The Who: Difference between revisions

[[File:whos_1971-1.jpg|frame|[[Rockers Smash Guitars|This guitar has seconds to live]].]]

 

 

 

 

The group started out as the Detours in 1962 when classmates Townshend and Entwistle met Daltrey, then a high-school dropout working in a sheet metal factory. After beating around the bush for a while as a mod-rock act, changing their name to the High Numbers and then the Who, added Moon to the lineup in late 1964, and finally struck gold in 1965 with the singles "[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vhuL79iEWDo I Can't Explain]", "[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aUkJYkVTITU Anyway, Anyhow, Anywhere]" and the famous "[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5MnDbWqe_kQ My Generation]". The album of the same name however was a rushed affair lacking in memorable work (though the American release was better). Guitarist and primary songwriter Pete Townshend had more ambition though, and included the 9-minute "mini-opera" "[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eIpsDTSmRyM A Quick One, While He's Away]" on the album ''A Quick One'', which was released the next year(and also featured the single "[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bvFuUaCe8eY Boris the Spider]"), as a taste of things to come.

After a quick break, The Who recorded another [[Concept Album]]/[[Rock Opera]], this time about a mentally ill teenager named Jimmy and his conflicts with his family and friends during the height of the mods-rockers conflict in the 1960s. Named ''[[Quadrophenia]]'', it was released in 1973 to critical acclaim, and spawned another hit with the ballad "[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gDbAtWpoA6k Love, Reign O'er Me]". During the supporting tour a famous incident occurred on 20 November 1973 in San Francisco, when Keith Moon passed out twice during the performance due to tranquilizers (the put-to-sleep-large-animals kind of tranquilizers), the first time returning after a half-hour delay, and the second time he was carried off. After playing "See Me, Feel Me" with Daltrey on tambourine, Townshend asked "Can anybody play the drums? I mean someone good!" An audience member, Scot Halpin, filled in for the three-song encore and did a pretty good job. When interviewed by ''Rolling Stone'', he noted: "I only played three numbers and I was dead".

 

 

However, one month after the album's release, Keith Moon died after accidentally overdosing on Heminevrin, a drug he had been prescribed to treat alcohol withdrawl. (He had taken to [[Too Dumb to Live|downing them by the dozen and mixing them with alcohol]]; 31 undigested pills were found in his stomach during his autopsy.) He was replaced by Kenney Jones of The Faces, who lacked Moon's characteristic hyperactive drumming style, with John "Rabbit" Bundrick unofficially added as the band's keyboardist, a position which Townshend (and occasionally Nicky Hopkins) had filled in the past. With Jones, they recorded two more albums: ''Face Dances'' (1981) and ''It's Hard'' (1982), which suffered from uninspired songwriting, the only notable songs being "[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mj58IHA3urc You Better You Bet]" and "[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OhuLhcbY_08 Another Tricky Day]" from the former, and "[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jkRx3NZ-qp4 Athena]" and "[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GnHLgxKUsEA Eminence Front]" from the latter. Finally, in December 1983, Townshend issued a public statement that The Who had disintegrated.

The Who first reunited for a one-off performance at Live Aid in 1985, where Kenney Jones was replaced with Simon Jones (no relation). A 1989 tour followed, where, citing an inability to play electric guitar due to hearing problems, Townshend recruited a large backing band, including a guitarist, a second drummer, three backing singers and a five-piece horn section. During this tour, the band regularly performed ''Tommy'' in its entirety for the first time since 1971.

 

 

The band's current incarnation, which Townshend jokingly refers to as "Who-2", consists of Daltrey, Townshend, Palladino, Starkey, Bundrick, and Townshend's little brother Simon on backing guitar and vocals. In 2006, the group released ''Endless Wire'', their first studio album since ''It's Hard''. While not particularly a hitmaker, the album featured some rather good songs, including the ''Man in a Purple Dress'', a Dylanish [[Protest Song]] inspired by ''[[The Passion of the Christ]]''; ''It's Not Enough'', the band's first charting single since 1982; ''Mike Post Theme'', a salute to the writer of theme songs for many of the TV shows catalogued on this very Wiki; and ''Wire and Glass'', a "mini-opera" adapted from Townshend's novella ''The Boy Who Heard Music''.

