The Neon Boys

The Neon Boys were formed after Richard Hell and Tom Verlaine dropped out of school and wound up in New York in the early 1970s. Here they found drummer Billy Ficca and recorded a self titled single in 1973, which has been described as the 'first punk rock single' (preceeding the more popular choice of The Damned's 'New Rose' by three years). The Neon Boys never played live due to the absence of a second guitar player. When they found one, Richard Lloyd, they changed their name to Television and morphed into an Art-Rock band. This original line-up lasted until 1975 when Hell left to join the Heartbreakers with Johnny Thunders and Jerry Nolan. Two Neon Boys songs can be found on the Richard Hell compilation 'Spurts'. . Brief (very) history of this if you didn’t know: before there was Richard Hell and the Voidoids and Television, Tom Verlaine and Mr. Hell were in a band that went nowhere pretty quickly by the name of Neon Boys. This is a bootleg that came out a while back that some may not have heard. Love Comes In Spurts is not the same as the Voidoids track. Read more on Last.fm. User-contributed text is available under the Creative Commons By-SA License; additional terms may apply.