Tom Verlaine: An Appreciation

I am fairly certain I bought “Marquee Moon” based on reputation and I was a big fan already of the New York punk scene. Everything you can say about the album is true. I think it is fantastic. I also bought “The Blow Up” shortly after- a more messy live affair that has been packaged and repackaged quite a bit over the years. It was a ROIR cassette that showed the band’s live side -adding versions of their early single “Little Johnny Jewel” - a song as adventurous as anything the band did and covers of “Satisfaction”, “Knockin on Heavens Door” and the 13th Floor Elevators “Fire Engine”. I was becoming a fan around the time the band reunited and released a self-titled third album. I was disappointed with the album at the time, although it has grown on me. Verlaine always spoke to me. His path seemed mystical - paired with Richard Hell and Patti Smith in bringing poetry to rock music. Verlaine pops up in another of my favorite artists biographies, working with Jeff Buckley for what would have been the follow up to Grace- a great rock n roll what if. Uncut featured Television a few months ago. Apparently, rumors of a fourth album are an annual occurrence with the possibility of actual recordings as anybody’s guess (Richard Lloyd having checked out of this conversation many years ago) Little Johnny Jewel is also the first track on the fantastic 2015 Ork Records: New York New York compilation