* Townshend was the most successful commercially. Townshend's career outside the Who started in 1969, when he and several other musicians recorded three albums of religious music for devotees of Meher Baba. These albums were heavily bootlegged and tracks from them were later released on his first official solo album, 1972's "Who Came First". Townshend's solo career peaked in [[The Eighties]], with his albums "Empty Glass", "All the Best Cowboys have Chinese Eyes", and "White City" producing a number of minor hits with "[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4FZbcoWrUsw Let My Love Open the Door]", an electro-pop love song sung from the perspective of God, reaching #3 in the pop chart. He was also a member of two short-lived [[Supergroup|supergroups]] - "The Palpitations", which included himself, Ronnie Wood, Steve Winwood, Rick Grech, Jim Capaldi and others as backing band for [[Eric Clapton|Eric Clapton's]] comeback show in 1973, and "The Deep End", featuring himself and [[Pink Floyd]] guitarist David Gilmour, who played on his solo album "White City" and released a live LP in 1986. In 1999, Townshend resurrected the Lifehouse project as a radio play which aired on the BBC; this play, along with his original demos of the Lifehouse songs and several other recordings, was released in a six-disc box set called "Lifehouse Chronicles" in 2000. The now-defunct "Lifehouse Method", a website which allowed visitors to create synthesizer tracks based on their vital statistics in a manner similar to how Townshend composed "Baba O'Riley", spun off from it in 2007.

* Daltrey's solo efforts were less remarkable, consisting mostly of ballads written for him by other people (most notably "[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l_6lCaqeBFQ Giving It All Away]", penned by fellow pop star Leo Sayer, which reached #5 in the UK), as well as a cover of [[Elton John]]'s "[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tLSl8kwnnVU Don't Let The Sun Go Down On Me]" for the soundtrack to ''[[The Lost Boys]]''. Daltrey's success outside the Who was mainly as an actor - after his big-screen debut in the film adaptation of ''Tommy'', he starred in the musical ''Lisztomania'' and the crime drama ''McVicar'', as well as a string of minor roles in film and TV throughout the '80s and '90s, including a memorable appearance as the villianous Col. Rickman on ''[[Sliders]]'', and hosted the short-lived [[The History Channel|History Channel]] series "Surviving History".

* Moon's lone solo album, ''Two Sides of the Moon'', defies categorization; it's a compilation of '60s pop covers, produced by [[Phil Spector]]. Moon ''does not play drums at all'' on the album, leaving that job to session musicians while he sings and often ''croons'' the lyrics to [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f29jcB1bZLI Beach Boys songs], a number of [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ugm1C1jSLDQ Lennon/McCartney tunes], [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-rMvUNXvVdI one of his own band's songs], and [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=te3CqTHa1e0 a Harry Nilsson song] where he and [[The Beatles|Ringo Starr]] talk over the music and tell bad Music Hall jokes. ("My dog doesn't eat meat!" "Why not?" "We don't give him any!") Moon also made a one-off appearance with the Jeff Beck Group, playing drums on the instrumental piece "[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vuj5toLeyY8 Beck's Bolero]".

