But I’ve got more.

This morning around the house I’ve been listening to Television, one of the earliest bands to develop a synchronous relationship with the iconic Bowery club owned by Hilly Kristal.

I had quite a lot to say about Television in a previous post in which I mentioned Terry Ork, played by Johnny Galecki in CBGB, the openly gay producer whose Ork Records released singles by Television, Alex Chilton, The Feelies, and others. Ork is hardly a household name — he doesn’t even have a Wikipedia entry! — but he was one of those figures who just made things happen. (Click here for a nice picture of Ork along with other key CBGB figures and the actors portraying them.)

Ork died in 2004. From Richard Hell’s website, where he refers to the deaths of other old friends including Bob Quine:

We’re very sorry to hear of the death on October 20th, in San Diego, of Terry Ork. He’d been ill with cancer for a while. Richard says, “Good grief. That’s three this year. What is up? We’re not that old. I saw Terry a couple of years ago when he was in New York for a little show of some art he’d made. He was laughing a lot, as always. He’s about the only person I can think of who whenever I think of him it’s with a big smile on his face. I actually got a longish email from him the day before he died. I’d written inviting him to speak at the Quine memorial. What to say about Terry? He was a troublemaker, and some of the trouble he made was the band Television–he suggested his blond boy Richard Lloyd as second guitar which made the live band possible, and he gave us his loft to rehearse in which made it probable. He had lots of shady dealings. He ended up in jail for a while. He was a movie freak. That’s how Verlaine and I got to know him — he was managing Cinemabilia in New York when we worked there. Godard was his main man, and Guy Debord. When I left the Heartbreakers he brought out my first music release, a three song EP featuring ‘Blank Generation,’ on his new Ork Records. He’d started the label one EP before that, with Television’s ‘Little Johnny Jewel.’

Here’s a shot of Johnny Galecki as Terry Ork, talking to Hilly Kristal (Alan Rickman with the curly hair) and Merv Ferguson (Donal Logue).

And here’s a lot of Television, which we may not ever have heard were it not for Terry Ork:

And check out this great song off Television’s 1992 self-titled album:

Relics from New York City’s bygone CBGB club – including “Smithsonian-quality pieces” like its bar, the phone booth, chunks of the walls and those stained toilets, all pulled from storage – will reunite on the big screen next year in CBGB, which indie filmmakers confirmed they finished shooting in August.

Forty years after CBGB opened its doors on the city’s Lower East Side, writer Jody Savin and director Randall Miller of Unclaimed Freight Productions tell Rolling Stone they are now editing the 100-minute feature. It tells the story of how the late Hilly Kristal [Alan Rickman] offered his club’s cramped stage to bands playing original songs, which attracted groups like the Ramones, the Patti Smith Group and Talking Heads. In 1974 Television became the first act to play CBGB, and gigged there every Sunday for years before recording their album Marquee Moon. The club closed in 2006.

Much of the film was shot in Savannah this past summer, as most people reading this already know. The Rolling Stone piece contains a number of details likely to be of interest to those who have followed the project.

But will the film feature the soundtrack that it really should? That’s a question that has been nagging those of us who hope CBGB is both a critical and commercial success.

From Rolling Stone:

Produced for less than $10 million, CBGB will feature more than 40 songs of the period, though Savin admits “the music decisions are not done yet,” because “some bands are more cooperative than others.”

40 songs = good
uncertainty about which songs = bad

The Dead Boys (l-r): Justin Bartha as Stiv Bators, Rupert Grint as Cheetah Chrome, Bronson Adams as Johnny Blitz

The piece notes that the filmmakers have been consulting with both Tom Verlaine and Richard Lloyd, so one could reasonably expect that Television songs might be in the final cut. Ditto for The Dead Boys, since Cheetah Chrome (played in the film by Rupert Grint) even had a brief role as a cab driver picking up Hilly Kristal’s mom (Estella Parsons). I’m betting songs by The Shirts will be available too — the film is a great chance to boost sales and visibility for some bands that have largely faded from public consciousness.

Given Patti Smith’s reaction to the film, I don’t expect to hear any of her music, but what about the Ramones? What about Talking Heads? What about Blondie?

From Flavorwire’s CBGB Icons: Where Are They Now?, which was published last fall:

As the burgeoning punk nostalgia industry suggests, the downtown scene of the 1970s and early 1980s has officiallly become part of New Yorkâ€s cultural mythology – but as ever, itâ€s a fairly narrow view thatâ€s entered the history books. While the likes of Smith, Blondie, and The Ramones are justifiably (if belatedly) celebrated for their ongoing influence on music, there are plenty of other CBGB veterans who are still out there making fascinating music and art somewhere out of the public eye. Weâ€ve investigated what ten of our favorite CBGB-related punk and post-punk artists are up to these days — read on after the jump!

