Category Archives: The Who

Who’s Next (The Who) – Album Review (Part 2)

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Remember to check out Part 1 in order to learn about the context in which Who’s Next was born.

Doing a quick recap, Pete’s “Lifehouse” project had failed to materialize and it had exhausted the band while driving him to a nervous breakdown. The Who decided to salvage what they could and had Glyn Johns assemble a single disc with the best of the new material.

Glyn Johns did something more than assembling the disc that we know as “Who’s Next”. He actually produced it, and his expertise was specially noticeable when we compare this record with any of the albums that Lambert had mastered. It comes as no surprise that Lambert never produced a Who album again. His lack of technical skill, his lax bookkeeping, his growing disconnection with the band… he (and partner Chris Stamp) would be out of the picture within a year. And a lengthy litigation would ensue. Continue reading →

Who’s Next (The Who) – Album Review (Part 1)

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A Symbol Of Alienation Meets Rock & Roll

A Symbol Of Alienation Meets Rock & Roll

Pete Townshend was always one to push boundaries. After conceiving the first rock opera in history, it was only natural that he would continue leading The Who into uncharted territories. But this time there would be trouble ahead, for the first time in his artistic career.

As everybody and his wife knows, the album we know as “Who’s Next” is nothing but the salvage job of a project of Pete named “Lifehouse”, a project that would finally be realized in the year 2000 with Pete’s solo release of the “Lifehouse Chronicles” boxed set, and that was to resurface in several guises all through the years before that. Continue reading →

Moon: The Life And Death Of A Rock Legend (Tony Fletcher) – Book Review

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Moon

Without a doubt, this is one of the best biographies I have ever set my eyes on. This edition was first published in 1999 by Spike. The enthusiasm and integrity of biographer Tony Fletcher drives the book along its 40 chapters, and he takes upon himself to demolish a myriad of myths and legends along the way.

The Beachcombers were not a surf band. Keith’s audition did not take place as we were always told. His 21st birthday party was exaggerated. But Fletcher has a deft way of bringing some much needed light into a life that was to be incredibly aggrandized, explaining how these fabrications are really secondary to Keith Moon as a man and as a musician like no other. Continue reading →

Live At Leeds (The Who) – Album Review

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A Discreet Cover For An Explosive Album

A Discreet Cover For An Explosive Album

As successful as Tommy would prove to be for The Who, it would also prove to bring about a series of difficulties that were to undermine the band, the way it saw itself, and the way the audience saw it. The problem with the famed rock opera was that the sound of the record was not even remotely reminiscent of the way The Who sounded on stage, and since many people discovered them through Tommy they had no idea of the volume and electricity the band generated when playing live. How could they address that situation and make newcomers realize how they really sounded, and show their old fans that they were as demolishing as ever? The answer was to be named “Live At Leeds”, and nowadays any fan of rock & roll knows the words. They are inscribed into the collective soul of rockers, and into the cognition of those who have experienced music in its purest form.

“Leeds” found the different band members at the point in which they realized The Who was to be what they were to do for the rest of their lives. Not because they were making a substantial income, but because they had found something they truly excelled at, and something that truly inspired others to do their best. Continue reading →

Tommy (The Who) – Album Review (Part 2)

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(If you haven’t done so already, read Part 1 of this review where “Tommy” is introduced, and the context in which it was created is detailed)

The album had 20 tracks. It was the first double album the band had released. The operatic connection was made evident through a formal overture and an “underture” which was mostly the extension of a theme called “Sparks”, also featured on the album and derived from a chord pattern found on “Rael” from the previous record.

Highlights included “Pinball Wizard” (the first single from the album) and “See Me, Feel Me”, a prayer sent to the most private space within the soul of every listener, a pronunciation of faith and endearment like no other within their repertoire. Other songs which merit mentioning are “The Acid Queen” and “I’m Free”, both very fine rockers. (“I’m Free” was to be released as a single too, and some time later an orchestrated version would be a minor hit.) Continue reading →

Tommy (The Who) – Album Review (Part 1)

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The Album's Artwork Was Created By A Fellow Baba Lover, Mike McInnerny.

