Marquee Moon: Tears... POLLING back the years

prove it, easy

venus 2nd best

this definitely ranks among my top five albums and i couldn't begin 2 think what is the best song off of this, would be like picking ur favourite child imo

well except that guiding light is the weak link

It's a pretty perfect record. After all these years, I still love hearing the entire 10 minutes of the title track.

either venus duh meeeelo or mr. que moon

life in the hive puckered up my liefff

the kiss o deth the emberace of lighut

and her i stand

hesitatin

Lloyd's guitar part on "Venus" is incredible -- just a beautiful piece of music throughout. I'd love to hear him play it as a solo guitar piece.

the little harmonics at the start of prove it kill me!

tom verlaine doing an impression of patti smith is more awesome than actual patti smith imo

also how melodramatic and noirish the opening guitar part is on torn curtain is like a steely dan but way better

"How does a snake get out of its skin? Here's a depiction" = one of the cooler things to say before a guitar solo ...

prove it. i used to sit on my bed and play air drums to this whole album every morning when i was in high school. it's how i learned to play for real.

is that what he says there!? xp

yeah this was totally my favourite album in secondary school!

i thought i was so cool when i finally figured out how to play prove it on the guitar!

You complain of my DICK-tion.

well except that guiding light is the weak link

aw no wai, the guitar solo is transcendent!!

anyway i will boringly vote for the title track

wait i will play it again tonight, i'm willing to let this record take me by surprise again!

Voted title track, being boring for this poll too. But it is just too epic to do otherwise.

Not much to say about this record that hasn't already been said.

Voting See No Evil, because that may get overlooked.

haven't felt the urge to listen to this in years but i saw them at a festival once and i was feeling extremely uh delicate and Venus reduced me to a blubbering wreck so i'll go for that

"venus de miloooooo." i love the way tom verlaine sang that line.

venus

Voted title track, being boring for this poll too. But it is just too epic to do otherwise.

― The Perfect Weapon 2, Wednesday, November 25, 2009 8:00 PM (1 hour ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

See no evil.

as much as I find "venus" to be a perfect little jewel of a song, "marquee moon" can't be denied - that starstruck coda is the aural manifestation of wonder & awe. the way they casually sashay up the staircase toward ineffable B.U.T., deliberate, devoid of pretense, like they're fetching the mail, it gets me every time.

I have a very distinct memory of the first time I heard it, just another song on the car radio. I pulled into the driveway, sat and listened for a while, then drove back out again.

see no evil for the hook but this album is so perfect.

wow don't even have this on the hard disk now when i used to own it on cd. By memory: Marquee moon or See No Evil. Going with the former.

saw a guy i know play a show recently and he did a slow version of "See No Evil" on electric mandolin that was awesome, song is surprisingly adaptable

also have a soft spot for Mike Watt's angry pirate renditions of "Friction" and "Venus"

add me to the boring ppl voting for marky moon and the punky bunch

I've listened to this a gazillion times but am totally blanking on "see no evil"

can somebody hum a few bars

evilllllllllllllllllllllllllll

i see
i see no
evulllllll

*guitar mouth noises*

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kb3G4D3FKNg

I keep singing "see no evil" to the tune of the other songs and cursing

it's like I have new wave tourette's

'adventure' is pretty good, too, imo

Chris Stamey does a nice, mellow version of "Venus" on some record (w/ Yo La Tengo backing) ... worth seeking out!

I am non-youtube capable right now but thx for that and also for the soulful message board renditions

xp

Adventure is great -- at this point, after having listened to Marquee Moon a bazillion times, that one is the one I reach for more often.

^^^^ yeah, ditto!

One ridiculous thing about Marquee Moon is that every single note Richard Lloyd plays on it is double tracked. An insane feat of guitar heroism.

(the album as a whole, not just the title track)

i don't really like adventure :(

give it another try! DO IT.

i'm still occasionally pulling out Adventure and trying to get into it, so far no luck

adventure never did much for me either. "the fire" has a wicked solo though

i will try again, i'm pretty sure i haven't listened to it since 2004/5.

c'mon the solo here is about as good as it gets
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BKgyjw478B8

Dunno, "Guiding Light" is really growing on me. But I'm leaning toward "Prove It" 'cause "this case is CLOSED"

Elevation has grown on me over the years that I have to vote that.

c'mon the solo here is about as good as it gets
― tylerw, Thursday, November 26, 2009 4:16 AM (25 minutes ago)

thanks for the clip--awesome!

I did a "Friction" thing because the guitar frackin' SIZZLES

This one's pretty great too, but it takes a couple minutes to get going. Kind of Jerry Garcia-esque in the middle for a while. In two parts.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rYFn8NUicY4

'Venus'. My local mall plays it as muzak occasionally.