There are updates on Television guitarist Richard Lloyd, Dick Manitoba of the Dictators, Wayne/Jayne County of The Electric Chairs, Richard Hell of Television and other bands, Alan Vega of Suicide, Cheetah Chrome of The Dead Boys, sax player James Chance, Tommy Ramone, DNA drummer Ikue Mori, and Tom Verlaine.

Here’s the blurb about Verlaine, whom I mentioned in a previous post, Listening to Television:

Then: The man who defined the word “angular”

Now: The man who defines the word “angular”

The Television guitarist and singer has been an elusive figure over the years, rarely giving interviews and surfacing every few years with a new solo album. However, if you believe this extensive interview he and the rest of Television gave to Brazilian MTV earlier this year, a fourth Television album may be on the cards (although apparently not with Richard Lloyd, since heâ€s not involved in the interview). In the meantime, Verlaine is apparently often to be sighted at Strand Books.

The piece includes some great video clips, including The Dictators:

Last fall the Houston Press posted The Top 15 Bands To Come Out Of CBGB:

CBGB, owned by Hilly Kristal and shuttered in 2006, obviously helped birth numerous bands. From the early pub-rock bands that made their scratch on the stage, the earliest stabs at relevance from various art-school grads, the leather-clad sneers of punk royalty, and the bloody Sunday matinee shows from the hardcore and crossover groups who kept the club’s spirit alive in the ’80s, it was the beating heart of too many scenes to count.

We compiled a list of just 15 bands that first made their mark on the stage at 315 Bowery at Bleecker Street before finding themselves on shirts and jackets on everyone from Nebraska to Mumbai.

Obviously, such lists are wildly subjective.

But here’s the playlist with samples from the piece:

Television is frequently described as “punk”, but I think that’s a reductive description of the sound. But you can decide for yourself if you listen to a few of tracks embedded at the end of this post.

The 1973 band members were Tom Verlaine, Richard Lloyd, Richard Hell, and Billy Ficca. Hell left the band in 1975. (Btw, Verlaine recently played guitar on Patti Smith’s “April Fool” on her new album Banga.)

Television was among the first bands to play CBGB.

Evan Alex Cole plays Richard Hell in the movie, with recent SCAD graduate Max Reinhardsen as Tom Verlaine. (Reinhardsen was excellent in a SCAD stage adaptation of two Flannery O’Connor stories that I reviewed here.) I don’t know who’s playing Lloyd or Ficca.

And then there’s Johnny Galecki as Terry Ork, whose Ork Records released singles by Television, Alex Chilton, The Feelies, and others. He was Richard Lloyd’s roommate for awhile and was openly gay.

And here’s one of those points where counter-culture scenes intersected — New York’s gay scene and punk scene fed off each other. From a 2007 Richard Lloyd interview at Rock Town Hall:

RTH: Tell me about your days setting the scene at CBGBs.

RL: We needed a place to play. A shithole nobody else wanted, and we steamrolled over the owner, who wanted to have country bluegrass, and we created the worldâ€s most creative rock ‘n roll club bar none. I mean, is there any – I donâ€t care for your Cavern Club, Marquee Club, Whiskey-a-Go-Go, Boo-Hoo-Hoo Club… CBGBs is the most famous rock ‘n roll club to have ever existed and I fucking created it! I was the invisible force behind it, because Terry Ork, my lover – oh, he wasnâ€t, he just chased me around. I mean, after all, he was Televisionâ€s manager. Whoâ€s more interested in the careers of young, delicious-looking men than gay people? After all, Brian Epstein… Any rock ‘n roll manager is one of two things: either a sleazebag, cigar-smoking asshole businessman or a gay person. Iâ€d much rather be managed by a queer. Queers are usually nicer than the other critters that run along the surface of the earth trying to play the game of King of the Hill.

Here’s more on Lloyd, Television, and those earliest days of CBGB from Legs McNeil’s Please Kill Me: The Uncensored Oral History of Punk:

Well.

I have not read the CBGB script and have no idea how or even if it will deal such sexual undercurrents.

Anyway, here’s a selection of Television tracks, beginning with a handful of early recordings before Hell left the band (I think). If nothing else, be sure to listen to the first one, a demo of “Friction”, which also appears on the album Marquee Moon below:

Here’s the full 1977 album Marquee Moon:

Here’s the track list for Marquee Moon:
1 00:08 “See No Evil”
2 03:56 “Venus”
3 07:45 “Friction”
4 12:26 “Marquee Moon”
5 23:04 “Elevation”
6 28:10 “Guiding Light”
7 33:41 “Prove It”
8 38:40 “Torn Curtain”

And check out this great song off Television’s 1992 self-titled album: