Verlaine’s mostly excellent solo albums carry no such mythology. They are works of an elusive individualist. After dissolving Television in 1978, the frontman was never again part of a legible scene—never caught in a zeitgeist, never anchored to a trend.
After 1992, Verlaine gradually receded from the public eye. Appearances were sparse. Disillusioned with the grinding routine of touring, he kept live commitments to a minimum. He contributed to Patti Smith’s 1996 comeback album, Gone Again, and lent some music to a little-seen Renée Zellweger film, Love and a .45. He also met Jeff Buckley, who hired him to produce what would have been Buckley’s second album, My Sweetheart the Drunk, though the singer became dissatisfied with the tracks and planned to re-record the material, sans Verlaine, before his untimely death.
But at 16 tracks, the album overstays its welcome and, at times, slips into aimlessness. There are plenty of pieces that would work great soundtracking some ’90s art-house neo-noir but remain less than engaging on record. “A Burned Letter,” for instance, may make you wonder why Verlaine never broke into Jim Jarmusch’s rolodex the way Neil Young did—Verlaine could have had a second career as a film composer. (He did, in fact, enjoy a regular side hustle creating new scores for European silent films from the 1920s.)
During his final years, Verlaine moved through New York like a ghost. He went unrecognized by the masses, but you could find him lurking outside the Strand for hours, smoking in an overcoat as he thumbed through volumes of Buddhist poetry or shot the breeze with Thurston Moore. He had zero interest in the celebrity that accompanied being a rock legend. He maintained a low profile, rarely made public appearances beyond Television’s sporadic tours and festival sets, never used social media, and stopped giving interviews (I tried).
Zach Schonfeld (2024)
#TomVerlaine
I Heart Noise
John Sohn
Punkrock History
Dom Tyer
ResearchBuzz: Firehose
Markku Roinila 
剃刀小狗RazorPuppy