Lou Reed has crafted a largely brilliant, post-Velvet Underground career by chasing his own black-clad persona, as he cast a curious brand of darkness on everything from the Warhol-era New York that defined his solo career (the timeless Transformer) to the supernatural undertones of his own mortality (his underrated 1992 gem, Magic and Loss). Journalist and NYU professor Ellen Willis once wrote that Lou Reed was an auteur who found common ground with the seemingly disparate rock and roll ideas of ‘self-conscious aesthete’ and ‘self conscious punk’ (Greil Marcus’ Stranded, 1986). So it seems somehow logical that one lyrical master would turn his experimental gaze to the poetry of another, by bringing to music the spirit of some of Edgar Allan Poe’s greatest works on Reed’s new disc, The Raven.

For all its inherent peculiarities and pretentious experimentation, Reed’s Raven is an inspired work, revealing a refreshed artist who still isn’t afraid to venture out onto musical terrain where most artists would rapidly lose their way. The work itself is less about transferring Poe’s immortal words into music and more about harnessing the effect of those words. By sketching a fitting picture in the listener’s head, Reed adequately conveys many of the themes akin to both Poe and Reed: darkness, death, self-destruction, magic and loss. It’s a natural marriage, and Reed’s own restraint (he thankfully doesn’t over-indulge) keeps it afloat.

At first listen, The Raven has a largely disorganized air about it that will instantly turn off the closed-minded and confound even the most open. But give it another go and appreciate Reed’s faith in his own ability to reinvent both Poe and himself. A new, deconstructive reading of Reed’s own ‘Perfect Day’ offers a fresh angle on the tune’s deceptive warmth, and collaborations with the likes of everyone from Blind Boys of Alabama (in a transcendent ‘I Wanna Know’) to spoken word readings of Poe’s poetry from actors Willem Dafoe, Steve Buscemi and Amanda Plummer conjure otherworldly images that Poe himself would embrace.