 

* Leslie West - Guitar (Songs available on the deluxe editions of ''Who's Next'' and ''Odds and Sods'')

 

Albums released:

* 1965 - ''My Generation''

* 2004 - ''[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aNP2jxAdpk8 Real Good Looking Boy]''

 

* [[Going Mobile]] ("[[Captain Obvious|Going Mobile]]")

* [[Magic Bus]] ("[[Captain Obvious|Magic Bus]]")

* [[Power Pop]]

* [[Teenage Wasteland]] ("[[Refrain From Assuming|Baba O'Riley]]")

 

* [[All Drummers Are Animals]]: Keith Moon was the [[Trope Codifier]], legendary for wrecking hotel rooms - including part of a Holiday Inn in Michigan on his 21st birthday while The Who was touring the US. Popular legend claims that the chain banned the Who from all its hotels afterward, though Moon's biographer claims this was an exaggeration.

** Moon's trademark room-wrecking gambit involved dropping a lit cherry bomb into the toilet; he bought ''five hundred'' cherry bombs on his first trip to the U.S. and spent the next few years working through them. In later years, John Entwistle confessed that he occasionally joined in the fun, handing Keith the matches.

** Possibly lampshaded by Pete in the ''Live at Leeds'' album. When introducing "Substitute", "Happy Jack", and "I'm a Boy", he mentions that the first "was our first #4", the second "was our first #1... ''in Germany''", and the third, "according to Melody Maker, was our first #1 in England... for about half an hour." ([[Don't Explain the Joke|"I'm a Boy" ended up peaking at #2 in the UK]])

* [[Angrish]]: The stuttering in "My Generation" is meant partly to evoke this, and partly to invoke [[Watch It Stoned|a pill-popper who can't control his speech because he's high on amphetamines]].

* [[Audience Participation]]: Scot Halpin.

** Hell, even Keith Moon was picked up as an audience member, claiming to be better than their drummer at the time. In an interview clip from 1977, Moon claimed that he was never officially ''hired'' by the band, and he'd just been sitting in for 15 years.

** In the Broadway version of ''Tommy'', the line "How can we follow?" in "I'm Free" is intended to be sung by the audience.

** And at the call and answer part of "Pinball Wizard" (''how do you think he does it?'' / ''I don't know!''), the second part is often done by the audience.

** Even Abbie Hoffmann, who was told to "get the fuck off my fucking stage" at [[Woodstock]]. An audio recording of the incident exists on [[YouTube]] for skeptics such as Hoffman to listen to. Here's the full transcript:

''(Cue song)''<br />

'''Pete Townshend''': The next fucking person that walks across this stage is gonna get fucking killed, all right? (audience laughs) You can laugh, but I mean it! }}

* [[Call Back]]: Jimmy, the main character from the [[Rock Opera]] ''Quadrophenia'' attends a concert performed by the Who themselves, circa 1965. The song "[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w2W1-69yraU Helpless Dancer]" even ends with a brief fragment of their early hit "[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=afam2nIae4o The Kids Are Alright]".

** From "[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ir2rFb_ghn0 You Better You Bet]," released on the 1981 album ''Face Dances'' (and as the band's last top 20 single): "I drunk myself blind to the sound of old T.Rex / And ''Who's Next''."

* [[Cloudcuckoolander]]: Keith Moon

* [[Concept Album]]: ''The Who Sell Out''. In its original LP release, the concept gets more or less abandoned by the start of side two. Later CD releases correct this error by including real-life commercials recorded by the band to pad out the concept.

* [[The Cover Changes the Meaning]]: The cover of Sonny Boy Williamson II's "Eyesight to the Blind", as featured on ''Tommy'', was reworked to fit it into the story of the album.

** The Who later did it to one of their own songs. ''The Kids are Alright'', off their debut album, is a pop song about [[I Want My Beloved to Be Happy|a man who has to leave his girlfriend because she'll be better off without him]]. Beginning in 2000, the live performances of the song worked in an extended freestyle section which varied from show to show, where Townshend and Daltrey described how their lives and their perspectives on life had changed between now and when they first sang the song.

* [[Creator Breakdown]]: ''Lifehouse'', ''[[Lampshade Hanging|The Who By Numbers]]''.

