“For the few brave souls who invested, it was no easy listen. It was the most extreme music the young rock epoch had yet produced”: This 1969 album was a prog leap too far – and it wasn’t even by a prog band

1969: (L-R) Lou Reed, Sterling Morrison, John Cale and Maureen "Moe" Tucker of the rock and roll band "Velvet Underground" pose for a portrait in circa 1969. This lineup of the group was active from March 1968 until June of 1970. (Photo by Michael Ochs Archives/Getty Images).

As part of our continuing mission to identify music that’s prog but not as most people know it, in 2023 Prog cited the example of The Velvet Underground’s second album, 1969’s White Light/White Heat – which was deemed to difficult a listen at the time.

While cited as original pioneers of a simplistic, primal brutality latterly re-branded as punk, the Velvet Underground’s avant-garde and experimental interpretation of pop as outsider art had a seismic influence on prog.