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Tom Verlaine Passes

#41
I discovered Television during the pandemic when I was recording and assembling a vinyl radio show for the host (nobody could do live shows at the station). Each week he gave me a box of records and a playlist and I'd turn it into a show. One week Marquee Moon was on the playlist. I'd never heard of Television but I really liked that song.

I'm now 70 (the show host is in his 60s). It's never too late to discover good new* music. :)

*Edit: Including new-to-me old music.
 
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#44
ElectroVibe said:
Well in 1987 he did release an album and that album was on IRS records. The original label for REM. So there was definitely a fascination with his music around that time.
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Verlaine had nine solo albums across different labels, plus a compilation, so there was always continuing interest in what he was up to, he was just reclusive at times…
Solo albums
 
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#45
ElectroVibe said:
I just listened to Marquee Moon and noticed how mainstream some of it sounded. Guiding Light especially.
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Mainstream? Hardly, in 1977. Maybe now, ears catching up with him 45 years later. Not every song they did had to sound like “Elevation” or “Friction”. What I hear in “Guiding Light”(title lifted from the TV soap), is a bit of doo-wop send up, and a trace of the Rolling Stones’ “Let It Loose”.
 
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#47
Michedelic said:
Mainstream? Hardly, in 1977. Maybe now, ears catching up with him 45 years later. Not every song they did had to sound like “Elevation” or “Friction”. What I hear in “Guiding Light”(title lifted from the TV soap), is a bit of doo-wop send up, and a trace of the Rolling Stones’ “Let It Loose”.
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I love mainstream. I was hearing more like Bob Seger. But that might not have been the song I meant.

Tom's rhythm playing is kind of standard it seems like. Whereas Richard Lloyd was doing inventive stuff on both lead and rhythm guitar.

But I really loved Tom's lead guitar playing.

Friction was one of my favorites when I was younger.
 
#48
Some of my friends got into Marquee Moon around 1991 or so. By that point I had gotten kind of tired of all forms of alternative music. Especially older stuff like that. So I was even tired of that album, at least for a while.

But yesterday I started wondering. Was all of this punk and new wave music just created by arrogant suburban kids, and whose fans were the same?
 
#49
Michedelic said:
Verlaine had nine solo albums across different labels, plus a compilation, so there was always continuing interest in what he was up to, he was just reclusive at times…
Solo albums
Click to expand...

I remember owning his first two solo albums on cassette now that I looked at the covers. I remember really liking the first. I don't know if I got the other one because I mainly bought used back then. But I'm going to listen again.
 
#53
ElectroVibe said:
I just listened to Marquee Moon and noticed how mainstream some of it sounded. Guiding Light especially.
Click to expand...

Listening to the album today with your comment in mind, yes I can hear faint but definite suggestions of “mainstream”. But still not really mainstream in terms of the literal performance. Does that make sense? Probably not.
 
#55
I have a confession to make. He is one of the musicians I have most envied in his ability to leave home to pursue a dream, and go on to create such a legendary band. It will explain some of my earlier posts.
 

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