Re: (TV) TV interview from Relix

[amilcar amarante <amilcaramarante2002@yahoo.com.ar>]

thanks andy !

Andy <andy@notaworry.net> escribis:  PARTING SHOTS

Tom Verlaine: Taking the TV out of Television

[]
In the category of Influential Bands with
Legendary Debut Album that Broke Up Too Soon,
Television is always a top contender. Though the
band periodically regroups for shows with its
original lineup and releases an album even less
frequently, its five-year, two-album existence
from 1973 to 1978 still has lasting influence.
Its magnificent debut, Marquee Moon, is
unequivocally heralded as one of the great
art-rock albums while its leader, Tom Verlaine,
was instrumental in getting CBGBs to become a
live venue for New York Citys burgeoning
underground music community. Verlaine has gone on
to a prolific solo career, releasing ten albums
on his own, including two this year after more
than a decade: Around and Songs and Other Things.
Verlaines angular, jaunty guitar riffs that
defined Marquee Moon have remained with stoic
resignation, as nimble and piercing as ever. So
too have his lyrics returned after an extended
hiatus. Whats more, Television is slowly at work on another album.

One of the first demos you cut with Television
was with Brian Eno, yet it never saw the light of
day. It seems that there was such a natural fit
there as far as aesthetic but clearly it didnt
all go to well. Did you two ever collaborate again?

Thats way back. All I remember about it is that
a guy from Island Records called and said, Im
here in New York. Would you like to do some demos
with this guy Eno, who nobody had heard of. We
said, Yeah, okay. So we went in for two days
and that was it. The band didnt like the sound of them at all.

I also find it intriguing that in your search for
a producer for Televisions first album that you
wanted Rudy Van Gelder, the ultimate master of
capturing and preserving sound. Im curious how
different Marquee Moon would have sounded with
him at the controls versus Andy Johns.

[laughs] I have no idea. But I still like Rudy Van Gelders stuff, though.

Were there any particular albums Rudy was
responsible for that led you to wanting him, like Out to Lunch or something?

Just all that stuff. It all sounded good.
Whenever I put on an album that sounded good as,
his name was on it. So I thought, why not get
him? The only rock record Ive ever seen that he
did was The Free Spirits. Larry Corryell had a
rock group for six months. Its a really wild,
interesting record. Hes a pretty wild guitar player.

One of your two new albums, Around, has a notable
Eastern influence that nods to the amazing
traditions in a similar way jazz greats like Eric
Dolphy or Yusef Latif did. The arid nature of
Indian music seems well suited to your playing style.

[thought-pondering mmmm]. Well, I like all kinds
of music and I grew up hearing all kinds of
music. I think that maybe theres a lot of things
with drones on there. But its also like a lot of
church music from maybe the 14th century-no,
maybe earlier than that; maybe the 12th century.
Usually there was a harmonium in the background.
Theres a woman who was a nun named Hildegard von
Bingen. Those records are really nice. You can
hear the drones in those things, tons of them.
The drones are really a worldwide thing now.

>From what Ive read youre generally a happy
person, though your recorded output has always
been a bit more moody. Around seems very happy
and effusive in a way previous efforts have not. Accurate or no?

Its really not. I hope youre going to print the
questions, too. I wanted to do more kind of
uptempo songs and I also wanted to do the shorter
songs. So I think that leads to a record like
that. And also the jammier songs, kind of like
heres the rhythm and heres the chord thing
which is one chord strummed in a certain way or a
rhythm pattern or something, and I also think
that leads to that kind of feeling.

I guess I say that because I was recently
listening to the recent reissue of Warm Cool.

Ah, fair enough. But yeah, thats a very different vibe going on there.

Songs and Other Things is your first vocal album
since 1990s The Wonder. Given your lyricism and
writing output, was there any particular reason
you stopped recording vocally until recently?

I would just say that I was in a state of
suspended animation and in that state I only
worked around the house and didnt really want to
get involved with the whole recording thing, so I
just wrote lots of different things and I
thought, Well, if Im going to put out this
instrumental record maybe I should just record
some songs as well and see how it goes.

Do you feel as if, with or without lyrics, youre
expressing the same thing essentially?

Yeah, yeah, you could say that. Its different from song to song, of course.

