Re: 1977 Album Survivor Round 3 - results

Steve2000indeja wrote:

>JGM wrote:

>> Greg Ioannou wrote:

>>>   I'm beginning to think I must have a blind spot with respect to
>>Television,
>>> which I really considered a fairly obscure act.  Perhaps it's a geographic
>>> thing; certainly they didn't get much airplay in Chicago during this
>period
>>> compared to, say, Talking Heads or even Ian Dury.

>>I don't think Television got significant airplay anywhere in the US,
>>except for college radio.

>The band got a good deal of press, I definitely read about Television - I
>still
>read about Television..but have never heard them. Not much airplay...except
>maybe on college stations as noted. 

 Well, I did get hold of a copy of Marquee Moon, and have been giving it some
close listening.  I can confirm that I heard little if any of this when it was
new.  I like it better now that I probably would have then, when the lack of
any kind of groove, the raw production, and the amatuer vocals would have
seemed odd to my AOR-trained ears. 

 A few things come to mind: it's easy to hear the influence these guys had on
acts that would follow, notably The Cars and XTC and even, as someone
mentioned, Dire Straits (the cut "Prove It" seems like a blueprint for Straits'
"Water of Love").  I even imagine that John Cougar or his producers had a bit
of this in mind when they did the long guitar intro to "I Need A Lover".  It's
also clearly of a piece with early Talking Heads, especially in the bass and
drum parts, though the Heads didn't have a guitarist with these guys' talent. 
What the Heads did have that Television lacked was decent production and a
scant couple of radio-friendly hooks -- it's interesting to speculate where
these guys might have gone with just a *smidgen* of compromise to the
mainstream.  

JGM