Some are inclined to wear their hearts on their sleeves. Others, more musical-minded sorts, prefer to wear their hearts on their songs, or, rather, in their songs. If one adds to this latter category, the mind and the soul, visions of the past, ruminations on the future, memories of friends dead and living, of scenes long gone, all set to slashing rock chords and pimply sweet melodies, the result is Pete Townshend.

"All the Best Cowboys Have Chinese Eyes" (Atco), Townshend’s newest solo record, is ostensibly based on a short story of sorts, reprinted on the album’s inner jacket. The prose-poetry deals with the evil and heroic sides of heroes 6 their crucial role in society, and the darker side of their nature, as well as the need for and the need to create and sustain that role and the heroes themselves. Weighty stuff to be sure; one might say, universal. Yet, in the most curious of ways, the prose and the lyrics to the songs on the record seem somehow addressed to Townshend, the newest form of hero, the pop hero 6 and the constant ebb and flow of the character of the man himself.

There is an irony to all of this 6 the irony that comes only with the passage of time. Near the start of his career with The Who in the early 960s, it was all so very easy and black and white. On the song 3My Generation, 4 Townshend could proclaim quite blithely (through the voice of Roger Daltrey), 3I hope I die before I get old. 4 But now, to the great good fortune of himself and his fans, Townshend, 37, has survived to grow old, or, at the very least, to a steadily encroaching middle age. And the forces that confront him are no longer simple, or easy or black and white.

Time, as is its habit, has blurred the

boundaries of certainty.

3Chinese Eyes 4 is, in many ways, enigmatic and obvious, both musically and lyrically. Musically, it is Pete Townshend, the pop hero, grappling with the opposing poles of his composing style 6 the clash between hard, crashing rock and a kind of ingratiating melodicism. Lyrically, it is Pete Townshend, the man, grappling with himself, in a manner that is sometimes serious, sometimes witty, almost always self-deprecating.

Coming hard on the heels of a desperate time in Townshend 2s life 6 a time filled with personal dissipation and professional ambiguity 6 the record represents a fine line that cuts across the boundaries of self-assurance and self-doubt.

On songs such as 3The Sea Refuses No River 4 and 3Exquisitely Bored, 4 Townshend displays a musical power and majesty that are fully the equal of

the accompanying lyrics. 3Sea 4 opens with a plaintive harmonica and soft instrumental background that build to the awesome refrain of the song 2s chorus: 3For the sea refuses no river 6 We 2re polluted now but in our hearts still clean - The sea refuses no river 6 We tried not to age - But time had