What you need to understand is that to me, this is real original punk. Not The Sex Pistols. Not The Clash. For some reason I always thought the first punk music was this: NYC 77. I don’t know why. I think it was probably because my first taste of what old punk was, wasn’t all that British stuff. It was all the New York bands. Television being one of my favorites.
I’ve seen interviews in a few movies on the genre of punk, where members of both The Sex Pistols and The Clash admit that they were all at the first Ramones show in England, and then started their bands after seeing that band. At least those “punks” had a blueprint to build off of. God, or the flying spaghetti monster, only knows what influenced Television to play the way they did. Or be able to play what they did. They did things on their debut full length “Marquee Moon” that I cant honestly think of influence for reference. Lets just take the albums title track for instance. It starts with every member coming in and playing on some off beat of one another. Math rock ancestry fodder maybe? The leads and solos in the song are not your typical blues based guitar lines used in popular rock at the time. You can hear it in the song's however many minute long guitar solo. Which leads into a build up and peak that I have to think influenced Sonic Youth on some level. And that’s only one song. Overall, this is a punk rock record, with an emphasis on the rock. Though there are a lot of ideas from other genres of music. Elements of classic pop songs can be heard in “Guiding Light.” While a song like “Elevation” has an almost reggae vibe in the beginning, but completely changes by the chorus. Singer/guitarist Tom Verlaine has such a distinct voice. It works so well with his lyrical style. And both his voice and lyrics work so well with the music the band produced on this album. Like they were all made for one another.
I feel like, over time, people who have wanted something different in the music they listen to have gravitated towards this record. A lot of the ideas contained on this album might not seem like a big deal today. But viewed in context, its kind of outrageous this band did what they did, when they did it. I think the album still holds up as one of the greatest “punk” albums, and maybe one of the best albums of the 70’s.
-matthew st.
support your local independent record store buy purchasing the album if you like it
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