"See No Evil" over the title track.

'Prove it' was a real highlight the two times I saw Television live - Verlaine didn't seem bored with it at all - so I'm voting for that over long long term fave 'Venus' (it was years before I clocked the gag abt 'falling into the arms of Venus de Milo') - love the Kronos Quartet version of 'Marquee Moon'

"Didja Feel Low??"

Probably my favourite album. Lloyd & Verlaine's guitar sounds are just unbeatable and the drums are recorded (and played, of course) so well. When you listen to some of the over-compressed, zero dynamics production travesties that get released these days,it just shows how RIGHT this sounds. My vote goes to See No Evil, just cos I've been playing it with a band recently and I never get tired of either playing or hearing it.

Never understood the criticism of Adventure - if MM is a 10, Adv is a 9.8. Great record.

Never understood the criticism of Adventure - if MM is a 10, Adv is a 9.8. Great record.

I have said this exact thing, many times, here.

No harm in saying it again, Mark! Actually if MM is a 10 and Adv is a 9.8, I reckon 'The Blow Up' is a 9.9 and the S/T album a 9.5.

MMmm, never got into the ST one. "Flashlight" seemed more in tune with Television of old to me. Possibly because of the reverb (the first two albums had very little)

I've never wanted to hear any of their other records - in fact 'Days' is the only track I think I've even heard. I just can't imagine them having anywhere left to go.

^ Recommend listening to all of "Adventure"

The problem with Adventure is it's their first step into old fartdom.

The songs are good, but it's far too sedate. Even it's can't-miss rocker, Ain't That Nothin', with a riff that sounds like it's from Mt. Olympus, fails to cook compared to live versions.

I saw this poll at work and couldn't wait to get home and re-listen to this to vote, then decided on Venus seconds after it came on.

The rest of this thing is brilliant though, I usually don't like my music so meticulous-sounding, but they just make it sound so effortless.

The problem with Adventure is it's their first step into old fartdom.

Probably, yes, but I swear there are bits of "The Dream's Dream" that are the most beautiful electric guitar playing I've ever heard in my life (outside of Popol Vuh)

SHIT TORN CURTAIN IS ALSO AMAZING WHAT HAVE I DONE

There are aspects of Adventure I prefer — whenever MM tries to get all emotional at you the results can be kind of stilted and awkward, like on 'Guiding Light' and the lyric that's been excerpted for the thread title. But yeah the drumming's nowhere near as epic or anything.

I am voting for 'Marquee Moon', because I mean come on now

"Guiding Light" is awesome

there are bits of "The Dream's Dream"

Yes. But that's the best song on the whole record. What's good by Popul Vuh?

I don't think it's the best song on the record, I'm not sure I even like the song as a whole, just bits of it! Search for Popol Vuh thread.

Saw Television in the New Bands Tent(!) in Glastonbury in 2003 or so, brain hasn't been the same since.

Always have a soft spot for Venus, as it's where Lawrence got the name of Felt from. But it's the title track really, isn't it?

I first got into Television with the eponymous 1992 album, so I'd probably give it an 8.

This really ought to be impossible; I love the guitar figure that ends the verses of Elevation but the climactic DUH-DUH-DUH bit of Marquee Moon is just undeniable all time next level shit

Also pretty sure the solo on Torn Curtain isn't particularly complex or musically out of the ordinary anything but something about is just "wait...what...what are you DOING?" to me

It's fairly out of the ordinary... unless you're Richard Thompson

it can't be anything but the title track for me, the part after the aforementioned DUH-DUH-DUH bit where they make their guitars sound like SEAGULLS always kills me.

I don't think there's anything "boring" about voting for the title track here - it's massive and pulls off the feat of being a eleven minute song that doesn't feel like one at any point. Of course I voted for it but as has already been said, any of the other tracks would be correct, too.

THINK I"M VOTIN VENUS BTW!

anyone who likes that self-titled 90s record should get thee over here: http://doomandgloomfromthetomb.tumblr.com/post/243843224/no-glamour-after-a-14-year-hiatus-television

I still can't remember how "see no evil" goes, even after looking up the lyrics online

baffling

reading the lyrics to the album, I know why my two favorites are "venus" and "marquee moon". "prove it" has an insanely catchy chorus but "prove it to the facts" doesn't say as much as "I was listening, listening to the rain, I was hearing, hearing something else". gives me goosebumps.

its the one with all the overlapping vocal lines?

its the one with the coolest guitar riff ever?

