Tag Archives: The Who

My Generation – The Very Best Of The Who

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This Compilation Surfaced In 1996, And It Coincided With The Remastered Series

This Compilation Surfaced In 1996, And It Coincided With The Remastered Series

This was the single disc compilation that accompanied the remastered series that were issued in the ‘90s. The disc has 20 tracks, and many were the remastered versions that the forthcoming CDs were to include.

On the whole, the compilers did a very good job. All the early non-album singles minus “Call Me Lightning” and “Dogs” are included. From “Tommy“, we have “Pinball Wizard”. From “Who’s Next” we have “Baba O’Riley” and Won’t Get Fooled Again” (both unedited). Beside, two of the three Lifehouse leftovers that were issued as singles are here. They are “Let’s See Action” and “Join Together”. We are missing the final one, “The Relay”. It is a loss, but not a great one. The best thing about it is Moon’s funky drum track. But the other two singles were the real deal, and they proved it on the charts.

“Quadrophenia” is represented by just the one track, “5.15” (also unabridged). Finally, we have the ineluctable “Squeeze Box” (it was a top ten hit after all), an edited “Who Are You” and the full length “You Better You Bet”. The song is unremixed. You can tell because the background vocals are not as crisp as on the reissued “Face Dances”.    Continue reading →

The Iron Man (Pete Townshend) – Album Review (Part 2)

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Don’t forget to read the introduction to this review.

Pete wrote 20 songs for this musical, 11 of which are included on this album. Some were released as B-sides, too. The singles from the CD were going to be “A Friend Is A Friend” (a song that does not sound like a Townshend composition at all – maybe that was the reason why it was a single) and the excellent set opener, “I Won’t Run Anymore”. Sung by Pete (as Hogarth) and Deborah Conway, the song details the protagonist’s initial encounter with the lumbering giant, and his determination to be as courageous as an adult would be and face the situation instead of fleeing.

The song is immediately followed by “Over The Top”, my personal favorite of the two songs in which John Lee Hooker takes the lead. The other is “I Eat Heavy Metal”, and I am certain most of you will actually like it best than “Over The Top” as it treads bluesier territory, hence Hooker is more at home. In any case, John Lee Hooker as the Iron Man was the best casting decision of the whole disc.

For its part, Simon Townshend tackles “Man Machines”, a brief passage that deals with the same theory that movies like “Terminator” have popularized – we come up with machines to fight our wars for us, and in the end they will nab us.

The song leads into the first Who tune, “Dig”. Roger fills in as Hogarth’s father (no doubt he got an added thrill for lecturing Pete on the song), and the song gave everybody renewed faith on the Who. But the band was not going to record any new tracks after a lackluster cover of Elton John’s “Saturday’s Night Alright For Fighting”. The next recordings would already take place after Entwistle had passed away. Continue reading →

The Iron Man (Pete Townshend) – Album Review (Part 1)

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"The Iron Man" (1989) Was A Musical That Ended Reuniting Pete Townshend With The Who

"The Iron Man" (1989) Was A Musical That Ended Reuniting Pete Townshend With The Who

When Tommy was being recorded, there was a big issue: whether or not to use outside musicians to fill in all the different roles. The Who finally decided not to, and it was the right choice – the whole opera would have escalated otherwise, and replicating it onstage would have been impossible without dazzling logistics. The legendary performances that we can listen to today in albums like Live At The Isle of Wight and the Woodstock soundtrack would never have been. And the sanitized performances that we have as part of boxed sets like Join Together just put a fine point on it all.

However, knowing that Tommy was once considered as a multitudinous project is vital, as it shows that big conceptual schemes in terms of participants had been lodged on Pete’s brain for a long time. He finally had a chance to let that come to fruition in 1989 with the musical “The Iron Man”.

The CD marked the first time Pete had adapted somebody else’s work, as the opera was based on the child’s tale by poet laureate Ted Hughes. Townshend invited musicians from all over the specter to lend their talents, and these ranged from blues legend John Lee Hooker and jazz stalwart Nina Simone to vocalists like Chyna and Australian rocker Deborah Conway. Likewise, he drafted his younger brother Simon and old-time associate Billy Nicholls to sing backup. But most importantly (and tellingly in the long run) was that the Who guested on two tracks, the excellent “Dig” and the ineffective cover of “Fire” by the Crazy World Of Arthur Brown (a song Pete had produced in the 60s and taken all the way to number one).