The Album's Artwork Was Created By A Fellow Baba Lover, Mike McInnerny.

Pete Townshend needed an album like Tommy from an intellectual point of view, and The Who needed an album like Tommy from the vantage point of its career. Tommy is regarded as the first “Rock Opera” ever. Endless discussions arise regarding whether or not it deserves that denomination, and whether or not it was the first album that could be termed like that. Leaving the denomination aside, what we have is a collection of songs that came from disparate sources and which the band assembled together as a sort of story with the aid and constant presence of manager Kit Lambert, whose driving force was felt particularly strong on this project.

The main influence might as well have been the teachings of Indian guru Meher Baba. Pete became a Baba lover about a year before the album was first released, and he tried to make the whole work showcase the Compassionate Father’s teachings. Continue reading →

My Five Favorite Keith Moon Drum Breaks

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Keith Playing Live In The Mid-70s

Keith Playing Live In The Mid-70s

Ha. That is quite a hard thing to set down, for the mere reason that Moon played a constant drum break from start to finish. This list is made up of personal favorites- I am not saying they are the best, they are just the ones I like best.

Doctor Jimmy

One stormy afternoon I was listening to “Quadrophenia” (the duty of every Who fan when it is stormy outside, you know). While listening to “Doctor Jimmy” the almightiest thunder you could imagine roared and shattered the air, right before the break that you can hear at 05:20. I had always loved it, and from that point onwards it became the one I was the most emotionally attached to from their entire discography. Continue reading →

The Who Sell Out – Album Review

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The Front Cover. It Was Actually Banned In Parts Of The States On Grounds Of Vulgarity.

The Front Cover. It Was Actually Banned In Parts Of The States On Grounds Of Vulgarity.

As you probably know, The Who’s discography was extensively remastered and updated in the mid 90s, when the band celebrated its 30th birthday. A boxed set was released and every single album minus “My Generation” (owing to a legal dispute) was fortified with bonus tracks and big booklets including new liner notes and plenty of photographs. And none of these re-releases stood out so distinctly as this one.

You see – the original album (first issued in 1967) was structured as a pirate radio broadcast devoted solely to you-know-who, and the songs were interspersed with jingles and fake ads. But only on the first side. The ads disappeared from the second side, maybe because the songs themselves were more serious and they did not want to do the equivalent of painting a moustache on the Mona Lisa. Or – fans always wondered – because they had run out of ads and ideas. Continue reading →

Before I Get Old – The Story Of The Who (Dave Marsh) – Book Review

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The Original Cover

The Original Cover

Published in 1983, this book covers the story of The Who from the very inception of the band to their farewell tour of 1982. It is a lengthy book (it has 546 pages), and many criticisms were leveled at it owing to that – it was claimed the story was not balanced, since the book has 36 chapters and only one deals with the post-Moon Who. The Kenny Jones albums barely get a paragraph each, whereas the “classic” Who records are covered from every angle to the point that the descriptions become too exhaustive (and even exhausting) for some people.
Continue reading →

A Quick One (The Who) – Album Review

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Alan Aldridge Designed The Pop Cover For The Album

Alan Aldridge Designed The Pop Cover For The Album

This was The Who’s sophomore album. It was released in England in the year 1966. As their previous record, it was not released in the States immediately, and when it saw release later the same year it did so with a different name (“Happy Jack”) and (again) some differences in the track list. This time, though, Decca made a wise move: it replaced one of the weakest cuts (their cover of “Heatwave”) and added the little ditty about the hermit who “lived in the sand at the Isle of Man”. Happy Jack was their first top 40 hit in the States. Incidentally, it was also to become Jimi Hendrix’s favorite Who song. Continue reading →