It was originally featured on Transformer, Reed's second post-Velvet Underground solo album, and as B-side of his major hit, "Walk on the Wild Side".
Its fame was given a boost in the 1990s when it was featured in the 1996 film Trainspotting and after a star-studded version was released as a BBC charity single in 1997, reaching number one in the United Kingdom, Ireland, and Norway.
The original recording, as with the rest of the Transformer album, was produced by David Bowie and Mick Ronson (who also wrote the string arrangement and played piano on the track).
The song was written after Lou Reed and his then fiancée (later his first wife), Bettye Kronstad, spent a day in Central Park.
[11] The song has also appeared in TV shows including Fear the Walking Dead,[12] "The Tenth Meal" the season one finale of The Mist, Doom Patrol,[13] and Our Flag Means Death.
[14] In 2015, the song appeared as ironic counterpoint to the main character Jim Gordon (Ben McKenzie)'s demotion in the season 2 premiere "Damned If You Do..." of the TV series Gotham.
album Music of Quality and Distinction Volume One in 1982 with the track credited to lead singer Glenn Gregory, and the early Human League performed it live numerous times, but the first significant cover came in the 1990s.
It was released in the United Kingdom on March 13, 1995 by EMI and Capitol Records, and reached number 28 on the UK Singles Chart the same month.
[37] Speaking of her collaboration with Dando, she told Steve Harris in 1995: "I met Evan a couple of years ago and we sort of talked about possibly doing something together.
When I was recording the new tracks for [Galore], I thought "Perfect Day" would be a really good song to do as a duet [and that] he would be the ideal person to sing it with me."
MacColl was initially unsure of how to contact Dando, but decided to record the backing track in anticipation of being able to add his contribution at a later date.
[39] Music Week described "Perfect Day" as a "hugely sentimental ballad" with Dando "shockingly in deep-voiced crooner mode".
[41] Jennifer Nine of Melody Maker was critical of what she felt was a 'pablum-smooth rendition", in which "every last bit of menace, irony and life has been sucked out" and MacColl and Dando sound "Prozac-ed into a coma".
Kirsty has one of the most beautiful voices in pop and even old bonkers Lemonhead Evan relocates the plot for long enough to make a husky-but-lovely contribution to the tune.
"[45] In response to accusations from commercial competitors that the corporation had wasted vast sums on the film it was revealed that each artist received a "token" £250, which was at the time the minimum pay for a performance on BBC.
[44] Prompted by huge public demand, the track was released on November 17, 1997,[46] as a charity single for Children in Need, and Reed commented, "I have never been more impressed with a performance of one of my songs.
Seventeen years after "Perfect Day"'s release, the BBC produced a campaign for their new music division where 27 musicians (labelled "The Impossible Orchestra") covered the Beach Boys' "God Only Knows".
A BBC live television event in 2000, which consisted of music programs around the clock, ended in another round-robin performance of "Perfect Day".
She had planned to sing "Perfect Day", but two hours before the show, she was told that Lou Reed had intervened, refusing her permission to perform his song and to include it on her forthcoming album The Gift.
[83][84] Soon after Reed's death in 2013, Cardinal Gianfranco Ravasi, the Vatican's culture minister, made news by tweeting lyrics from the song: Oh, it's such a perfect day I'm glad I spent it with you Oh, such a perfect day You just keep me hanging on As the song is widely interpreted by listeners to be drug-related, the cardinal later clarified that he did not condone drug use.