Roger Daltrey, left, and Pete Townshend are celebrating.

Pete Townshend would be the first to concede that the 13-piece band 47,000 people will see tonight at B.C. Place isn't really The Who.

The real Who were four people who existed for a precious time — in turmoil for most of it — that was just long enough to crystalize the frustration, restlessness and confusion of youth and enshrine it on round discs of plastic.

One of the four died, the other three reached middle-age.

For his part, Townshend developed tinnitus and took on non-musical projects such as editing books.

That indirectly led him to recording a musical based on Ted Hughes' children's story, The Iron Man.

It is Iron Man that dovetails into The Who's reunion to celebrate its 25 years of recording.

While reading the story of a boy named Hogarth who befriends an Iron Man, Townshend saw a parallel with his most famous character, Tommy.

"It's obvious now, isn't it?" he says. "I never really realized when I began reading the story.

"I knew there was something about it that appealed to me," he says.

"I've gone back even farther, partly from examining Who songs for use on the road — stuff like Pictures of Lily and I'm a Boy. Kids Are Alright, even My Generation to some extent. There is always that boy. Happy Jack. Even Happy Jack. Always that idea of that boy living through dreams, living through a fairy-tale."

It also was while considering the early Who songs that the current three-hour show began to take shape. If this wasn't to be the essential Who, then it could be the essential retrospective of a great band's time, its place, its context.

In all, Townshend, Roger Daltrey and John Entwhistle rehearsed 80 songs. These included not only the rock opera, Tommy, and several unlikely but welcome numbers such as Mary Ann with The Shaky Hands and Pictures of Lily, but also versions of Hey Joe, Love Hurts and Bo Diddley's I'm a Man, which the band recorded for the UK version of its first LP in 1966.

"We've become accustomed to the idea that what we do in the future might be a lot less important than what we've done in the past," Townshend says in a matter-of-fact manner, yet with a trace of regret.

"It's taken a long time for the penny to drop. It's happened mostly because we have no record deal; we don't want a record deal (well, I don't. I'm not going to make a record with The Who; it would be sad, really).

"But" he continues and brightens, "because this is a 25-year celebration, we're looking back and, as a result, we tend not to be looking back on just our own work but that of others.

"You know, when we first went on the stage at the Marquee we had one song in our repertoire that we wrote. But we played an hour. We played Dance to Keep from Crying by Smokey Robinson and The Miracles, Please Please Please by James Brown, Anytime You Want Me, Daddy Rolling Stone, Heatwave, Leavin' Here, a lot of Tamla stuff and stuff other bands around London were playing, such as Smokestack Lightning, Chuck Berry. We were a scary band playing that stuff. We were these four spindly little white-faced kids growling I'm a Man.

"What is strange about hearing Roger sing I'm a Man is that he is a man now and he seems comfortable with it. So he is singing I'm A Man with a real dignity like the way Muddy Waters or Bo Diddley used to sing it."