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"I Heard Her Call My Name" is a song by American avant-garde rock band The Velvet Underground. It is the fifth track from the band's second album, White Light/White Heat. It is a particularly loud, brash and aggressive song that features a pair of guitar solos performed by Lou Reed. The heavy levels of guitar distortion as well as the furious (albeit out of tune[original research?]) playing is often attributed to have influenced punk music and heavy metal. Indeed, Zyklon-B Zombie by Throbbing Gristle uses the same rhythm and humourously high levels of distortion, complete with the line "And then my head split open!".
Lou Reed's vocals are especially unintelligible and enthusiastic. He further accents his lyrics by singing them in a purposely demented voice, often adding exclamations of "eehee!" and the like. The lyrics contain some intimation of necrophilia in the lines "Still I know she's long dead and gone,/I heard her call my name..."
In their biography Uptight, the band claimed they were unhappy with the recording of "I Heard Her Call My Name", saying that the recording was a poor attempt to capture the energy of live versions of the song.
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