Remembering Tom Verlaine

Singer-songwriter and guitarist Tom Verlaine of Television died recently. We reflect on the genius of their album 'Marquee Moon'

- Bibek Bhattacharya

He bowed his head, gripping his Jazzmaster, releasing billowing clouds, strange alleyways populated with tiny men, a murder of crows, and the cries of bluebirds rushing through a replica of space. All transmuted through his long fingers, all but strangling the neck of the guitar." There probably isn't a more poetic way of describing the music that Tom Verlaine made with his seminal band, Television, in the 1970s. The words are those of musician and poet Patti Smith, Verlaine's one-time lover, collaborator and life-long friend, eulogising her friend in a New Yorker article a few days ago.

Verlaine died on 28 January, after a sudden illness, at the age of 73. It was uncanny: I had played Television's peerless debut album, Marquee Moon, from 1977 just the previous evening. Every few months, I just have to have the album on repeat, luxuriating in Verlaine's odd, haunting songs, sung in his high, slightly wavering voice. Only this time, it turned out to be a wake.