Tom Verlaine

 I never saw Tom Verlaine or Television live but with his sudden passing I'm realising how much I listened to his music.

I arrived at Television a bit late, I'd found contemporaries Blondie, the Ramones and Talking Heads first The evidence is in my record collection the monumental 'Marquee Moon' LP is budget priced 'Nice Price' release and the second 'Adventure' is a cut-out import bought for £3.49, probably at that hippie run second hand record shop I used to go to in Dundee.  

Those two albums were inspiring, 'Marquee Moon' was like nothing else of it's time (and nothing since). The interplay between the twin guitars of Verlaine and Lloyd is legendary. I've always found 'Adventure' more approachable but nonetheless a sublime and important album. 

I bought the first two solo albums when the came out and played them endlessly. This was brought home to me when I listened to them today, the Sunday after Tom's passing and finding I know them back to front, singing along, well blurting out lyrics tunelessly but accurately. 

I dug those vinyl albums out along with a compilation 'Shake to Date' which contains that iconoclastic single by the the Neon Boys, Verlaine's band with Richard Hell. The early version of 'Love Comes in Spurts' is the well known song that Hell took to the Voidoids but my favourite is 'That's all I know (right now)' it is punk in attitude and approach all incendiary guitar which is probably why Verlaine is often called the godfather of punk. In truth his playing and writing was always more sophisticated than punk perhaps as he said he was inspired by jazz so moved well beyond the one chord wonder limitations of punk. There was always an economy in his playing, it was like he was choosing his path carefully not wasting any notes so the attack was more precise.

Of course Tom Verlaine was originally, like his friend Patti Smith, a poet and somewhere on my bookshelves there is a slim volume shared with Patti that I bought in Grouchos Record Shop in Dundee possibly on the same day that I bought the 12" 'Gloria/My Generation' by the Patti Smith Group in a brown paper bag. 

Tom Verlaine is gone and I might have a slight regret that I didn't see him live but I'm just glad I have the music to listen to and that I have that quartet of albums that I've returned to again and again over the years.

Perhaps bizarrely Television were due to tour with Billy Idol last year, playing large venues - the Hydro in Glasgow - but dropped out due to illness. In hindsight a portent of what we are now mourning. RIP Mr Verlaine, Thank you for the music.