had been said between them, Lou seemed very upset.
“Yes,” Bowie says, wearily. He seems close to tears.
“It was nothing,” I’m now being told by one of Bowie’s assistants, who looks like she’s just been collecting their coats from the cloakroom. “It’s all over,” she adds.
“It isn’t,” Bowie says then, eyes glaring.
“Are you a reporter?” another of Bowie’s reassembling entourage wants to know. After a fashion I admit. I’m then told to leave.
I protest, tell them Bowie’s just asked me to sit down, suitably indignant. Basically, I just want to know what happened.
This does it for Bowie, who’s on his feet in a flash.
“FUCK OFF!” he shouts. He means me. “If you want to know what happened, you’ll have to ask fucking Lou. He knows what fucking happened.”
Lou’s gone, I remind Bowie.
Bowie, apoplectic now, grabs me by my lapels and starts shaking me. If he hits me, I wonder if I’ll hit him back. Probably.
“Just FUCK OFF!” he yells, shoving me hard. “You’re supposed to be a journalist, go and fucking find him. Ask him what happened. I don’t know.”
He pushes me again, turns away, trips over an upturned chair. I’m grabbed from behind, dragged back to my table. Bowie sits down. Then he stands up. He starts throwing things around, tips the table over. “Ahhhhh, FUCK!” he shouts.
He pushes his way through the restaurant, kicking chairs out of his way, clearly in a fearful flap. He starts to climb the stairs to the street. There’s a potted plant on each step. Bowie smashes most of them on his way out. The remaining guests are speechless. The waiters look on, astonished. Just as Bowie gets to the top of the stairs, I am prompted to call up to him.
Good night, then, Dave!
There’s a kind anguished howl from above, followed by a plant pot that sails over my head and shatters against the wall behind me. Bowie then disappears, still wailing, into the night.