The reunion with the Who was most tellingly because Pete (who had resisted touring with his former compadres for so long) was to finally abdicate and agree to a massive tour of arenas backed by a large ensemble band including percussionists, vocalists and someone else playing electric guitar – Pete was to play mostly acoustic on the “quiet” side of the stage, shielded from the wall of sound. These performances were to result on the live “Join Together” boxed set, a much-reviled collection of live songs. In a certain sense, Pete and the guys had the right to try something different. They had never toured with such a band before, so they had a good excuse. Money also factored heavily at that time, but I already discussed that here. Continue reading →

Live At The Isle Of Wight (The Who) – Album Review

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Recorded In 1970 At The Isle Of Wight, The Who's Legendary Performance Was Finally Issued In 1996

Recorded In 1970 At The Isle Of Wight, The Who's Legendary Performance Was Finally Issued In 1996

It may sound incredible –  nay, it is incredible – but a live rendering of Tommy by the original lineup was not released until this double album was issued in 1996. The one landmark live disc by the band bypassed Tommy almost entirely. And the one “official” release that had a full performance was as diluted as it could ever possible be – it was part of the “Join Together” box set, with a trillion guest chirping in and a backing band as huge as to render the three surviving members irrelevant.

That was the reason everybody flocked to this when it was issued in 1996. We all had our appetites whetted the previous year, as a video of the performance was released by Murray Lerner. Although it was not the full performance, it sufficed to send everybody counting the days until a live CD was issued. And we didn’t have to wait that long, fortunately. Continue reading →

The Kids Are Alright – Biopic Review

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"The Kids Are Alright" Was Directed By Super-fan Jeff Stein. Its Theatrical Release Was In 1979.

"The Kids Are Alright" Was Directed By Super-fan Jeff Stein. Its Theatrical Release Was In 1979.

The music of The Who came from them being one of the truly unique ensembles in the history of music. If there was ever a band with a million tales to tell, it was them. The way those guys were together and constantly at odds was something that their music did not necessarily convey, until one (correctly) interpreted the outrageous volume as a telltale of bottled emotions and anger. But there was also enormous love and belief lying at the heart of it all. And that was something which just had to be told.

“The Kids Are Alright” (1979) was assembled with that objective in mind. The idea was to show what made the band so distinctive, and why it was that their fans were so loyal. The movie itself (directed by a then-young Jeff Stein, and released shortly after Keith Moon died) achieved that aim, but only in a certain sense: it captured their offstage irreverence in full flight by the inclusion of interviews and specials that were shot through the years. Continue reading →

Tommy (Movie Review)

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The Tommy Movie Was Issued In 1975. Ken Russell Directed It And Modified Several Key Plot Aspects.

The "Tommy" Movie Saw Release In 1975. Ken Russell Directed It, And He Modified Several Key Aspects Of The Plot.

An absolute abomination of a movie, “Tommy” (1975) was directed by the ever-controversial Ken Russell. That was the director Pete Townshend actually wanted owing to his artistic background. Pete also thought having Ken along for the ride would free him for having to explain the story ever and ever again, but he was wrong – Russell needed him no less than any other director that the band and (specially) their managers had approached for years on end to get this thing together.

In any case, Ken was to rewrite the whole story, and a major shift took place, as Tommy’s drama was situated outside his family (the lover kills the father here, rather than the other way around) and the film mainly revolves around the attempt to market and sell the deaf, dumb and blind boy’s vision to the world. In other words: Ken Russell’s Tommy is the original work without any innocence or magic. I could barely enjoy the original album, and the little appreciation I had for it stemmed from those two attributes. I don’t need to tell you how much I suffered through the entire running time of this travesty of a movie. Continue reading →

Who Came First (Pete Townshend) – Album Review (Part 2)

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Read the first part of this review here.

I haven’t talked a lot about the tracks that were contributed by fellow musicians yet. “Evolution” is Ronnie Lane’s all-acoustic take on a Small Faces track named “The Stone”, with him playing rhythm and Pete leading the way. For its part, “Forever’s Not Time At All” comprises mostly Billy Nicholls’ vocals and Caleb Quaye’s instrumentation – he handles bass, drums and guitars. “Forever’s Not Time At All”, incidentally, was a phrase inspired by Meher Baba. And the same applies to the coda of “Let’s See Action”, as “The Nothing & The Everything” was one of Baba’s teachings.

As far as Pete’s original compositions go, we have “Time Is Passing”, yet another song from the aborted Lifehouse project and one that did not surface as a Who recording until the remastered “Odds & Sods” saw release in 1999. A note on the Who’s version on that disc: what you listen to is only half the song. The other half (including a French horn and the full bass part) are missing, although the exactly opposite version of the song does exist, featuring the missing instruments and lacking the other ones. Some bootlegger even managed to combine the two mixes and come up with the “definitive” version of “Time Is Passing” by the Shepherd Bush’s combo.

