When Lou Reed died at 70 last Sunday, I tweeted out a post I’d done back in 2010 about Duran Duran’s 1995 cover of “Perfect Day.” While some purists scoffed at the British synthpop band’s take on “Perfect Day,” Reed called it “the best cover version ever completed of one of my songs.” That’s how a pioneering rock icon rolls.

Another of Reed’s compositions covered during the same early-’90s period that deserves attention is Eye & I’s revamp of The Velvet Underground’s “Venus In Furs.” Affiliated with Living Colour via the Black Rock Coalition, and also signed to Sony/Epic, Eye & I was led by vocalist DK Dyson. The New York outfit released exactly one album, their self-titled 1992 debut.

I discovered Eye & I’s cover of “Venus In Furs” on a label compilation from the same year, Stanley, Son Of Theodore: Yet Another Alternative Music Sampler. Then unfamiliar with the 1967 original, Eye & I’s industrial-funk reimagining of Reed’s ode to S&M was all the education this college student needed at the time. Dyson confidently asserts herself as the center of the hypnotic swirl, tempting, teasing, and winking all the while. Taste the whip.

And if you missed the obituary Laurie Anderson penned for Reed, her late husband, it’s essential reading, as is Michael Stipe’s remembrance.

Purchase Eye & I – “Venus In Furs” (The Velvet Underground cover) via iTunes, Amazon MP3.