Richard Lloyd (guitarist)

Richard Lloyd (born 25 October 1951, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania) is an American guitarist, singer and songwriter, probably best-known as a former member of the rock band, Television.

Richard first became interested in music as a small child and would sit at the age of three or four at a small 28 Key child's piano, playing notes and wondering where they went as the vibrations subsided. When he was a young teenager he spent his evenings with a transistor radio balanced on his ear and a pillow over his head, searching for intelligent life. When he saw the Beatles on the Ed Sullivan show and experienced the phenomenon of Beatlemania, his main interest was anthropological, wondering how four young men would cause mass hysteria worldwide the likes of which could only be matched by world wars. He followed the British invasion back to it's roots in American Blues and Jazz and listened to as much blues and jazz as he could find.

Too young to be a beatnik, and too old to be a hippie, Richard attended Stuyvesant high school in New York City, which is a specialized science school considered to be one of the best public schools in the country. He attended the Be-ins and Love-ins in Central Park and even attended Woodstock and stayed awake for the entire three days, after being driven there by his stepfather. In his early teens he studied drums with William Kessler, who was the ghostwriter for Cozy Cole, one of the famous big-band drummers. But his cousins had also taught him three chords on the guitar, and after playing drums for 3 1/2 years he had an auditory hallucination which told him to play a melody instrument. So he turned to the guitar. His first guitar was an Stratocaster, sold to him by one of his best friends older brothers for $200, which he saved up himself.

In his middle teens he met a scrawny black kid from Brooklyn named Velvert Turner who had the audacity to claim to know Jimi Hendrix. Richard was the only one of a group of friends who believed him on first sight and it turned out to be true; in fact, Jimi considered Velvert his "little brother", and took him on as his protégé, inviting him to various clubs and teaching him guitar from Jimi's apartment on W 12th St. As Velvert and Richard Lloyd were best friends, Velvert asked for permission to teach Richard what he was learning, and so Richard and Velvert began practicing together under the teaching auspice of Hendrix, and frequently attended his shows as well as those of other well-known acts such as Led Zeppelin, The Who, The Jeff Beck Group with Rod Stewart, the Allman Brothers Band, Grateful Dead etc...

At Stuyvesant high school, during the 11th grade, Richard decided that he was going to become a well-known guitarist, and so he stopped bringing his textbooks or homework to school, instead bringing an electric guitar in a hardshell case. When his teachers would ask him where his schoolbooks were, he would point to the case. Being asked to open the case, the teachers would proclaim "I don't see any books in there -- only an electric guitar", and Richard's retort was "That's the book I'm studying." He still managed to pass all of his tests but quit before graduation, because he did not believe in diplomas, and he considered that having a high school diploma would not do him any good in his pursuit of the music business. He would've been in the graduating class of 1969 but quit in May of that year. That summer his parents moved to Montclair New Jersey and gave him an ultimatum: he could either get a job or repeat the 12th grade in a new high school. He chose the latter, which led to his deep friendship with another guitarist named Albert Anderson, who went on to be the only American to play in Bob Marley's touring band, The Wailers.

After quitting a second high school before graduation, he moved to Boston, where he lived for two years. It was during this time that he enjoyed his first public performance, sitting in with John Lee Hooker at the Jazz workshop on Boylston Street. By this time Richard had already met and knew Jimi Hendrix, Buddy Guy, members of Led Zeppelin, and could be frequently found backstage conversing with his heroes. John Lee Hooker asked him what he did and Richard replied that he was a guitarist whereupon John Lee Hooker called him over and whispered into his ear "the secret of the electric guitar" and invited him to sit in with the band. After living in Boston for a period of time, Mr. Lloyd moved back to New York, but desiring to visit other centers of musical culture, he first decided upon hitchhiking across Route 66, but after considering how long it might take, he flew directly to Los Angeles instead. He spent 1971 through 1973 in Los Angeles, practicing the electric guitar without an amplifier and going to record company parties, which at that time were very ostentatious. He lived as a roommate with Richard Cromelin, the music critic for the Los Angeles Times, so again, he had access to the highest level and echelon of rock 'n roll.

In 1973 he heard about the New York Dolls and the beginning of a brand-new New York scene, so he arranged with a friend who owned a Lotus Europa to take him on as a passenger across the country. As they winded their way through the country at 125 miles an hour, with stops in famous towns like Memphis and New Orleans, he reached New York and heard the unpleasant news that the Mercer Arts Center had "fallen down." He began frequenting shows at the Diplomat Hotel and other spots, and seeing the possibility of a new scene, began contemplating putting a band together. He met a fellow named Terry Ork at Max's Kansas City, who had a huge loft in Chinatown and needed a roommate, so Richard moved in to Terry's Chinatown loft, living in the front room, a small room facing East Broadway. Terry Ork worked for Andy Warhol making silkscreen prints at night and working at a theatrical poster shop called Cinemabilia during the daytime. Terry Ork very much wanted to manage or create a band such as Andy Warhol had done with the Velvet Underground. During discussions with Richard, Terry mentioned that he knew of another guitarist without a band who was auditioning a couple of songs at Reno Sweeney's audition night. Reno Sweeney's was a off-Broadway style club on W. 13th St that mostly hosted singers like Peter Allen and Bette Midler and gay Broadway wannabes.

