Marquee Moon

Television, 1977. Solo by Tom Verlaine.

CBGB's answer to the psychedelic jam.

Two guitarists solo here: Richard Lloyd takes a brief, tightly structured break after the second chorus, and Tom Verlaine's extended solo fills most of the song's second half. Verlaine leans on a jazz-inflected Mixolydian approach, building steadily toward a climax before the band drops back to the opening theme. He played a Jazzmaster through a Fender Super Reverb with no effects, captured in one live take. It showed that punk-era bands could stretch out without falling back on blues clichés. Listen for the long, gradual build in Verlaine's solo; it climbs almost imperceptibly until the whole band is ringing.

Marquee Moon by Television is ranked #53 in our consensus of 79 guitar-solo lists. The solo is played by Tom Verlaine and the song was released in 1977. It appears on 10 lists, placing as high as #10 (uDiscover Music).

The story of Marquee Moon

Marquee Moon is the title track and centrepiece of Television's 1977 debut album. Tom Verlaine wrote it, and it began life years earlier as an acoustic ballad before the band turned it into a long electric workout. Television started playing it around 1974 at CBGB in New York, where early versions ran about five minutes; as the group refined the arrangement onstage, performances stretched past ten minutes and sometimes toward twenty.

The song is built on the interlocking guitars of Verlaine and Richard Lloyd, who avoided punk's standard power chords in favour of melodic lines and counter-melodies drawn from rock and jazz. Over Fred Smith's steady bass and Billy Ficca's busy drumming, it opens with a double-stopped guitar figure, runs through several verse and chorus cycles, and features two solos: a short one from Lloyd and a long, exploratory one from Verlaine.

Television recorded the album at A&R Recording in New York in November 1976, with Verlaine co-producing alongside Andy Johns, who had been hired on the strength of his work on the Rolling Stones' Goats Head Soup. Johns largely captured the band playing live in the room. The title track was nailed in a single pass that Ficca thought was only a rehearsal; when Johns proposed another take, Verlaine refused. The guitars went to tape without effects or compression, panned hard left and right.

Elektra issued the album in 1977, and in Britain the song came out as a single on 1 April 1977. The first pressing was a limited 12-inch of 25,000 copies with stereo on one side and mono on the other, while the 7-inch split the song into Part I and Part II. Despite its length it reached number 30 in the UK, where the album also charted at 28, even though it sold modestly in the United States.

The solo

Two guitarists solo on Marquee Moon. Richard Lloyd takes a brief, tightly structured break after the second chorus, while Tom Verlaine's extended solo follows the third chorus and fills most of the song's second half. Verlaine's solo leans on a jazz-inflected Mixolydian approach, building steadily toward a climax before the band drops back to the opening theme. He played a 1958 sunburst Fender Jazzmaster and Lloyd a 1961 Stratocaster with jumbo frets, both through Fender Super Reverb amps. No effects were used; the parts were multi-tracked and left uncompressed, and the whole track was captured in one live take at A&R Recording. Rolling Stone's Rob Sheffield likened the tone to a translation of late-night urban unease into guitar.

Legacy

Marquee Moon is widely regarded as Television's masterpiece and a cornerstone of guitar-driven post-punk. Rolling Stone ranked it 381st in its 2004 list of the 500 greatest songs, raised it to 173rd in 2021, and placed it 41st among the 100 greatest guitar songs in 2008. Its clean, interlocking two-guitar architecture has been traced through Talking Heads, Slint, the Strokes and Parquet Courts, and Elvis Costello quoted its guitar bridge in his 1996 song You Bowed Down. Songfacts notes that grunge songwriters in particular drew on it.

Top 10 facts about Marquee Moon

The title track was recorded in a single take that drummer Billy Ficca believed was just a rehearsal; Verlaine turned down Andy Johns's request to try again.
Wikipedia: Marquee Moon (album)
Verlaine played a 1958 sunburst Fender Jazzmaster with an anodized aluminium pickguard, while Lloyd used a 1961 Stratocaster with jumbo frets; both went through Fender Super Reverbs.
Fender
No effects were used on the guitars; Lloyd doubled some parts to get a natural chorusing he preferred to any chorus pedal.
Fender
The first UK pressing was a 12-inch limited to 25,000 copies, carrying the song in stereo on one side and mono on the other.
Wikipedia
Despite running nearly ten minutes, the single climbed to number 30 on the UK Singles Chart.
Wikipedia
The song started as an acoustic ballad and was first played by Television around 1974 at CBGB, where it lasted about five minutes.
Songfacts
Andy Johns was chosen as engineer partly because of his work on the Rolling Stones' Goats Head Soup.
Wikipedia: Marquee Moon (album)
Rolling Stone ranked the song 41st on its 2008 list of the 100 greatest guitar songs and 173rd in its 2021 list of the 500 greatest songs.
Wikipedia
Elvis Costello quoted the song's guitar bridge in his 1996 track You Bowed Down.
Wikipedia
Rob Sheffield singled out a 17-minute Portland performance from July 1978 as the best Marquee Moon ever.
Rolling Stone

Live versions

Live at the Old Waldorf (San Francisco) (1978) Recorded 29 June 1978 and issued by Rhino Handmade in 2003; captures the song's extended live form.
The Blow-Up (1982) ROIR cassette of 1978 concerts, first bootlegged as Arrow; its Marquee Moon runs 14:45.
Portland, Oregon (1978) A 17-minute July 1978 performance Rob Sheffield called the best version ever played.

Notable covers

Luna (2020) Ten-minute Bandcamp single reuniting the band with founding bassist Justin Harwood.

In our lists

Deep Cuts — #21
The Greatest Solo of Every Year — #34
Genre Champions — #15
The 25 Greatest Indie Rock Guitar Solos — #1
The 25 Greatest New Wave Guitar Solos — #24
The 25 Greatest Punk Guitar Solos — #1
The 1970s — #19
Epic-Length Solos — #12
Critics' Picks — #12

Sources

What guitar was used on the Marquee Moon solo?

A fender jazzmaster, according to widely reported accounts.

Where does Marquee Moon rank among the greatest guitar solos?

#53 in the GreatestSolos consensus of 79 published lists; it appears on 10 of them.

Who wrote Marquee Moon?

Tom Verlaine, Television's singer and guitarist, wrote the song.

Who plays the guitar solos on Marquee Moon?

Richard Lloyd plays a short solo after the second chorus, and Tom Verlaine plays the long solo after the third.

What guitar did Tom Verlaine play on Marquee Moon?

He used a 1958 Fender Jazzmaster through a Fender Super Reverb, with no effects.

How long is Marquee Moon?

The original LP version is 9:58; later CD reissues run about 10:40, and live versions often ran far longer.

What is Marquee Moon about?

Verlaine kept the lyric deliberately opaque; some listeners read it as a comment on drugs in the rock scene, but he never pinned down a meaning.