Photo used under Creative Commons by rockographer.com
One of my favourite artists of all time is Tom Verlaine, including his work with Television. For quite a while, Verlaine was off my radar, doing production and generally not releasing any Verlaine-like works of solo genius since 1990 (The Wonder). Television regrouped to put out a third record in 1992 and played sporadically between then and now, but have never put out any more recorded material. Verlaine has said that there will be a Television album out someday, but I'm still waiting.
Luckily, there are others out there in blog-land who love Verlaine and Television as much as me.
Captains Dead has made available some fine demos for Television's second album, Adventure. Although the first, Marquee Moon, is considered the classic, Adventure seems to be finally getting its due. Aquarium Drunkard recently released a charity album of L.A. bands covering songs from Adventure.
This is the video that sparked my interest in solo Verlaine; I was a little late in realizing how amazing he is. The sinuous guitar, the unique way he spits out his sing-speak vocals, the decidedly un-rock star-like look (pale-face beatnik in the big-hair 80's? Cool.) all intrigued me, and still do.
Verlaine finally released a couple of new albums in 2006, you can download a tune from Songs and Other Things at the ultra-fine Largehearted Boy blog.
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2 comments:
Thanks for posting the link to the Adventure demos... Since Verlaine's churning out releases at the rate of a sloth these days, I welcome any new old recordings I can get my hands on!
Thanks for commenting, Amy. Yes, releasing new recordings doesn't seem to be Verlaine's priority...but at least he's not putting out bad music just to make a buck, which he could easily do.
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