The Blow-Up is a live album by the American band Television, released as The Blow Up on cassette in 1982.[2][3] It was reissued in 1990 and again in 1999.[4][5] The songs first appeared on a bootleg titled Arrow.[6]
Production
Recorded at CBGB in 1978, the album was released four years after the band broke up.[7][8] It contains covers of "Knockin' on Heaven's Door" and "Satisfaction".[9]ROIR allegedly acquired the recording from the fan who had bootlegged the band's shows; The Blow-Up's sound quality is typical of a bootlegged recording.[10][11][12] "Little Johnny Jewel" had previously only been issued as a single.[13]
Robert Christgau, who cowrote the liner notes, stated that, "as with so many ROIR cassettes (and commercial tapes in general), audio makes the difference between a laudable document and living history," and called the version of "Little Johnny Jewel" "definitive."[15]The New York Times praised the "lyrical, incendiary" renditions.[18]
AllMusic wrote that the album "comes awfully close to being an essential document, simply because the band's studio albums didn't always capture the rawness and spontaneity that fueled their on-stage improvisations."[14] In 1990, The Philadelphia Inquirer determined that The Blow-Up "captures the heady intensity of the best guitar band to come out of New York's late-'70s punk/new-wave scene."[19] The Vancouver Sun admired the "breathtaking dual guitar interplay."[20]Spin listed the 1999 reissue as one of the five best of the year, deeming "Little Johnny Jewel" "the height of love between man and E-string."[21]
Track listing
All tracks are written by Tom Verlaine, except where noted.
