(TV) Pt. III of 3: Longest, 1 of Best TV & Lloyd Interviews Ever?

["Casey, Leo J" <CaseyL@VOLPE.DOT.GOV>]

>From  Michael Olcsvary copy of Musician Magazine
(1992) 

TELEVISION
The Great Lost Band Finds Itself by Scott Isler
MUSICIAN Magazine, September, 1992

Part III of 3 Parts


Ficca maintains intra-band relationships are better than 
they were in the '70s.  "We're more mature.  About time, 
for crissake."
	
"I don't see a problem with doing another record if Capitol 
wants it," Smith says.  Telfer similarly states the reunion 
"is not intended to be a one-off.  You don't suddenly 
reactivate a legend without giving it your full shot.  
But who knows what can happen."
	
Verlaine - typically - looks through the glass darkly, 
and finds it half-empty.  "It really won't surprise 
me if this isn't happening nine months from now," he 
laughs.  "I frankly think this record will be the 
same thing in this year that [Television's debut] 
Marquee Moon was in that year:  a group of people 
will like it.  It won't be the people who liked the 
old ones; it'll be a new group of people: 'What the 
fuck is this?' 
	
"Nobody knows about the band's dynamic.  A few 
girlfriends go around and say, 'Oh, this guy's 
fighting with this.' Everybody fights all the time.  
I've never seen two people who didn't fight at least 
twice a week no matter what they're doing.  Either 
they fight with their bosses or they quit their jobs 
or they simmer and stew.  Fighting's just a part of 
being alive."
	
Television.  See them while you can.


TELEVISION SET LIST
	
For the new Television album TOM VERLAINE relied mostly 
on his trusty Fender Jazzmaster and Stratocaster, the 
latter often used for chording.  Also appearing were a 
Vox "with a vibrato arm that wouldn't stay in tune," a 
hollowbody Gibson and hollowbody 12-string Harmony - 
"they're much better than people give them credit for."  
For effects, Verlaine employed "a lot of little whacky 
'60s boxes...generally not featured on the main part of a 
song, but a little bit that comes and goes."  Among them 
were an Electro-Harmonix delay, a Fender Dimension 4, 
a Musitron and a tube Echoplex "that was in a fire and 
the plastic melted off.  So sometimes it distorts and 
sometimes it doesn't."  

His amplifier was a Valv-O-Tronics, a new tube amp made 
by Television techie Robert Derbie.  Tube fan Verlaine 
also used old Ampeg, Danelectro and Sears Silvertone amps.
	
RICHARD LLOYD has held onto his 1961 Strat as his main 
instrument.  The other guitars he played on Television 
were reissues of a '62 Strat and Tele, and a "rare Gretsch 
double-cutaway cat's-eye thing."  Formerly a D'Addario 
string-bender, Lloyd now swears by Dean Markley Super 
Long Plays, .10-.46.  "They keep their tone, they stay 
in tune and they don't break.  Television used to pop 
strings left and right."  Besides borrowing Verlaine's 
Echoplex for a preamp, Lloyd hooked up an MXR green box 
and a custom "Brownie" preamp.  For amps, Lloyd trundled 
in "all these wonderful old Fenders - a 1950 Deluxe, '55 
Tremolux - and a '59 Ampeg Jet, a '63 Vibroberb.  Some of 
the most expensive ones, you turn around and go, 'Hey, that 
sounds like a Pignose!'"
	
"I bought all these basses," FRED SMITH says, "and wound 
up using the same bass that was on Marquee Moon, this little 
student-model Ampeg."  Not exclusively, though; he plugged 
in a Ginell on two songs, and a Fender precision on a third. 
Strings are D'Addario round-wounds.  He adds chorus occasionally; 
"live I'll end up using a compressor and noise gate, maybe a 
flanger - nothing heavy."  His studio amp was an Ampeg V-15.  
Picks are Fender heavies.
	
Drummer BILLY FICCA has a Pearl black lacquer MLX maple-shell set.  
Until his old Pearl Jupiter brass snare gets repaired he's using 
a Pearl metal floating snare.  The toms are 12", 13" and 16"; 
the bass drum is 22".His Zildjian cymbals include an 18" K custom 
ride, paper-thin 17", a medium-thin 19" and a big 20".  The famous 
hi-hats are 15" live, smaller for recording.  Sticks are Zildjian 
3As:  "I don't like nylon tips because they fly off!"
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