* [[Crazy Prepared]]: Townshend's preferred manner of preparing songs to be recorded by the band was to record demo tracks on which he sang lead and ''played all the instruments himself'', to give the other band members a clear idea of what he wanted. His "Scoop" trilogy of solo albums is made of of compilations of these demos, and two discs of the six-disc "Lifehouse Chronicles" box set are made up of them.

** Additionally, every live performance had at least one John Entwistle song, with him on lead vocals, usually "Heaven and Hell" (as an opening number), "Boris the Spider" and/or "My Wife". These numbers would usually be amongst of the rare moments of the concert where the spotlight was on the stoic bassist.

*** Keith Moon used to sometimes take the lead vocal on rare occasions, on studio recording and during live performances, which would often also qualify as [[Crowning Moment of Funny]].

** The 1989 ''Tommy'' anniversary tour: "The Who on Ice"

* [[Fingore]]: Yes, Pete hurts his hand playing the guitar like that. In many cases, he loses fingernails outright.

** [[The Hero]]: Pete

** [[The Lancer]]: Roger (or the other way around, depending on your point of view)

** [[The Smart Guy]]: Keith

* [[Four More Measures]]: "Baba O'Riley".

* [[Genre Savvy]]: The band's onstage personalities tended to reflect the stereotypes of their instrument/role in the group: the flashy lead singer (Roger), the [[The Stoic|stoic]] bassist (John), the [[Cloudcuckoolander]] drummer (Keith), and the lead guitarist as the songwriter and the lynchpin holding it all together (Pete).

* [[Harsh Vocals]]: John Entwistle's growled refrain in "Boris the Spider" has been cited as one of the earliest examples of a [[Death Metal|death-growl]].

* [[Heavy Meta]]: "Long Live Rock"

*** You mean Keith Moon's drum kit from their appearance on ''The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour''. Moon was said to have packed more powder into the kit than the technicians were comfortable with and nobody but him knew about it. Pete and Roger claim that their respective hearing losses began in opposite ears because they were facing each other when Keith's bass drum exploded.

* [[Hypochondria]]: The song "Doctor, Doctor" has this in the lyrics, with someone claiming to have whooping cough, the mumps, and chicken pox in quick succession.

* [[Incredibly Lame Pun]]: And plenty.

** A lot of their songs do this in some way.

* [[Long Runner Lineup]]: The classic lineup falls under Type 2 and lasted from 1964 to Keith Moon's death in 1978.

* [[Lost Forever]]: Several of the songs the group recorded for ''Lifehouse'', such as "Mary", were lost due to the master tapes being inadequately preserved, and decayed to uselessness by the time the group sought to remaster them in the '90s. Some, like "Put the Money Down" and "Time Is Passing", were partially restored with new vocals and overdubs added to what could be retrieved from the originals.

* [[New Sound Album]]: ''Who's Next'' sees the group stepping decisively away from their early mod / pop art roots.

* [[No Ending]]: "Rael 1" was intended as the first part of a longer "mini-opera" in the same vein as "A Quick One (While He's Away)." Only Pete Townshend didn't finish writing it, so the story ends abruptly before it really has a chance to get started.

* [[Not Christian Rock]]: Pete Townshend is a follower of Meher Baba, an Indian pantheist guru, and as such many of the songs he wrote for the Who are either addressed to God ("Who Are You, Bargain", "Listening To You"), written ''from the perspective of God'' ("Let My Love Open the Door", "God Speaks of Marty Robbins"), or are about God in a more abstract sense ("Drowned", "Don't Let Go The Coat"). Most of Townshend's religious songs are oblique enough that one wouldn't notice it unless they were informed of it beforehand. His work with the Who aside, Townshend also recorded a trilogy of solo albums with Ronnie Lane which were explicitly dedicated to and based on the teachings of Meher Baba.

* [[Older Than They Look]]: Roger Daltrey seems to age at a fraction of the normal rate. Probably partly explained by his being straight-edge.

