The Lou Reed dialectic continues. In the past, this artist's work has zigzagged between extremes of light and darkness with pendular regularity. The felicitously titled Growing Up in Public at first seems to have dug out of the emotional depths plumbed by Street Hassle (and, to a lesser extent, The Bells)…. Public's material is medium-to-up-tempo songs, thoroughly composed from start to finish. The lyrics are the thing here, emphasized by being printed on the inner sleeve—a rare departure from the Reedian norm.

Those lyrics give the lie to the album's boppy music…. It would be too ingenuous to take the words at face value—this is a Lou Reed album, remember—but the temptation sure is strong. Reed casually tosses around the first person singular …, and refers to parents on four of the album's 11 cuts. "Families" (on The Bells) was merely an appetizer in this respect...