The Jazz Guitar Chord Dictionary
Reply to Thread Bookmark Thread
Posts 1 to 24 of 24
  1. #1

    User Info Menu


  2.  

    The Jazz Guitar Chord Dictionary
     
  3. #2

    User Info Menu


  4. #3

    User Info Menu


  5. #4

    User Info Menu

    I really liked Television's first album, not so much the others, and have taught Marquee Moon to at least one student over the years, all the parts and solo. Great band. And Tom Verlaine always found spaces most people wouldn't go to.

  6. #5

    User Info Menu

    I liked Verlaine’s solo albums. David Bowie covered Kingdom Come on his Scary Monsters album.

    I always thought their interplay was like bluegrass pickers playing off of each other.

    Another band they influenced: Wilco. For his birthday Jeff Tweedy’s wife gave him guitar lessons from Richard Lloyd. He and the band (with Nels Cline of course) do a good version of Marquee Moon live.

  7. #6

    User Info Menu

    I liked everything about Television, except the production on their records. Shame, because it stopped me listening to potentially great albums like Marquee Moon. It just simply sounds too "safe", in my opinion.

  8. #7

    User Info Menu

    I was living in NY close to CBGBs and the Bowery during those days and Tom Verlaine, Richard Hell, Patti Smith were all regulars. Honestly, I didn't think of it as a "punk" club, but a place where really amazing young rock was being shaped. Verlaine loved Coltrane and I was always aware he was trying to bring that love into his own take on rock music. Their live shows were amazing!
    That was the Bowery end of Bleeker Street. Turn west and walk 15 minutes and Jim Hall would be doing a regular duo with Ron Carter, Bucky and Slam or Joe Pass would be playing at the Village Gate and Lew Tabackin and Toshiko Akioshi's big band would be playing any given night.
    It was a remarkably fruitful time for music and it was all coming together downtown NY late 70's early 80's.

  9. #8

    User Info Menu

    Quote Originally Posted by princeplanet
    I liked everything about Television, except the production on their records. Shame, because it stopped me listening to potentially great albums like Marquee Moon. It just simply sounds too "safe", in my opinion.
    Bootlegs of the live shows were always on the back walls of the Village record shops if you knew where to look and who to ask. THAT's where the music was.

  10. #9

    User Info Menu

    I fell into the arms of Venus De Milo.
    Great.

  11. #10

    User Info Menu

    Quote Originally Posted by Jimmy blue note
    I fell into the arms of Venus De Milo.
    Great.
    Love that song!


  12. #11

    User Info Menu

    Broadway looked so medieval.

  13. #12

    User Info Menu

    Tom Verlaine is a great songwriter and guitarist. Love Television and love his solo stuff. I saw the regrouped Television in New Haven in the 90's. They were walking around before the show and Tom was sporting a Pith Helmet. Great concert and great memory!

  14. #13

    User Info Menu

    Wonderful first album.

  15. #14

    User Info Menu

    Quote Originally Posted by Jimmy blue note
    I was living in NY close to CBGBs and the Bowery during those days and Tom Verlaine, Richard Hell, Patti Smith were all regulars. Honestly, I didn't think of it as a "punk" club, but a place where really amazing young rock was being shaped. Verlaine loved Coltrane and I was always aware he was trying to bring that love into his own take on rock music. Their live shows were amazing!
    That was the Bowery end of Bleeker Street. Turn west and walk 15 minutes and Jim Hall would be doing a regular duo with Ron Carter, Bucky and Slam or Joe Pass would be playing at the Village Gate and Lew Tabackin and Toshiko Akioshi's big band would be playing any given night.
    It was a remarkably fruitful time for music and it was all coming together downtown NY late 70's early 80's.
    That was a special time for sure. I only went to New York once in that time period, but did have the wonderful experience of seeing Woody Shaw live at the Village Vanguard with Steve Turre on trombone. I got to speak with Steve for a while in between sets. Nice guy, and a truly memorable evening.

    I was living in Atlanta in the late 70s – early to mid 80s and frequented all the clubs there, especially 688. Alt rock was being born about an hour away in Athens, and all those bands would come up to Atlanta.

    I do wish that I had been around during the CGBG heyday. Sounds like it would’ve been my kind of place.

  16. #15

    User Info Menu

    Ah the late 70’s/early 90’s…inflation and the crime rate were high, trash pickup and the rents were low—a PERFECT recipe for art.

    Don't you know the crime rate is going up, up, up, up, up?
    To live in this town you must be tough, tough, tough, tough, tough!
    You got rats on the West Side,
    Bed bugs uptown,
    What a mess this town's in tatters, I've been shattered,
    My brain's been battered, splattered all over Manhattan.

    Anyway back to TV—they were a very tight and creative band who didn’t have the success they probably deserved. To paraphrase Brian Eno, “They didn’t sell many albums, but everyone who bought one went out and got a couple of Jazzmasters and started a band.”

    Television: The Punk Guitar Heroes Who Weren't Punk At All-television-jpg

  17. #16

    User Info Menu

    Nowadays, Nels Cline is a lot like Verlaine stylistically IMO, when he's doing his own solo thing, instead of playing in Wilco.

    Here he is doing some genre blurring with Julian Lage as the other guitarist, Scott Coley on upright, and Tom Rainey on drums.




    Nels also occasionally does jazz collaborations with his identical twin brother Alex, who is a noted percussionist in his own right.

