Writes Patti Smith in "He Was Tom Verlaine/Patti Smith remembers her friend, who possessed the child’s gift of transforming a drop of water into a poem that somehow begat music" (The New Yorker).
"He lived twenty-eight minutes from where I was raised. We could easily have sauntered into the same Wawa on the Wilmington-South Jersey border in search of Yoo-hoo or Tastykakes. We might have met, two black sheep, on some rural stretch, each carrying books of the poetry of French Symbolists—but we didn’t. Not until 1973, on East Tenth Street, across from St. Mark’s Church, where he stopped me and said, 'You’re Smith.'... Examining each other’s bookcases, we were amazed to find that our books were nearly identical, even those by authors difficult to find. Cossery, Hedayat, Tutuola, Mrabet...."
Goodbye to Tom Verlaine, my fellow Wilmingtonian. I too lived among the Butterscotch Krimpets, long ago. Never have heard of Cossery, Hedayat, Tutuola, and Mrabet though. Imagine being into Cossery, Hedayat, Tutuola, Mrabet, then meeting somebody who had books by all 4.
30 Comments on Althouse: "He awoke to the sound of water dripping into a rusted sink. The streets below were bathed in medieval moonlight, reverberating silence."
(Since 1982 the Bulwer Lytton Fiction Contest has challenged participants to write an atrocious opening sentence to the worst novel never written.)"
"Take what you have gathered from coincidence
The empty-handed painter from your streets
Is drawing crazy patterns on your sheets"
"
I'll admit being a little bit of a insular caveman, aloof from more informed evocation, but I'm not sure what medieval moonlight is intending to convey. Pre-electrical? Filled with dancing elves? That particular silence that occurs just after a knight is knocked off his horse in a jousting match and they are hidden by the horse's moon shadow, hiding them while the rest of the arena is illuminated with expectation? "
I sent in my payment and received the record, a long single tune (LITTLE JOHNNY JEWEL) split over two sides, and: I HATED IT. It seemed amateurish, the recording lacking in sonic dynamics, and the song and performance sounding meanderins and washed out. And Verlaine was no great shakes as a vocalist, (which didn't ever really change over time).
But...I kept going back to it and I did become more attentive to its elusive charm. A few months later, Richard Hell and the Void Oids, (Richard Hell having been a friend and co-founder of Television with Tom Verlaine, and a style model for Johnny Rotten, though Rotten will deny that to his death), put out their own E.P. on the same independent label, ORK Records. I bought that and...THAT WAS MORE LIKE IT! Driving, jagged, aggressive, acerbic, and new.
When Television released their debut LP on Elektra a year later, I bought it hoping for improvement, and they delivered in spades! All the potential that was hidden on their indie 45" was manifested in their album.
(Later, I heard a live version of LITTLE JOHNNY JEWEL on a bootleg record of Television in performance, and it was mind-blowing, a guitar tour-de-force by Verlaine. Later still, I saw them live several times when they reunited in the early 90s, after having disbanded in 1978.)
By all accounts, Verlaine was a control freak, but he did have a clear idea of what he wanted to do and he was committed to accomplishing that. R.I.P."
I know nothing about the artists in question; even Patti Smith is a bit vague of outline to me . . .
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Thanks Cook, that was a cool addition."
Damn it, I was sure that was ChatGPT when asked to write an overwrought introduction of a character...
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got a light?
I am Laslo."
Never heard of Verlaine or Television by the way. By the late 70’s I was out of college, married and trying to build a career. Current music trends wasn’t on my mind. "
All great!"
How about Robert Quine on Matthew Sweet's song "Girlfriend?""
She is nothing if not sincere. Me, I love her. I can see how others may not.
Finding someone who loves the same books that you do is one of the best things that can happen in life. Great story.
RIP Tom Verlaine."
Heartless Aztec: I remember hearing of Milk Bar, but I never went there, as I had moved to NYC by 1981, before Milk Bar opened. I was also familiar with the punk club in Jax Beach, Einstein a Go Go, but I never went there. I grew up at the beach and stayed with my folks there when I was in town for visits and I would drive by the place. Einstein a Go Go took up space where a music store had once operated, the store where, in 1974, I bought an electric guitar and took a couple of lessons from the store's proprietor. (I never became particularly adept or creative on guitar, and I eventually gave it up.)
Are you still in Jax?"
I used to see Quine browsing at various record stores in the East Village. Knowing his reputation, (prickly and difficult, like Lou Reed, one reason Quine left/was fired from Reed's band), I never tried to speak to him or tell him of my appreciation of his playing with Richard Hell."
I went to the Milk Bar to see The Cramps with Dash Riprock about 1994. Alcohol was not allowed so I brought 2 pints of Vodka and so all I remember is it was loud and wild. "
"Both Roberts - Christgau and Cook - have their musical tastebuds in their respective derrières."
When one of the geniuses leaves a comment like this, i always wonder- what kind of music do they like.
Even money says Iman has really bad taste.
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