* [[The Power of Rock]]: ''Lifehouse''

* [[Promoted Fanboy]]: Scot Halpin.

* [[Protest Song]]: The Who were never a very political band, but there are a few examples among their catalogue;

** When [[The Rolling Stones|Mick Jagger and Keith Richards]] were briefly jailed for marijuana possession in 1967, the Who released a cover of "Under My Thumb", backed by "The Last Time", in protest. The plan was reportedly for the Who to keep covering Stones songs for as long as Jagger and Richards were in jail, but as it turned out the pair were released even before the "Under My Thumb" single was issued.

*** The song "Teenage Wasteland" has two verses, a bridge, and a second chorus section that were later cut out when the song became "Baba O'Riley".

* [[Repurposed Pop Song]]: "Who Are You" is the [[Theme Tune]] for ''[[CSI]]''. Which makes sense, because the show is about finding the killer. Well, except that the song is really about getting drunk, being hassled by the cops, and finding God.

*** '''''[[Memetic Mutation|YEEEEEEEEEEEEEEAHHHHH!!!!!]]'''''

** ''[[CSI New York]]'' uses "Baba O'Riley"... which makes ''no'' sense whatsoever.

* [[Rockumentary]]: ''The Kids Are Alright''. There's also the recent ''Amazing Journey: The Story of the Who'', which is a more serious look at the band's history.

* [[Scooter Riding Mod]]: The Who were closely associated with the British mod scene during their early career, with 1966's ''A Quick One'', their second album, being the zenith of their association with that subculture. The next few albums following it, though, see the group reinventing itself as one of the pioneers of 1970s hard rock, a process that was more or less complete by 1971's ''Who's Next''.

** The song "[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bhtmzy5L4hw Glow Girl]," recorded during the ''The Who Sell Out'' sessions but unreleased for a number of years, ends with a short song fragment ("[[Gender Bender|it's a girl, Mrs. Walker, it's a girl]]") that is recycled almost verbatim as the second track of ''Tommy''.

** A subtle one: listen carefully to the music during the chorus of "I'm One" from ''Quadrophenia''; part of it sounds like part of the ending of "Overture" in ''Tommy''.

** Wasn't always the case, though; it wasn't until after Daltrey's [[Vocal Evolution]] that it really became like this trope.

** John Entwistle sometimes sung "soprano" to both Daltrey and Townshend's "gravel", his falsetto being a big part of The Who's vocals. Also sung much lower than Daltrey's tenor in Summertime Blues, for comedic effect.

** The shining example is in Sea And Sand on Quadrophenia.

* [[Spiders Are Scary]]: "Boris the Spider"

* [[The Stoic]]: John Entwistle played this role within [[The Who]], usually not moving too much and keeping a straight face to contrast with the other members' wild antics. It's really only ''comparatively'', though; he had his fair share of crazy moments, including sometimes joining the others in the onstage instrument-destroying.

** "Comparatively" is right. It's odd that you can be described as the low-key member of the group while performing an entire concert in a '''''leather''' Halloween skeleton costume''.

* [[Subdued Section]]: "You Better You Bet" among others

** As for the Codifying, ''Tommy'' is still one of the best examples of a continuous narrative via music there is, and uses several common [[Rock Opera]] Tropes, particularly [[Rock Opera Plot]] and [[Leitmotif]].

* [[Unsound Effect]]: Because they couldn't afford to hire additional musicians, Pete, Roger and John had to sing "cello cello cello cello" for the part in "A Quick One, While He's Away" that was supposed to have strings.

* [[Very Special Episode]]: "Little Billy", an anti-smoking jingle the group recorded for the American Cancer Society in 1968.

* [[Word Salad Lyrics]]: The title of the song "Eminence Front" <ref> i.e., a pretension of being suave and elite</ref> barely makes sense even if you ''do'' understand the context of the words.

 

[[Category:The Who]]

[[Category:Music]]