I feel like critics and fans of your music tend
to separate the music and the lyrics and almost attack them separately.

I think most people dont listen to instrumental
music. Thats what it comes down to, whereas the
history of music is equally instrumental. If you
go into a so-called world music bin, theres
equal amounts of both, or you go into classical
music there are more CDs available of
instrumental music. And you have your soundtrack
thing going which used to be 99% instrumental but
which is now reduced to compilations of
almost-hits from platinum-selling artists. Its
just a shame as there are some good soundtracks out there over the years.

Speaking of soundtracks, youve done some. Are
you still doing the silent film soundtracks?

Yeah, thats always kind of around. Its hard to
get gigs with it because the cost of the whole
thing and the licensing of the films. Its
basically a gig that goes to art museums with
screening rooms. So theres not that many of
those in the whole wide world when you get down
to it. We might go to Moscow and do it next year.
Then again we might do a second series, a whole
nother bunch of different films with different music, too.

I saw some Shakespeare in England, and it made
me think about what makes a great artist. Is it
someone whos extremely accurate in describing
something? Or is it someone who is creating
something that has nothing to do with what is
actually happening? The thing is Im becoming
more and more detached from what it is I thought
I wanted.  I dont identify with being a
musician. Have any of these issues resolved
themselves for you or are they an ever-present
type of thing thats constantly changing?

Well, I think the skill to describe anything is
part of it. The sense of purpose isnt
necessarily dramatic, which is something people
dont realize all the time. You imagine someone
doing something theres often a lot of drama that
gets projected on to something; a work of
creation. I have to think about that one more. Its a good question.

I always find it interesting to hear idolized
musicians like yourself say of your profession,
To me, theres minimal glamour in all this. My
idea of success has always been fixed in the same
place. Some records do better than others. Thats all there is.

Well, there is a sense of purpose but it isnt
accompanied by a sense of drama or the word you
use, glamour. Part of it, I always I like the
idea that people can listen to a record 50 years
later, so it doesnt matter what it sounds like
or what anybody thinks about it when its
released. Whatever word we want to use, is one of
those records. In 1965, the Hot Club, Louis
Armstrongs records were some of those records.
And in 1995, Albert Ayler was those records. I
think thats sort of a really important thing to
keep in mind. Likewise, so many records from 1995
were already completely vanished. Whether you get
a good notice or something when the record is
released or no notice or not even hardly the
least, it doesnt really matter. People are
picking up on it 10, 20, 50 years later and
knowing that something-when they know nothing
about the person who did it hardly-is really an important thing for me.

People taking albums seriously versus live. People are burnished. Etc.

Phil Upchurch is a guitarist who has probably
been on 3000 records since 1963. I dont know how
he still makes records now or records with
anybody but some point in the last 15 years he
said, You used to produce a recording but now
you record a production. And this is more and
more true where you have basically now in the top
10 or 20 records, a good deal of them are just
some face or somebody with a song that you can
auto-tune on a computer quickly. The producers are sort of the whole thing.

It seems like you were able to marry that live
spontaneity with something more orchestrated for
your albums, and Television in particular.

Yeah, thats pretty good. Thats the hope, anyway.

In 1984 you said of New York: Its been replaced
by the supermarket mentality. They sit around
talking about shoes and third-rate films. What
would you say the mentality of it is now?

The shoe-store thing is even bigger than it was
in 84. Its just incredible how many ridiculous
shoe stores are here. [laughs] Its just
completely absurd. The other thing that took over
are nail parlors where people get their nails
done. I never saw one of these. I think there was
one on the second floor of some place on 14th
street in the 80s but I never saw one in the
70s and now theres one every block. So shoes
and getting your nails done seem to be extremely important to New Yorkers.

Television periodically comes together with all
its original members in a way like few other
bands of its stature can or do. Is it, as youve
commented about recording guitar solos, simply a question of timing?

We tend to rehearse. We rehearsed over the last
two years, so were gradually working on another
record. One that will get done, who knows its
like so slow. The rehearsals are like once a week
or twice a month. Weve got like six or seven
things were working on. The pressure to write
songs isnt so good. Were not really pursuing a
record deal. When we get this stuff done, well
record it. Its that kind of attitude.

Tom Verlaine was interviewed by Josh Baron.

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