Terry and Richard went to Reno Sweeney's one night during the summer of 1973, where Richard saw Tom Miller play three songs. Richard leaned over to Terry during the second song and told him that this fellow had something, but was missing something, and what he was missing, Richard had. He advised Terry that if Terry could convince Tom, the combination of Richard Lloyd and Tom Miller would have the makings of the band Terry Ork was looking for. This was the beginning of the formation of the band "Television". Tom Miller would eventually changed his last name to Verlaine and Richard Meyers became Richard Hell and promised to learn the bass as they went along. With the addition of Bill Ficca on drums, the quartet was complete. Television rehearsed seven days a week for five or six hours a day during the fall and winter of 1973, and made their first public performance on March 2, 1974, at the Town House Theatre on W. 44th St.

Television were looking for a club where they could develop an audience and play more often as the house band, when Tom Verlaine spotted a guy putting up the awning on a bar on the Bowery which stood under a flophouse for homeless alcoholic bums. Tom and Richard Lloyd went back up and discussed the possibility of playing in this new club, which was to be called CBGBs. After Televisions manager Terry Ork promised CBGBs a large take at the bar, Television was given a gig at the end of March, 1974. CBGBs was run by a man named Hilly Kristal, who was planning to have country blues and bluegrass at the club, but when more original rock bands like Blondie, the Ramones and the Talking Heads started to show up after finding out that there was a place to play, Terry Ork became the official booking agent for the club. CBGBs started to get noticed after bands like Television and Talking Heads started to fill the place up, and when a young poetess named Patti Smith began playing double bills with Television, the club started becoming famous. CBGBs closed its doors in New York in 2007, but not until having earned the distinction of being the most famous rock-and-roll club in rock-and-roll history, all started by Tom and Richard Lloyd and their band Television looking for a place to play.

After recording some demos for various record companies, Richard Hell left the band and was replaced by Blondie bass player at the time, Fred Smith. Fred Smith's solid bass playing allowed for a more transcendent and profound music from the two guitarists and drummer, resulting in their being signed to Elektra records in 1977.

Television recorded two albums for Elektra records, Marquee Moon and Adventure. As a debut release in 1977, Marquee Moon remains on lists of greatest guitar albums in rock-and-roll history, and has never been out of print.

After recording Adventure in 1978, and finding success elusive in the United States, Television disbanded after a successful series of dates at New York's Bottom Line. The various members went on their separate ways, although all of them continued in the music industry.

After Television first disbanded in 1978, Mr. Lloyd released one album for You Elektra Records called Alchemy, and then stayed underground practicing psychological chemistry (commonly known as drug addiction) solo career, as a guitarist and session musician he has since worked with various luminaries in the music industry, including Matthew Sweet, John Doe (of the band X), and Stephan Eicher. He is also known to teach other aspiring guitarists in his studio in New York, where he frequently produces other acts. He acted as producer and recording engineer as well as a member of the band Rocket From The Tombs, entitled Rocket Redux, which was released on Smog Veil Records. He has also produced a number of records for other local bands, including The Blondes.Inc., Chris Purdy, and Kevin Otto. He recently finished up producing the album "Let it Die" from HTR, or Holy Trinity River, a Brooklyn southern-rock influenced band who is on the rise. [www.myspace.com/htr] He still owns the famous pinstriped Stratocaster he played with Television.

His other current projects include a reformation of Rocket From The Tombs. He has now released five solo albums. "Alchemy" in 1979, "Field of Fire" in 1986 (re released in 2007 with an additional disc of music),his live disc "Real Time" in 1987 (recorded at CBGB's) and "The Cover Doesn't Matter" in 2001. His most recent album "The Radiant Monkey" was released on Parasol Records in late 2007. The CD features Lloyd playing everything but the drums (manned by session drummer Chris Purdy and on one track Television's own Billy Ficca). And plans are in the works for his most ambitious album yet: a tribute to his hero Jimi Hendrix, due in 2009, and dedicated to the memory of his best friend as a teenager, Velvert Turner, who was Jimi Hendrix's only authenticated protégé and guitar student. His upcoming release of Jimi Hendrix covers will be released by Parasol Records, and will be titled "The Jamie Neverts Story", Jamie Neverts being the secret codename that Velvert and Richard came up with to prevent all the kids in the neighborhood from trying to come along when they went to see Jimi.

olo discography

* "Alchemy" (Elektra 1979)
* "Field of Fire" (Moving Target/Celluloid 1986) - later released on CD by Reaction Recordings (c/o Parasol Records)
* "Real Time" (1987)
* "The Cover Doesn't Matter" (2001)
* "The Radiant Monkey" (2007)

References

External links

* http://www.richardlloyd.com/