Television

meanwhile
http://www.villagevoice.com/arts/richard-hell-confessions-of-a-book-collector-9824490

It only took me six years to get around picking up the 33-1/3 book. I kind of got burned out on that series as too many were dull slogs for me, including Lethem's Fear of Music. This one is great though. I like how part of it is investigative research to show the conflicting differences in the various accounts, interviews, oral histories and myth making.

So looks like Richard Lloyd has a new book out

I read Lloyd's book. Lots of funny stories about his escapades--the best one involves his driving a car up on a sidewalk, getting the front wheel caught somehow on a wire and having the car hang perpendicular. His account of making Marquee Moon is really good, and in general it's fine. He discounts the third Television album, but I think it sounds great these days and the live footage I've seen of them playing that material is just great, and saw them in NYC on that tour in '92. Saw him play Nashville--he lives in Chattanooga now--last summer and also thought he was superb, tho he can't exactly sing. I even like Rosedale, his last solo album, kinda has a basic rock 'n' roll edge that reminds me of late Hendrix and, on some cuts, ZZ Top if they'd been junkies in the Bowery in 1977. Quite credible album.

Thanks. Wonder how it will stack up next to Grant & I

I have tickets to see him in New Haven in a few months. I have no idea what to expect.

I like the third TV album a great deal.

Why Rosedale? It’s not named after place in Queens is it?

I always thought his tune “Misty Eyes” was based on “Love Is Strange” by Mickey and Sylvia.

On Lloyd's Facebook page, someone posted : Terry Ork was such a Genius & very much ahead of his time ! Richard , can you shed some light on what it was like to work with him ???

His response: Just read my book, with an Amazon link.

He also posts Youtube videos of musicians he likes such as blues guitarist Magic Sam.

Why Rosedale? It’s not named after place in Queens is it?

I always thought his tune “Misty Eyes” was based on “Love Is Strange” by Mickey and Sylvia.

― Some Dusty in Here (James Redd and the Blecchs), Monday, February 5, 2018 9:44 PM (one hour ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

i think it's a reference to "crossroads" as done by the cream

Guys, Rosedale is a town in Mississippi, in the delta, on the river. Down Highway 1. It's in Robert Johnson's song. Lloyd's album is quite listenable--the songs are good and the playing really is "Dolly Dagger"-era Hendrix gone gaga. He did all of side 1 of Marquee Moon. Lloyd's one of the most free-jazz of electric guitarists but he keeps it such control. He even did "Number Nine" and "Thought You Wanted to Know." I'd seen him w/ Television and with Rocket from the Tombs, so it was just great to stand close and watch his hands. The only mistake in his book I found is "Fred Marr" for "Fred Maher," so I assume it was dictated--but who was reading the proofs? I'm with Alfred Soto, though, the third TV album is underrated. I'm also a fan of Verlaine's schneideries and find him droll and wonderful--Dreamtime is a marvelous album, one of the most New York records ever made.

that is, he did Marquee when I saw him in 2017.

I rate the third TV album very very highly myself. My favorite solo Tom is Flashlight. The drum sound may be dated but in terms of guitar thinking and lyric writing it's the best thing he did after MM.

Songs and Other Things is also great musically and lyrically but something bothers me about the mix. Live, those songs killed.

This might have been the first thing I read about Television: "Somebody Somewhere Must Stand Naked," by Patti Smith, in the October 1974 issue of Rock Scene, Lisa & Richard Robinson's pulp mag (invaluable resource for a po' little boy down in the boondocks, where Creem never seemed to be on the same newsstand twice, and you had to trek to Collegetown to get the Voice) http://www.thewonder.co.uk/rckscene.htm
After it was published, a bunch of UK crits and musos flew to NYC---hopefully it turned out better than when Clive Barnes sent Paul Simon to scope, whereupon, according to Creem, "in an all-time classic fuckup, they picked that night to play the whole show dead drunk." Aw how bad/unusual could that have been? Anyway, Eno did produce them demos of course, and maybe the Smith vision->night flight helped that to happen.

Another piece preserved by The Wonder: Trouser Press ed. Ira Robbins writing for a 2001 issue of Mojo, going way back in there for quite a while (in which Lloyd mentions the Penthouse mention that led to a bunch of orders for the Ork single, when mailorder rock was quite a novelty; I was certainly too much of a wuss to try it---think this skin mag piece was the Tosches show review I read, with a mention of Sonny Sharrock, another first for me):
http://www.thewonder.co.uk/mojo.htm

(Skin mags were another handy boondocks music resource; some of xgau's contributions are on his site.)

https://aquariumdrunkard.com/2018/02/08/richard-lloyd-the-aquarium-drunkard-interview/

Guy I know is playing bass with Richard Lloyd but unfortunately I am going to have to miss the show.

when is it?

