'Tommy' a Smash Record Success

By Dave Donnelly

What a pleasure to be wrong. Or, more accurately, to have our pessimism proved unfounded.

Two weeks ago we discussed the new two-record album by the Who, "Tommy," and said the ambitious rock-opera was a sales question mark because it was so out of the ordinary — not at all like the normal big-selling album.

Now we can happily report that "Tommy" is the surprise smash success of the year. It's already a "gold" record meaning it has chalked up over $1 million in sales and is still going strong.

It broke into Variety's album bestsellers chart at 43 the first week it was out and this week moved up to No. 35.

For such an unusual record with only one "hit" song on it ("Pinball Wizard"), the album's success is remarkable.

AND WHEN one considers that this is a first in that one must listen to the whole album — nearly an hour and a half — to get the full effect, it is the more amazing. Especially since we live in a time when young people can't sit still for more than 30 minutes at a time.

So "Tommy" is a success and may even be performed and enacted on stage in the near future. Several companies, including the Seattle Opera Co., have expressed an interest in doing the rock-opera.

We found the music in the opera less than exciting in many places, but other critics have praised it for its simplicity and its carrying the story line along without being obtrusive. This it does.

THE WHO's leader, Peter Townshend,* who wrote most of the songs (arias?) in the opera, recently shed some light on the storyline which, while intriguing, is not always crystal clear.

Said Townshend: "It's about the life of a highly spiritually aware person. Tommy goes as high as he can go as a human being and becomes united with all the forces of God, the Creator, and the Universal Consciousness. The people around him build him into a messianic figure, but Tommy realizes that in order to get them back to their own lives, he must sacrifice his image."

If this seems like a radical departure from "I Wanna Hold Your Hand," it is.

Think where pop music may be a year or five years from now!