The other original track is “Sheraton Gibson” a small ditty about hitting the road. Whether Pete alludes to touring or striking down the pathway of spiritual enlightenment is up to each listener… Continue reading →

Who Came First (Pete Townshend) – Album Review (Part 1)

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Pete Townshend As Depicted On The Cover Of His First Solo Record, Who Came First

Pete Townshend As Depicted On The Cover Of His First Solo Record, "Who Came First" (1972)

Pete Townshend’s love for Indian Avatar Meher Baba produced the critically-acclaimed Tommy album in 1969, but there was more to it. As a “Baba Lover”, Townshend was involved with other devotees in the production and internal release of albums that included not only music but also poetry readings. Those were to fall into the hands of bootleggers and be repackaged before too long, and that was the reason Pete’s record company offered him the chance to assemble an official disc. That disc was to be named “Who Came First”, it was issued in 1972, and it was to be Pete’s first release outside of The Who.

As I explained in the general introduction to Pete’s music, “Who Came First” was not really a “solo” album as a literal host contributed to the record. Caleb Quaye, Ronnie Lane and Billy Nicholls lent their interpretative skills to three of the nine tracks that were featured on “Who Came First”, and the album also included a painting by Mike McInnerney (he who had illustrated “Tommy”). Lyrics were likewise composed by other Baba lovers, with both McInnerney’s wife and Maud Kelly having writing credits of their own.

Pete provided some Who demos, a few original numbers and an adaptation of Baba’s Universal Prayer (“Parvardigar”). He also tackled Jim Reeves’ “There’s An Heartache Following Me”, as it was one of Baba’s favorite Western songs. The other was “Begin The Beguine”, and Pete did also cover it on another of those tribute albums. It didn’t make it into “Who Came First”, though.

The Who demos included “Pure & Easy” and “Let’s See Action”. The inclusion of “Pure & Easy” was phenomenal if only because a Who version was not issued until the “Odds & Sods” album almost 5 years later. The song was the genesis of the whole “Lifehouse” project, and its omission on the “Who’s Next” disc has always been mourned. As Dave Marsh said, it wouldn’t have “saved” the album itself. Rather, it would have “perfected” it. Continue reading →

Pete Townshend – General Introduction

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Pete Playing With The Who In 1972. His Leaps Were A Trademark Move Along With His Windmills.

Pete Playing With The Who In 1972. His Leaps Were A Trademark Move Along With His Windmills.

Notwithstanding the scope and quality of his solo output, Pete Townshend will always be remembered as the driving force behind The Who. The fact remains that Pete always had such an attachment and belief on the band that his solo career took a long time to start in earnest. That is, his first solo releases were not really that – both “Who Came First” and “Rough Mix” were large scale collaborations, as if Pete wanted to dilute by all means the fact that he was recording with someone who was not his beloved band.

Come the early eighties, though, his one love had become quite fragmented and the will to strike out on his own was strengthened. The death of Keith Moon was the obvious catalyst, but he also found it uneasy trying to communicate to a younger public. And one of his recurrent themes was always that of youth and its connection with ideals and dreams. All he could do was study the evolution of these themes along with his already-established fan base.

He did so in his first solo disc, “Empty Glass” (1980). It would prove to be his most successful offering, although the second one (“All The Best Cowboys Have Chinese Eyes”, 1982) was also praised critically, even when it sometimes sank under its own pretensions.

Pete then released the first of many collections of demos. Those “Scoops” as he were to name them were invariably intoxicating to fans, for two reasons. The first was that Pete played every instrument himself, and he did so suiting the style of each member of The Who. The second was that his vocal delivery was always very removed from that of Roger, not only in terms of range but mainly in terms of interpretative force. Roger was always a ballsy performer, and his energy was to take some songs such as “Who Are You” into territory different to the one Pete had originally conceived. Continue reading →

It’s Hard (The Who) – Album Review (Part 2)

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Read the introduction to this review here.

The songs on The Who’s final record with Kenny Jones have a distinctive characteristic: many were written “to order” by Pete. That is, Roger and John requested that certain issues were touched upon and that is why we have a song about the health system (“Cook’s County”) and one about war (“I’ve Known No War”). These work in tandem with John’s “Dangerous”, about urban violence and security.

“Cook’s County” has the sad merit of being hailed by fans as one of the worst songs ever recorded by the band. The other is “Armenia, City In The Sky”, though to be fair that one was penned by Pete’s chauffeur at the time, Speedy Keene. ”I’ve Known No War” is better as it has a longer running time in which motifs are established and both the instruments and the vocals peak, culminating in an orchestrated fade.

The title track was actually reworked from an opera of Pete about each person being a soul under siege, and it has some mixed wordplay. But it is mostly compelling when taken as a whole. Continue reading →