Kind of starts like the Velvets' "Temptation Inside Your Heart"?

da na dunn! da na dunn!

i never notices this but YES!

I think it's no accident either

yeah, the neon boys is virtually a velvets cover band so that's not surprising

ok I remember the chorus to "see no evil" now

will be at a computer shortly so I can listen to the whole thing

it's kind of bizarre to not remember how the first song on one of yr favorite albums goes, maybe I should get a cat scan or something

eff. are. eye. see. tee!-eye!-oh!-en!

i doubt anyone had heard "temptation inside your heart" circa 1975 ... that wasn't bootlegged for awhile i think!

i wonder if Quine had a live version of it that some of those guys got to hear, er summink.
M-squared gets my vote. but this is another album with absolutely zero weak links. And i love adventure, too, if we're keeping score

yeah i suppose both the modern lovers and rocket from the tombs were covering Foggy Notion around then .... figured they learned it from live tapes though ...

never heard a live VU version of "temptation" though ....

I recognise sonderangerbot's bed drumming, this record gets me absent-mindedly air-playing along like no other. Prove it has gorgeous guitar, I love the bass and skirmish guitar moves on the verse of friction and everything about see no evil, especially the last minute. But marquee moon is too special, it has an awesome beat and the way the parts fit around each other is clearly too good even for edward to forget. It's kind of relaxed. And the vocals make it.

ok ok I listened to see no evil... how did I forget that dragstrip riff? the art of for-real forgetfulness

Damn, I should've given 'Torn Curtain' my vote - the extraordinary tension in that guitar solo until it breaks and lets the other one in. It's like standing at the bottom of a spiral staircase and watching two people ascend forever.

To think that the first couple of times I heard this, I interpreted it as impenetrably drab po-faced rock, when it's anything but. Can't really choose a fave - it has to be a toss up between Prove It and the title track though.

"Elevation"'s got one of the weirdest, nigh-unplayable choruses ever: "Elevation/Don't go to my hea-"BRANNGG! It's like they took a razor to the tape and sliced out a coupla inches everytime that line comes around. In fact I wouldn't be surprised if thats exactly what they did. Boringly, though, I gotta give it to "MM" itself.

Also, Billy Ficca is ridiculously undersung.

"Elevation"'s got one of the weirdest, nigh-unplayable choruses ever: "Elevation/Don't go to my hea-"BRANNGG! It's like they took a razor to the tape and sliced out a coupla inches everytime that line comes around. In fact I wouldn't be surprised if thats exactly what they did.

i bought this on 2nd hand vinyl as a teenager and was convinced for years it was a scratch on the disk.

You People...

(title track is obviously great but) Friction please.

I don't think there's anything "boring" about voting for the title track here - it's massive and pulls off the feat of being a eleven minute song that doesn't feel like one at any point.

Exactly - what could be more boring than voting for the track that's most voteworthy?

lighten up! it's only 'boring' because contention is more interesting than unanimity

actually that comment is right on one thing, marquee moon makes 10 minutes go by like 3

i doubt anyone had heard "temptation inside your heart" circa 1975 ... that wasn't bootlegged for awhile i think!

I didn't know "See No Evil" was written in 1975. Anyway, that famous bootleg single with "Temptation Inside Your Heart", "Foggy Notion" and "I'm Sticking With You" was definitely around in (Britain) in 1977.

Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.

Automatic thread bump. This poll's results are now in.

nice turnout!

wow

missed this! wd have probably voted 'see no evil'. because it rocks so so SO so hard. amazed that 'torn curtain' has done so badly - i really dig that one!

Torn Curtain is soooo good. I probably wouldn't have voted for it ultimately but it would have caused distinct hesitation before pulling the trigger on either Marquee Moon or See No Evil.

Boring! (Apparently.)

hahaha rabies has basically described my exact thought process

Side 1 - 87 votes
Side 2 -7 votes.

which is so deceptive, side 2 is great

justice

a more positive way to look at it is that every track got a vote - that really doesn't happen often in ILM album polls

i woulda spread some love to "Prove It" but some days the title track is my favorite song ever

results are a bit exaggerated, but yeah title track is such a rare thing as a 10+ min song i wanna hear again as soon as it's over

to the other guy who voted for "Elevation": sup dude??

lol! SUP WICH U ??

i hope this ends in marriage

i voted torn curtain. i have no regrets.

The song "Marquee Moon" was done in one take; drummer Billy Ficca thought that they were rehearsing.

omg!!

t0dd you better not have regrets; you prevented a great wrong

Daaamn @ MM in one take

hahahaha oh dang! xxxp

!
I am not following you around I swear.

why didn't i vote in this?

woulda added another drop in the bucket to "see no evil"

"Prove It" should have had more votes.

