![]() Maybe he even hopes he'll get old before he dies. He is currently finishing Floss, a "musical play" – pipe down whoever said "rock opera" – about an ageing musician and his horse-obsessed daughter (who, as it happens, writes a gardening column in the magazine of this newspaper). Pete Townshend is as busy as ever, if a little less restless and self-loathing. It is to the credit of the Super Bowl organisers that they have ignored hysterical protests against The Who's half-time show appearance by American groups such as Protect Our Children. The taint of the child-pornography charges brought against Townshend in 2003 – he claimed he was merely researching for his work, and the charges were dropped – will unfortunately always stick to The Who guitarist. ![]() ![]() It's all rather touching and even a little heroic. Moreover, he and Daltrey have not only survived John Entwistle's death but overcome their long mutual antipathy and learned to love each other. But Townshend has recovered from drug addiction to mature into one of rock's more revered elder statesmen. Little that the band has done since then – from Face Dances in 1981 to Endless Wire in 2006 – touches their former glories. But unlike Led Zeppelin, who called it a day after the death of their drummer John Bonham, The Who soldiered on into the early Eighties with the more cautious Kenney Jones in the drum seat. The Who were never really the same after deranged Keith Moon – a drunken cross between Ian Dury and the Dudley Moore of Derek & Clive – died in 1978. Long Live Rock Down at the Astoria the scene was changing, Bingo and rock were pushing out X-rating, We were the first band to vomit in the bar, And find. Live at Leeds, released in 1970 and recorded on the Tommy tour at the city's university, is regularly and rightly hailed as the greatest live album of all time. Live – as this writer can attest from seeing them as a teenager at Charlton in 1974 and Wembley in 1975 – the Moon-fuelled Who were astonishingly exciting. Due to be performed next month at London's Albert Hall in aid of the Teenage Cancer Trust, the revisited Quadrophenia capitalises not simply on the much-loved 1979 film with Phil Daniels and Sting, but on acclaimed shows staged in 1996 in London and New York. That was followed in turn by the mod magnum opus Quadrophenia (1973), a double album dedicated to "the kids of Goldhawk Road, Carpenters Park, Stevenage New Town and to all the people we played to at the Marquee and Brighton Aquarium in the summer of 1965". With Tommy (1969), about a deaf, dumb and blind pinball wizard, he single-handedly gave birth to the rock opera as we came to know (and dread) it. A Quick One (1966) and The Who Sell Out (1967) were early examples of "concept albums". Townshend's restless intelligence pushed him to conceive ambitious art-rock projects far beyond the scope of conventional rock releases. Although Daltrey had transformed himself from a Carnaby Street mod "face" into the tousle-headed rock god of the band's performance at Woodstock, Townshend was so incensed when stoned activist Abbie Hoffman interrupted their set at that festival that he clouted him over the head with his guitar, yelling, "Fuck off my fucking stage!"Įnjoy unlimited access to 70 million ad-free songs and podcasts with Amazon Music Sign up now for a 30-day free trial Sign up ![]() At the world-changing Monterey International Pop Festival in June 1967, they offered a pointed British contrast to the California bands Buffalo Springfield (who preceded them) and the Grateful Dead, who followed. Not surprisingly, The Who were wholly at odds with late Sixties American vibes of peace and love. In all but name, it was punk rock a decade ahead of its time: no wonder the Sex Pistols would cover "Substitute". "They're a new form of crime," their gay upper-class manager Kit Lambert purred approvingly in March 1966, "armed against the bourgeoisie". His rage and self-loathing spewed out on stage in wheeling arm slashes and what he termed the "auto-destruction" of his guitars, beginning one night in September 1964 at the Railway Tavern in Harrow and Wealdstone. Recorded at the Strawberry Studio, Château d'Hérouville, France, from April to July 1977 with only Blackmore, Dio, Powell and session keyboardist and bassist.Townshend was Will Self with a Rickenbacker guitar, a misfit icon of choice for every bedroom pop star who didn't look like Roger Daltrey. After Bob Daisley and David Stone joined and toured Europe, the full band went back to the studio in December 1977 to finish the album. Most of the bass lines on the album are played by Ritchie Blackmore. Tracks 5 and 8 by Blackmore, Dio, and Powell.
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