Marquee Moon

by Television

Marquee Moon cover art
  • Type: Album
  • Released: February聽8,聽1977
  • Label: Elektra
  • Country: United States
  • Length: 45:35
  • Community rating: 4.24/5 from 40 ratings

Artists on this release: Richard Lloyd, Billy Ficca, Fred Smith, Tom Verlaine

Album Notes & Community Reviews

Television's debut 'Marquee Moon' is defined by the intricate, jazz-inflected guitar interplay of Tom Verlaine and Richard Lloyd, who eschewed punk's power chords for complex melodic and counter-melodic lines. The clean, uncompressed production by Verlaine and Andy Johns highlights the band's live-in-studio precision, providing a stark backdrop for Verlaine's impressionistic lyrics which blend urban nocturnes and pastoral imagery with poetic ambiguity. A foundational text for post-punk and alternative rock, the album's sophisticated instrumental approach and extended song structures, particularly on the title track, profoundly influenced a generation of guitarists and bands.

Genres

Descriptors: guitar-driven, underground, literary, long-form, virtuosic, guitars, melodic, intricate, rhythmic

Tracklist

  1. See No Evil (03:52)
  2. Venus (03:49)
  3. Friction (04:43)
  4. Marquee Moon (10:38)
  5. Elevation (05:05)
  6. Guiding Light (05:32)
  7. Prove It (05:00)
  8. Torn Curtain (06:56)

Credits

  • Tom Verlaine - lead vocals, guitar, keyboards, production, written-by
  • Richard Lloyd - guitar, vocals
  • Fred Smith - bass, vocals
  • Billy Ficca - drums
  • Andy Johns - producer, engineer, mixed by
  • Tony Lane - art direction
  • Billy Lobo - artwork [back cover art]
  • Jim Boyer - engineer [assistant]
  • Greg Calbi - mastered by
  • Lee Hulko - mastered by
  • Jimmy Douglass - mixed by [assisted by]
  • Randy Mason - mixed by [assisted by]
  • Robert Mapplethorpe - photography by

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