Velvet Underground Acetate Hits Sour Note!

False bid sinks rare LP auction!
Tuesday, December 12, 2006

According to the Globe and Mail, a Canadian man who discovered a rare acetate Velvet Underground album has been thwarted in his attempt to sell the collector's item on Bay. Friday's final bid on the album, The Velvet Underground & Nico (pictured) a staggering $155,406, turned out to be too good to be true.

The Montreal man, Warren Hill, discovered the acetate, a temporary, in-studio medium preferred by musicians to record day-to day-work, at a street sale in New York in 2002. Hill purchased it for 75 cents and, after waiting a day, contacted a friend and fellow music collector, Portland's Erik Issacson, to verify its authenticity. Together, they determined the acetate to be a draft of sorts of Velvet Underground & Nico. The acetate is thought to be a "draft" of the album that Andy Warhol, one of the band's mentors, have tried to sell to labels.

Hill had been nervous as he watched the bidding price of the acetate skyrocket. At that time, Hill told the CBC that "Things have kind of fallen through before so I'm not gonna get too excited about it yet." Hill added that "I just want to wait until things actually happen before I get too excited."

It now seems that the sale, won by a user with the handle "mechadaddy" in the L.A. area, was debunked when a friend of "mechadaddy" bid on the item using his e-mail account. The Globe and Mail quoted part of the reply e-mail from "mechadaddy" that started with "Ohmigod, I'm so sorry." The e-mail offered an apology, which included "I can barely afford gas for my car," let along more than $150,000 for a 40-year-old musical collector's item.

Hill told the Globe and Mail that "I kind of had my doubts early on...especially when the numbers started to jump more than we thought they would." Despite the let-down, Hill remained stoic. "That's the way things go." (Source: CBC Montreal & Globe and Mail)