  18. #17

    User Info Menu

    Quote Originally Posted by EllenGtrGrl
    Nowadays, Nels Cline is a lot like Verlaine stylistically IMO, when he's doing his own solo thing, instead of playing in Wilco.

    Here he is doing some genre blurring with Julian Lage as the other guitarist, Scott Coley on upright, and Tom Rainey on drums.




    Nels also occasionally does jazz collaborations with his identical twin brother Alex, who is a noted percussionist in his own right.
    I like that a lot. He and Jeff Tweedy were both heavily influenced by Television.

    Have you heard the Woodstock sessions with Nels collaborating with Medeski, Martin and Wood? Highly experimental. Nels has probably the most facile mind of any guitar player, and Lage is not far behind him. (Well Bill Frisell of course—cut from the same cloth.)

  19. #18

    User Info Menu

    tom verlaine was into jazz when young, and played sax before getting into rock and playing guitar....he lived not far from philly and would go into town to hear jazz--or try to hear it, if he could get into the clubs--in person.

    tom was also WAY ahead of the curve in his early days in nyc--he'd haunt the large military/industrial surplus stores on canal street back then, in search of THE tubes for his amps...he was also a appreciator of danelectro liptstick pickups and danelectro amps--this at a time when dano's were still considered cheap 'throwaway' catalog guitars beneath pro consideration, but tom went by what his ears told him, not fashion or prevailing gear tastes.

    several mentioned CBGB's....it was a GREAT music venue, all kindsa music, ya never knew what you'd hear there, or who you might meet there. One of the all-time best PA's i ever heard or played thru. The onstage sound was incredible, making it very easy to perform, ditto for the front sound: loud, clear and very hi-fidelity. Hilly Krystal and his crew were all about the music, not 'ambiance' or 'mood.'

    In recent years drummer Dee Pop (of the Bush Tetras, who began as a jazz drummer and continued to love jazz lifelong) hosted a jazz series in the CBGB's annex which featured some of the best contemporary players. I attended a few, great music, great playees...RIP Dee--he passed about a month ago.

    Much of Tom Verlaine's most interesting guitar work is post-television, on his many solo recordings. Here's a longtime fave, not very 'jazzy' except in regard to Tom's approach to time in his solo--'let's take time apart and then put it back together'.... as if it was easy as pie....things begin to get real interesting starting at about 2:46:

    Last edited by janepaints; 10-31-2021 at 12:53 AM. Reason: typos

  20. #19

    User Info Menu

    Quote Originally Posted by janepaints
    Much of Tom Verlaine's most interesting guitar work is post-television, on his many solo recordings.
    I was lucky enough to see a performance of his work with film, Man Ray silent films, European traffic safety films, with Tom Verlaine's playing. Brilliant. Absolutely Brilliant

  21. #20

    User Info Menu


  22. #21

    User Info Menu


  23. #22

    User Info Menu

    the drums, the phrasing in general


  24. #23

    User Info Menu

    i only saw tom verlaine perform once, at city gardens in trenton NJ in the early 80's. spectacular performance. never saw television live, (i was too busy touring in a band at the time to go see any artists), television had already 'made it', and were playing at higher-level venues than the venues we gigged at.

    something else which hasnt been been mentioned, and should be: television drummer billy ficca was very much a jazz dummer in concept; didnt sound/play like any other 'rock' drummer i've ever heard...smallish kit, 'less is more' in both kit-size and in approach...IMO a VERY 'musical' drummer....always loved his playing.

    only met/talked with him once--bumped into him on the sidewalk in downtown nyc, very nice guy, no 'rock star' hooey, down-to-earth etc...

    ditto for bassist fred smith, who i've encountered/met often....playing on the same bills, mutual friends/bandmates etc...a nice guy, a gentleman, very very musical, has 'big ears', plays with great economy, tone and taste.

  25. #24

    User Info Menu

    regarding nyc in the 70's:

    before landing in NYC myself circa 1976, i saw one of the best jazz shows i've ever seen there....an art school classmate had moved to manhattan and i visited her for a weekend circa 1975....

    i adored ornette coleman's music and saw he was playing at one of the fabled jazz clubs....the five spot? the half note? cant recall the exact name--it was smallish, you hadda walk down a few steps to get into the room.

    i didnt know what to expect, i imagined a large swanky club, jam packed....instead, the club was fairly small, MAYBE 50-60 people in attendance, plenty of seats remained empty....debby and i got a table about 12 feet from the stage, front and center.

    WOW!!

    Ornette on sax (might've played some trumpet too), his son Denardo on drums, cant recall, or never learned, the name of the bass guitarist, and JAMES BLOOD ULMER on guitar...playing some battered old duct-taped archtop plugged into (if memory serves) some equally-battered solid state so-so amp--like one of them univox vertical deals, about 30 watts, 10" speaker, cool tremelo, weird reverb?

    easily some of the most distinctive, organic, individualistic and unique music/bands i've ever heard. Great Sound too. truly music 'beyond category'....if i was forced to describe or categorize what they sounded like, i'd say they played 'human music'...about as human as one could hope for. ....those 4 players manifested TELEPATHY like few other combos i've ever heard...things were happening beyond logical or rarional explanation, yet it never sank into screaming 'lets all shriek' too-free 'free jazz'...somehow the 'down home' element always remained intact....greasy AND brainy at the same time....

    dang, did i wanna dance but felt too shy. oh idiot self-conscious youth!
    Last edited by janepaints; 10-31-2021 at 12:51 AM. Reason: typos, additional info