Television - Call Mr. Lee

[lexo30]

I love Lloyd's guitar part in this song the chorus - that angry rumbling surge he does up and down the natural minor scale. Apart from being really fun to play it's also an essential part of the arrangement of the song, such that it's hard to imagine somebody covering this song and not at least gesturing towards that guitar part.

[desasterz]

Billy Ficca knows exactly how to get behind the guitar parts. He's amazing

[desasterz]

at 3:42 it sounds like the solo on "Light My Fire" by the Doors

[lexo30]

@desasterz Doesn't sound like it to me, except that both Lloyd and Manzarek have a tendency to play in sixteenth-notes when excited.

[blairh1966]

Thanks so much for posting. This became one of my favorite Television songs in recent years.

[joypq]

こりゃあすげえ。

[Steiner62]

But what does this mean?

:)

[Steiner62]

???

I hope this means you lik it!

:)

[rca88]

Richard Lloyd doesn't get near enough credit in this band. He's got the signature hooks / riffs in most of their songs. Listen to what he's doing under the chorus at 1:23 and 3:01. Mean, tight, right on target. Really nice solo at the end, too.

[windmills20]

I don't really think he cares how much credit other people are giving him, which is kind of the point of No Glamour for Willi, but yes, Richard Lloyd is a very underrated guitarist.

I think he was Tom Verlaine's pupil before Television was created but that could be totally wrong.

[lexo30]

@windmills20 I don't think Lloyd was Verlaine's pupil, at least I've never read that. I read an interview with him years ago where he talked about being a friend of a friend of Jimi Hendrix, and of having once got to watch Hendrix in the studio when he was a young teenager; in any case, it's hard to imagine Verlaine being a guitar teacher, as he's such an undisciplined player (but a great one). I read that Lloyd was introduced to Verlaine by Terry Ork, who was Television's first manager.

[gobeco]

Absolute agree with you. In 1992 album he play a lot of solos. Sometime tendency to play too much notes per second :-)

[lexo30]

@rca88 I agree, Richard Lloyd doesn't get enough credit but also his and Verlaine's styles really complement each other. Verlaine's style as a soloist is contemplative, he takes his time, he gets an idea and he works it out over a long (sometimes very long) period. You need another player in the band who can stun, and that's Lloyd. He usually only gets a chorus or two, but he really pulls off the fireworks. In this song it's like the storm has been building throughout and then breaks at the end.

[Efrasnel]

I would LOVE to see this band live. Any chance of it happening again in my lifetime???

[rca88]

I have seen them three times at the Fillmore (not the original) in San Francisco in the last 4-5 yrs. I think they "tour" sporadically - a gig here, a gig there.

[keyehaw]

Not with Lloyd in the band. He severed all times (amicably) this past summer.

[evelyneverettgreen]

why?

[keyehaw]

Just wants to focus on his own stuff. No harm no foul