Tomorrow at Bowery Ballroom. Tonight in New Haven.

bowery electric, i think you mean. he's also playing for free at the hoboken arts festival in may. (as are dream syndicate.)

his latest record rosedale is pretty good. you need to suspend disbelief, a little bit -- he has embraced his terrible vocals to a point where they almost become a feature. the songs are tightly wound and well constructed with some almost stonesy layering of guitars in spots. billy ficca plays on most of the tracks, chris frantz on a couple. there's one where ficca channels his inner mitch mitchell.

ooh did not know about ficca being on there!! Is he in the live band that's playing tonight?

No, this guy: https://www.codenycmag.com/kevin-tooley

ficca and fred smith must be very chill dudes to have put up with the two television guitarists over the decades

Indeed.

And yes the correct venue is The Bowery Electric.

fred smith on stage certainly appears to be the chillest of all chill dudes, the ne plus ultra of chill

I even like Rosedale, his last solo album, kinda has a basic rock 'n' roll edge that reminds me of late Hendrix and, on some cuts, ZZ Top if they'd been junkies in the Bowery in 1977. Quite credible album.

― eddhurt, Monday, February 5, 2018 7:31 PM (two years ago) bookmarkflaglink

does anybody know how i can hear this ? i really really really want to hear this.

i got my copy by mail from him.

ah okay. just emailed him via his website. hopefully will get a response.

well, richard doesn't have any copies and he's unwilling to allow me to pay for files or a burned CD.

the search continues !

Wait, you emailed Richard? I thought you emailed eddhurt.

yeah. i don't have edd's email. do you think he would send me files ?

try him via ilx, but be sure to incl. your email addy; ilx doesn't allow direct replies via ilx screen names (in my experience, anyway)

thanks will do

Yeah, and maybe check if there's anything he might wanna trade.

I love the part in "Venus" where Richard Hell is telling Verlaine "let's dress up like cops - think of what we could do" and Verlaine chickens out, seems perfect for those two

Agreed, it's such a joyful line.

The 1992 reunion album, my first Television purchase, still sounds fantastic. I love Verlaine's affected, archaic lyrics ("Sisters rejoice in a B-minor chord / With wildly impassioned delight") and the way the guitar interplay complements or mocks'em.

I like Tom Verlaine's Dreamtime probably as much as Marquee Moon, and more than Adventure.

I was looking for my LPs of Adventure and Dreamtime recently and couldn't find them, sadly. Perhaps I foolishly sold them at one point. Anyway, the s/t was my first TV purchase too and all three albums + Dreamtime are incredibly solid.

I listen to the s/t Television more than the other two. Verlaine's aging fun nice-guy with jitters all around. Album sounds like a sunny winter day, blindingly bright windows and snow.

The 1992 reunion album, my first Television purchase, still sounds fantastic. I love Verlaine's affected, archaic lyrics ("Sisters rejoice in a B-minor chord / With wildly impassioned delight") and the way the guitar interplay complements or mocks'em.

I've been meaning to revisit this. I couldn't get into it the first time I tried it, but I'll probably just buy a cheap copy (there's tons for a few bucks) and play it on a stereo and give it a real chance. I think there's a good chance I'll come around to it, because I've grown to love three or four of Verlaine's solo albums as well as some choice cuts beyond that.

Anyone see Television in recent years? I've been reluctant to go because I'm so used to hearing the classic bootlegs from the '70s that I have a feeling it'll be hard to shake those expectations.

I saw them in 2014, it was notable that I'd never seen a live act that ran the gamut from absolutely gripping to completely uninvolving (during a long, long unreleased instrumental). I also remember Verlaine making fun of a woman in the front who was apparently complaining.

Flash light is my favorite Tom solo album and my third favorite thing he did after MM and the 1992 s/t

Yeah.. Same.

I did feel a bit disappointed by s/t when it came out, but I did get the cd and tracked down "The Miller's tale" and like it much better now.

(got the cd etc a few years ago etc)

I'm guessing that somewhere on this thread, someone has posted Television's appearance on Later, two numbers from about the time of the release of the third album. If not, definitely worth hunting down on Youtube - really great performances, and at that point things seemed relatively genial between TV and RL.

Ranking

Marquee Moon
Television
Adventure
Cover
Flash Light
Tom Verlaine
Words from the Front
Dreamtime

I've never connected w/Dreamtime, despite its acclaim. Gonna listen to it again on my walk this morning.

Incredible live too so would definitely rank The Old Waldorf and Blow Up as pretty necessary.
& I think pretty much any of the live sets from 1978.
Probably from the previous couple of years too