Televison - s/t

Television (1992) ***

Remarkably, their comeback after a decade and a half layoff picks up right where they left off, with all of the classic elements of the Television sound intact; it says something about the enduring timelessness of Television's spare, angular guitar rock stylistics that they manage to fit snugly as a velvet glove into the '90s alternative rock scene.  So, good news first, now here's the bad news.  If you ever wondered what classic Television would sound like without the passion, warmth, energy, soul, or reason for existing, this is the record for you.  This is exactly the kind of smooth, self-satisfied professionalism that '70s punk stood in opposition to.  The tone is cool to the point of being cold, the sound of professional musicians so easy and relaxed in each other's intuitive company that there's no spark of creative tension - just Lloyd and Verlaine trading licks off each other:  imagine Eric Clapton and Mark Knopfler guitar dueting, only not quite as boring.  Verlaine's voice dropping a register doesn't help, either; his dry, tune-deaf vocals are even more off-putting than ever, as he intones everything in an emotionless monotone that sucks any potential energy from the songs - in short, he sounds bored.  The songs and performances never achieve the transcendent lift-off to make this album seem much more than a self-conscious genre exercise in lovingly, painstakingly recreating the classic Television sound.  Nevertheless, the first half or so contains some relatively solid songs, with "Call Mr. Lee," the clear highlight with its Middle Eastern snake charmer hook; the first track, "1880 or So," gets the disc rolling on a promising start; "Shane, She Wrote This," ain't bad love-pop; and "No Glamour for Willi," works because of not in spite of its cool, relaxed vibe.  But spoken-word tracks like "Rhyme," seem to exist soley to take up space (see:  filler, definition) and the final three tracks are all awful.  Kudos for so brilliantly recreating the Television sound - lots of holes and empty space, it's so rare for modern music to deviate from the wall of density and give the music some breathing room.  Those who've waited since 1978 for the return of Lloyd and Verlaine weaving their web of interlocking tasty licks, this is manna, as you won't be disappointed - tasty licks aplenty to waft in.  But this is the type of album that will only appeal to you if you were already a huge fan of Television in the first place. 

Television - Adventure

Adventure (1978) ***1/2

So, you've just released one of the Greatest Albums of All Time, and as a followup you release an album that's.....pretty good.  Actually, it's more than "pretty good," it's close to excellent (a 3.75 would more precise, but I ain't rounding up this time.  Because I just don't feel like it.)  It's initially underwhelming because Television go for a softer, mellower sound, and in contrast to Marquee Moon's stark audio fidelity, the considerably lusher production job here sounds overproduced.  The problem, though, comes down to the songwriting:  the clear (far and away) highlight is a Richard Lloyd tune, not one of the seven other of Verlaine's.  "Days," is transcendently wistful, glorious pop, quality enough to rival even Ray Davies' tune bearing the same title (yeah, that good), though closer in spirit-if-not-quite-sound of the Gene Clark side of the Byrds than the Kinks.  The rest of the songs simply aren't transcendent.  Adventure doesn't (can't) reach the stellar highs of "Venus" or even "Guiding Light,"; Verlaine's songs are either pleasant trifles such as the boppy opener, "Glory," or the boppy "Careful," or the boppy "Ain't That Nothin' " (wait, wait I think I'm beginning to see a pattern).  Or they are overblown epics such as "Foxhole," (love that "soldier boy!" yell smack in the middle) which works, and "The Fire," which doesn't (nice eerie atmospherics, though).  The album closes with the drifting, almost listless, yet lovely "The Dream's Dream," which at 6:39 is the longest track with the longest guitar solos; "Marquee Moon," it ain't, not by a spitting shot, but leave that comparison aside (which frankly I doubt was possible of any listener in 1978) and you've got a fine composition in its own right.  In short (and this review is much shorter than my review of the debut, because it is a much more lightweight, far less revolutionary, and less substantial LP than its predecessor) this is a good album.  Just not a great album.  It's a sleeper of an album that gets underrated because it gets unfairly shadowed by its counterpart, and listeners coming in with underwhelmed expectations might be shocked out how pleasant and in spots excellent this album is.  But let's not get carried away (reference intended) and overrate it just because it's underrated.  Whew!  Perhaps we should just shutup, forget about the relativity of ratings, and just listen to the music.