I reckons if we did a 'second place' poll,it'd be way up.

http://img134.imageshack.us/img134/6283/torncurtain.jpg

This is ridiculous - I had this on this morning, it gave me the shivers as reliably as ever. Not that I voted for it myself of course.

Yeah as noted above I feel really, really bad about not voting for it.

I don't think I voted in this but I would have been happy to vote for Torn Curtain just to give it a crooked number

So....are we doing Adventure next?

"I neeeed, a great Adventure, NOW!"

I think the top 3 is spot on in those results. It's a shame Guiding Light didn't get a bit more love it's so sweet.

OK, OK, I guess such a huge majority victory is pretty unboring! (Or at least boring in an interesting way)

Haha, I think I forgot to vote in this. The album is too perfect -- my subconscious wouldn't let me decide! Would've probably gone with the title track though.

So, do you prefer the "faded" version as on the LP, or the 'conclusion' version as on the CD?

what?

The Title track.

i had a long discussion with a friend once -- he preferred the faded version, because it suggests that the song never ends, that it just starts over and over and again. Which is a good argument. I think I prefer the conclusion though ...

I had that 'never ending' feeling too.

There was a 'live in the studio' version on the back of one of TVerlaine's solo singles that had the conclusion, recorded with his touring band in 1987 (they were a name band, forget who right now)

Still, can't choose.

I had no idea there were two versions. I had the cassette, now I have an mp3. I think they both fade out. Urgent investigation required.

touring band from the 80s had Fred Smith, Jay Dee Daugherty and Jimmy Ripp ... They're great, actually, live shows from that period are amazing.

I have that 1987 live-in-studio one somewhere...

Yeah the late 80s band was super awesome.

This link still works, if anyone's interested: http://doomandgloomfromthetomb.tumblr.com/post/157571178/souvenir-from-a-dream-its-been-a-couple-months

The Verlaine-Ripp-Smith-JD line-up are on the live disc of 'The Miller's Tale' TV anthology. That's 1982 IIRC. I think MM is around 17 minutes there.

Ah got it: The band on that version of Marquee Moon:

"Love and Money"

Now you tell me they were going right through the 80s?! Why didn't they release anything?

Television weren't -- this is Verlaine solo we're talking about.

xp that's the line-up in the clip linked up thread right? i think Billy Ficca deserves a better rep, i think it's odd he didn't play on more (famous) records in the 80's

It's downright inexplicable why people don't hire Ficca all over the place, he's a monster. I know Gary Lucas plays with him but that's it...?

are the Lucas albums any good?

I've owned I think 4 gary Lucas albums and they've been, ultimately, non-keepers for me. Annoyingly eclectic. I sort of wish I still had Killer Shrews, his power trio with Jon Langford and Tony Maimone, that was a fun record. And there were 3 or 4 really good avant-pop songs on the first Gods And Monsters record sung by the Woodentops guy and Mary Margaret O'Hara.

I don't know if Lucas has recorded with Ficca at all, I was just going by concert listings I've seen in the Village Voice over the last couple of years.

Ficca played in the Waitresses, right? I don't know much about them beyond "I Know What Boys Like" ... But yeah, a totally under-utilized drummer. Maybe he just wasn't into playing that much beyond Television.

He might teach or something. Or play in jazz combos.

"Christmas Wrapping" is a good tune; that whole ep is great. had no idea he was in that band.
i will play catchup w/ jazz week, but that t.v. academy show is killer!

I sort of wish I still had Killer Shrews

Hey, I have that. Can't remember what the hell it sounds like, though I recall enjoying it.

I found Verlaine's solo albums wildly inconsistent, but "The Miller's Tale" compilation with the live disc is mostly the cream of the crop (though I added a handful of tracks to round it out).

Ficca is on some of Warm & Cool and (I think) one track on Songs and Other Things, so he's still around. Both of these records are fucking great.

i had a long discussion with a friend once -- he preferred the faded version, because it suggests that the song never ends, that it just starts over and over and again.

This is exactly how I feel about the faded version - i.e. the proper version and you're all nuts if you think otherwise - and I think I've even said so on ILM before

xpost if you have The Miller's Tale comp then you just need to supplement it with Flash Light, Dreamtime and the s/t solo debut. Those are the rock-solid awesome Verlaine solo records.

I'd put the last one, Songs & Other Things on there as well -- it is really good! Kind of understated, but some great songs/sounds. But yeah, Dreamtime and s/t are as essential as the Television records. Flash Light a little bit less so (I prefer the live stuff from that period), but still good.

Flash Light's my favorite!

