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"Reed drew from a range of literary sources beyond the New York School, including the Beats and the French Symbolist poets Charles Baudelaire, Stéphane Mallarmé, and Arthur Rimbaud, poets who placed primacy on the expression of the immediate sensations of human experience. Just as Reed’s lyrics informed a succession of musicians during the 1970s and the decades that followed, his literary influences seemed contagious as well: David Johansen of the New York Dolls compared his own songwriting to the poetry of Rimbaud; Patti Smith, whose debut album Horses remains the defining "art-punk" record, channeled Baudelaire and Rimbaud; Richard Hell and the Voidoid’s punk anthem, "Blank Generation," was modeled on Rod McKuen’s poem "Beat Generation"; and founding Television member Tom Verlaine changed his name in tribute to the French poet Paul Verlaine. Beyond poetic influence, many of the musicians that emerged from the early New York punk scene also published their own collections of verse, including books by Patti Smith, David Byrne, and Sonic Youth members Lee Renaldo and Thurston Moore.

The Velvet Underground’s legacy is defined by many things: their noisy sound, their intelligent cynicism, and a long list of criminally great songs. The famous saying about the band is that only 100 people heard them, but all 100 started their own bands. However, the Velvet Underground's most enduring contribution to music, arguably, is the world made possible by their lyrics. As David Bowie has said, "The nature of [Reed’s] lyric writing had been hitherto unknown in rock...he supplied us with the street and the landscape, and we peopled it.""

from here.



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