Television # 5 Television (1992)

' (Marquee Moon)... achieved with two guitars, bass and drums something like what The Byrds and The Velvet Underground might have achieved if they'd been the same group.'  Nick Coleman

'Oh rose of my heart, the vision dims. The time is brief, now the shadow swims.'

1880 or So

 A different mountain now to climb. Somewhere slightly lower in the Himalayas. Television in middle age. The album actually called Television. The one no-one talks about.

In 1992 Television reformed again, out of nowhere and made another record. Not actually in response to overwhelming public demand. Their moment in every respect had long gone. Verlaine had made some solo albums in the meantime to diminishing returns  regardless of how adoring critics tried to build them up. Lloyd had made some solo records too. They received even less notice. The case apparently was closed.

In the meantime the allure of the initial quartet and their CBGB's legend and the undeniable word of mouth appeal of Marquee Moon in particular had built and built. I was one of those who fell under their spell after the actual event. It appeared very frequently, and incredibly high, on lists of the greatest albums ever made.

In some ways I came to Television through Magazine and Echo & The Bunnymen and Siouxsie & The Banshees. Listen to either of those two former bands, or The Banshees after John McGeoch bailed from Magazine and joined them, and you can hear Television loud and clear. They became a band throughout the late seventies and for the whole of the eighties, to listen to if you had any pretentions to play electric guitar or form a band that could play.

So, incredibly in the early Nineties, Television started rehearsing again, and in 1992 an album appeared. and then some TV performances, (notably on Jools Holland), interviews, and a Glastonbury performance, some way down the bill.

What did this all tell us. That Tom Verlaine sounds better playing with Richard Lloyd than he did on his own. That they could still cast a spell. That they were still not quite like any other band.

For the record I like this a lot. It works as a record on its own terms, as a really good album, without necessarily mentioning their two previous studio LPs. Though it doesn't  have a clear, apparent narrative like Marquee Moon and Adventure do. But there are some fine songs, worthy of their legend. Unlike Adventure on Wednesday when Springsteen, Petty and The Cars were mentioned, this one's all Television. Opener 1880 Or So and Call Mr. Lee are the two that seem to stand out and are the songs from the record that the band play every time they perform onstage together, which is highly occasionally nowadays.

But none of the ten songs here sounds out of place or unworthy of their legend. There's plenty of Verlaine and Lloyd sparking off each other and apparently having fun like they did in their golden days. Smith holds the whole thing together, Ficca is less flashy than he was, particularly on Marquee Moon. Verlaine still sounds wonderfully like a goat that's had its throat slit. His lyrics are still  triple entendres, About detectives, sci- fi, mysterious loves, time passing. and invisibility, a particular obsession of his. There's no disguising which band you're listening to. It strikes me as a job very well done.

The band drifted apart relatively quickly again. The 'friction' between Verlaine and Lloyd, that had made them so great but inevitably combustible in the first place is immediately apparent if you read the interview the band gave to Q Magazine at the time. They played together as a quartet occasionally in The States, The UK and elsewhere for the next decade or so. Eventually Lloyd lost patience and says that he won't play with Verlaine again.

He was replaced in the band by an old sparring partner of Verlaine's, Jimmy Rip. Generally adjudged a lesser player to Lloyd but more willing to conform to Verlaine's script. For the record Rip was in the line up when Television played the best of the three times I've seen them on a quite magical night at The Newcastle Sage about ten years back. It was really one for the ages and  though they were great all of the times I saw them I feel I can really say I've seen Television. Even though Richard Lloyd wasn't on the stage. I don't really expect to get the chance to see them again.

Verlaine and the rest of the band are in their seventies now. They were recently advertised as support for Billy Idol, a pairing and billing that seemed odd in every respect. They pulled out at a late stage, due apparently to illness. It seemed altogether for the best.

According to legend Verlaine still lives in the same flat in Manhattan that he's occupied since the Seventies. He and his band remain shrouded in mystery which is clearly the way he wants it. He rarely gives interviews or makes public appearances. He's notoriously grouchy. But I'd say he and his band are responsible for an incredible legacy. They're one of the great loves of my life and I'm not alone..

As a way of signing off on this, who better to turn to than Richard Hell. In many ways the story of Television is as much about him and his relationship with Verlaine as Tom himself or the other three. In 2013 Hell published his memoirs I Dreamed I Was a Very Clean Tramp at a point when you might easily have expected to find him long departed from this world given how he chose to conduct himself in the seventies. 

It's a fascinating if uneven read, which is what you might expect with Hell. But its Epilogue is particularly wonderful. It finds him chancing on his former foil and artistic partner on the streets of New York City where they both came in the late sixties, to make their mark:

'The other night I was walking home from a restaurant when I saw Tom Verlaine going through the dollar bins outside a used bookstore. I'd been surprised to see him there a few times in recent weeks. Usually I only spot him somewhere every two or three years.  In public he always holds himself nervously apart from everyone, meeting no eyes, as if he assumes everyone wants to accost him. His head and neck perch like a raggedly spooked hawk on the high, bulky prospect of his middle-aged body above the crowds, his eyes self-consciously focused on something in the distance. When I see him on the street I don't try to get his attention, but this time I was too curious to let the moment pass. What was he doing? The books in the dollar bin are as useless as they come - outdated text-books, forgotten mass-market trash, operating manuals. I walked up to him and asked . "Finding out anything about flying saucers?" The last time I'd spoken to him in person as opposed to a few e-mails had been seven or eight years before. "Yes, this is the Greek edition." He grinned at me, holding out a Greek-language three-volume set of some sort, proffering  it theatrically as if it were a great, but fragile and possibly dangerous prize and he was an animated cartoon, like Gumby, the way he does. He smiled something else, wide-eyed, going along with the flying saucer stuff. I replied "I hear Plato came from Pluto." He continued to smile widely. His teeth looked brown and broken in the night light, even worse than mine, (he still smokes), and his face was porous and expanded and his hair coarse gray. I turned away and walked on, shocked. We were like two monsters confiding, but that wasn't what shocked me. It was that my feeling was love. I felt grateful for him and believed in him, and inside myself I felt grateful to him and believed in him and inside myself I affirmed the way he is impossible and the way it's impossible to like him. It had never been any different. I felt as close to him as I ever did. What else do I have to believe in? I'm like him for God's sake. I am him."

There we go, Television. They're not a Prog Band. They're not a Pub Rock Band. They're not even a Punk Band. They're just a great band. They're one of the greatest bands this planet has ever seen. Of any kind. They deserve respect. One week was enough. They changed things. I hope you've enjoyed it. I did. Thanks for your comments and reactions.