I should have said Songs & Other Things also. Great songs and really neat arrangements, but something about the production bugs me a bit.

And then there's the 'Lost Album' which Flash Light was the replacement for...

yeah, i haven't heard that ... is it good? ysi?

It's really weird and very good. If you've heard '16 tulips' 'Passion of Anna' and 'Call Me The' off the Miller's Tale comp, those are off the lost album.

I can upload it from home later. Maybe it's a good candidate for Doom & Gloom? Besides those three tracks nothing has ever been released on CD (though it all turned up as vinyl b-sides in the Flash Light era, hence the ability of enterprising souls to cobble it together).

Yeah, totally, I was thinking about doing a series of "lost albums" sometime soon, so that would be perfect ... Love "Passion of Anna" ...

I DON'T WANNA GROW UP
THERE'S TOO MUCH CONTRADICTION

F-R-I-C-T-I-O-N!

*mouth-guitar noises*

I start to spin the tale -
you complain of my dic...

...tion

You give me friction

Album utterly rules. My favourite song is Friction, but my favourite *moment* is that beautiful guitar breakdown in Venus, come on you know which part I mean.

Missed this poll, but I'm shocked by the lack of love for side 2 here - and even more shocked by the single vote for "Ton Curtain," which is fucking mindblowingly amazing

the best part of "Torn Curtain" is when the cat starts meowing

you can hear it ~4:13

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mrMjNzk8E10

Pretty sure I voted for "Guiding Light."

good choice

I remember in high school my best friend's dad was into all these bands we thought of as being "guitar epics" like Nazarene. So we thought since this album has a lot of long songs with guitar in them that he'd really dig it. We spent a pretty awkward hour or so all listening to it in silence together while he drank Cuervo straight out of the bottle. When it was done, he said, "I love you girls but that music is for fairies."

;_;

I learned a very important lesson, and that's don't have listening parties with people who like to pretend they're Archie Bunker.

those kind of lessons always seem to come early in life...

Any recommendations for newer bands that made you think having two guitarists was absolutely essential? Locking in, overlapping, spiralling off in their own directions etc. P.S. not The Strokes.

^give the rangda alb a spin

Already have :) and all the other Ben Chasny stuff. All great stuff. There's just something about the interaction between the two Television guitarists that's difficult to find elsewhere.

"I love you girls but that music is for fairies."
haha.

xpost

well i tell ya, abt 6 years or so ago i went to see television play live and i particularly enjoyed the more 'improvised' parts of their performance and, like you, i got to wondering if there was anything similar out there... nearest equiv i cld come up w was the gd old grateful dead, the way that the three guitarists wrap around each other on a really gd 'dark star' or whatevs, and that led me into full on deadheadness...so be warned!

fleetwood mac

thin lizzy?

I only listened to this album for the first time the other day if you can believe it. I enjoyed it.

was rec'd this album by fellow ilxor samosa gibreel, listened to it obsessively for a month and when i spoke to him about it, was SEVERELY LET DOWN when he told me he'd only listened to it like one time. >:[

as usual for ilm album polls, these results are pretty spot-on, tho i'd bump elevation up to the third spot.

This one got played to death by everyone I knew for a while, unfortunately.
I'm almost ready to listen to it, I think.
Another recc for interlocking guitar epics: Allman Bros. Try Live at Fillmore East first, "In Memory of Elizabeth Reed."
Television jammed.

The role of the rhythm section is often overlooked on this record. The bass & dumming on eg Friction is awesome. So completely tight, like Elvin Jones & Steve Davis.

Am I alone in preferring the fade-out version of the title track?

Am I alone in preferring the fade-out version of the title track?

i had a long discussion with a friend once -- he preferred the faded version, because it suggests that the song never ends, that it just starts over and over and again. Which is a good argument. I think I prefer the conclusion though ...

― tylerw, Wednesday, 2 December 2009 16:28 (10 months ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

This is exactly how I feel about the faded version - i.e. the proper version and you're all nuts if you think otherwise - and I think I've even said so on ILM before

― E Poxy Thee Thule (Tom D.), Thursday, 3 December 2009 10:32 (10 months ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

faded version is the proper version, ie its the one i grew up with on the vinyl copy i bought for a quid at record & tape exchange in '95. but i still love the extended ending on the cd.

I like Friction and the title track best so far.

Who played what, with what? Marquee Moon unlocked. MM, June 1978. pic.twitter.com/CXrdZReKYL

— Johnnie Johnstone (@tnpcollection) July 25, 2023

Verlaine liked using Danelectro lipstick pickups in his Jazzmasters/Jags/Strat but had no idea he used a Danelectro so much on the album (certainly expected the Jazz more)