Televison - Marquee Moon



Marquee Moon (1977) *****

Let's face it, you buy this album for three songs.  First there's the garage-rock raver, "See No Evil," that kicks off the album like an updated "Satisfaction":  chunky but snakey guitar sound, that is, certainly not attitude - Verlaine's virtually sexless pseudo-nihilism is a million miles removed from Jagger's sleazily wheedling frustrated horniness.  The whole album is quite sexless, which is one differentation that makes this post-punk (the most sexless white rock music this side of prog-rock) not traditional '70s classic rock; and generally not very danceable, which differentiates this from their NYC CBGB peers Ramones/Blondie/Talking Heads and stamps the album as post-punk not New Wave.  It does sit them comfortably next to boho fellow traveler Patti Smith, whose music was as well non-dancey and non-sexy/ist; both she and Verlaine come across as leftover hippies who'd missed the Summer of Love a beatnik too late.  Oh, Verlaine "understands" punk's "destructive urges," but he views the Spirit of '77 from a cooly detached remove.  The second track, "Venus," is pure pop to "See No Evil"'s straight-up rock, and reveals the beatnik romantic in Verlaine's soul:  it's nothing more or less than a paen to the Big Crapple seen from the smitten eyes of a Maryland small-townie as he lifts his gaze to skyscrapers on Broadway.  It's as steely, majestic, and gorgeous as its subject, and the second best song on the album.  That honor goes to the lengthy title track, a stunning tour de force that isn't so much of a tune (though there is indeed a small pop song hidden inside the kernel) as a platform for Verlaine and Lloyd's expressive guitar soloing.  Like I said before in other reviews, I'm no guitar mechanic and I won't pretend to waste time blathering about things I know nothing about.  All I know is that a ten-minute prog-rock track full of extended guitar solos has me hanging on every transcendent chord, and I'm usually averse to those sort of indulgences.

Note that I haven't so far even bothered with an intro to the band or a brief summary of their sound or anything else of the sort.  That's because I'm assuming that any of the small handful of readers stumbling across this blog are already familiar.  A rock crit list of Greatest Albums of All Time without an entry for Marquee Moon would feel hollow and incomplete.  It's a byline in the Rock Critic Manual that we must include it.  As a music geek (and only music geeks read obscure blogs like this) you've heard of this album a hundred times, and have likely heard it a similar amount of times.  The only reason I'm bothering to re-review this is that I need to get this out of the way before I can review Television's followup albums, which are much, much, much less celebrated and so I am presuming some of you may not have heard.

Oh, and yes, I add as almost an afterthought, as you can see from my five-star rating, this album does live up to its hype.  It may not be the greatest album of all time, but it is one of the greatest albums of all time.   It always makes every rock critic best-of list because it's a consensus album.  While I can hardly imagine any rock fan personally totemizing Marquee Moon as his or her most cherished LP of the ages (Verlaine's music is too cool and detached to really reach or speak for anybody's heart and soul, you know), I likewise can't imagine any serious rock fan not enjoying or cherishing this album.  It appeals to all while offending none.  It has a raw, spare sound to appeal to punks and keepers of the garage-rock flame.  It has complex guitar interplay and lengthy epics to appeal to prog-heads and feasters of guitar wankery.  It has shiny crooked hooks and bright little melodies to keep popsters happy.  It's sufficiently angular, barbed, and aconventional to allow cerebral post-punks to stroke their chins along to.  And while in general things that appeal as all things to all people are as a rule of thumb a recipe for bland mush, this album is anything but boring.

I might as well close this review by trawling through the other five tracks, which I'm sure you're dying to hear my thoughts upon.  Of the non-canonical greats that occupy the rest of the space, only "Prove It," I can bring myself to dislike - it's mildly annoying and the lone "prove it!" hook isn't that clever.  "Friction," choogles along in a similar CCR-jam mode, but it rubs me this side of the right way.  "Elevation," boasts a mildly sinister minor-chord entry hook and a nice tension-building chorus.  "Guiding Light," possesses the album's most straightforwardly pretty melody, but it could sorely do with a little tension - as is, it's all merely prettiness, which of course isn't "merely".  "Torn Curtain," closes the album on a moody, almost dark-jazzy note; the guitar crescendo hook immediately after the shouted, angstily anguished choruses is to die for.