"Candy Says" is the first track on the Velvet Underground's self-titled third album.[2] It is one of four songs that Reed explicitly wrote in the voice of a female character, in the case of "Candy Says", a transgender woman, telling her experiences. Each would begin with the woman's name and then be followed by the verb "says". "Stephanie Says" was the first (later adapted into "Caroline Says" on his solo album Berlin).
The song is based on a real person, as it addresses trans woman Candy Darling's desire to escape her gender assigned at birth. Reed insisted that Doug Yule take the lead vocal on the song.
Reed said the song was also "about something more profound and universal, a universal feeling I think all of us have at some point. We look in the mirror and we don't like what we see...I don't know a person alive who doesn't feel that way."[3]
Reed's last public performance, seven months before his death in October 2013, was also "Candy Says" with Antony and the Johnsons, this time in Paris on March 6 of that year.[4]
In popular culture
Anohni's 2003 live version of the song was featured in the 2022 interactive film video game Immortality.
