Back in the ’60s, teenagers Tom Miller and Richard Meyers ran away from Sanford School in Hockessin (it was a boarding school back then) and went to New York, where they became Tom Verlaine and Richard Hell. Television, the band they started in the ’70s with another Delaware kid, Billy Ficca, became one of the most prominent and influential in lower Manhattan punk scene.
Television’s debut LP, “Marquee Moon,” was its biggest triumph, mixing punk energy with more sophisticated musical ideas, much like Velvet Underground did in its John Cale days. Hell had already departed — he and Verlaine disagreed about how well they should play their instruments, so he was replaced by Richard Lloyd — but Television disbanded after two albums.
Verlaine went on to a long career of solo albums and work as a hired guitarslinger. In 2006 a New York Times reporter asked Verlaine to summarize his life. “Struggling not to have a professional career,” he replied. He died in New York Saturday at age 73.
Like several other tracks on Verlaine’s eponymous debut LP, this was intended for Television and shows a strong VU influence. It features the guitar work of Ricky Wilson of the B-52s. I dunno who remastered the audio on this or how, but it sounds better than the original to me.
