Category: Television

Television :: CBGB, Early 1975

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A hack Hollywood filmmaker would likely use cliched/corny smash cuts to convey the kinetic energy of NYC’s burgeoning mid-seventies punk scene. The tapes tell a different story, with history unspooling at a leisurely pace. These audience recordings of Television at CBGB during a long winter residency at the club — dangerously lo-fi, utterly priceless — are full of awkward tuning breaks, persistent amplifier hum, muttered introductions, cacophonous false starts, muted applause. Something’s happening here, but no one is quite sure what it is.

Television :: Live at the Academy, NYC 12.4.92

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Television have two well-known live albums to their name, both taped in 1978 — the classic ROIR release The Blow-Up, which came out in the early 1980s, and the incendiary Live at the Old Waldorf, emerging about 20 years later. Live at the Academy is much more under the radar; originally sold in unassuming CDR format at merch tables in the 2000s, it’s been available only fleetingly since on various streaming services. This year’s Record Store Day, however, sees the performance getting a well-deserved double LP reissue. It’s a necessary addition to Television’s relatively small discography.

Patti Smith Group / John Cale / Television :: The Palladium, New York City, December 31, 1976

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As mentioned in a recent Aquarium Drunkard Book Club, some of the most entertaining parts of Thurston Moore’s Sonic Life memoir come during his teenage years, way before Sonic Youth was even a twinkle in his eye. A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Fan? From the suburbs of Connecticut, Moore made countless trips into NYC to soak in the punk/CBGB/Max’s Kansas City worlds, catching shows by The Ramones, Suicide, the Dead Boys, Sid Vicious … and Patti Smith, of course. Thurston paints an evocative portrait of this New Year’s Eve blowout, which doubled as Patti’s raucous 30th birthday party. He was dangerously high on mescaline.

Hear it for yourself …

Guiding Light :: A Tom Verlaine Appreciation

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Heartfelt tributes to Tom Verlaine have been pouring in since news broke of his death late last month. A famously enigmatic character, the Television co-founder never went out of his way to make himself lovable — but he was loved all the same. As you’ll see below, Verlaine provided a guiding light for a wide array of artists through the decades. His deeply original approach (to the guitar, to songwriting, to life) went beyond mere influence and inspiration; it seeped inextricably into the DNA of generations of musicians and writers. As a result, this case will likely never be closed …

Television :: Tell A Vision

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A reluctant farewell to Tom Verlaine, who helped define (and then quickly transcended) the NYC punk scene of the 1970s, inspiring countless groups through the decades.

We’ll likely have more to say about the man in the days/weeks to come, but in the meantime, here’s an hour’s worth of Television covers stretching from the 1970s on through the present day, putting a spotlight on the impact the band had on the generations of artists that followed in their wake.