Insane? the Who has 'reason‘

By 1mm PHILIP

The Who—violent and
aggressive onstage.

A series of catastrophes
offstage in the two days
before they played last
night's Spectrum (1 a t e
might explain why Pete
Townshend attacks guitars,
Keith Moon smashes at his
drums, Roger Daltrey wails
and growls and John Ent-
whistle plays bass in near-
-catatonic silence.

“I want to tell Philadel-
phia h o w they've been
treating us. How could they
do this to us? Philadel-
phia‘s one of our home-
towns in America and now

we can't even get a hotel
room.”

That was Peter Budge.
their agent. yelling about
the series of misadventures
before the concert. at which
t h e y w e r e presented
p l a q u e s commemorat-
ing over $5 million sales of
the rock opera “Tommy."

They had just flown in
from Atlanta with hotel
reservations. But all seven
hotel rooms for the Who
and their road staff had
been given to some Eastern
Star ladies here for a con-
vention. It took a few fran-
tic phone calls before they
were safely ensconced in
another motel.

It‘s a long way from the
Eastern Star to bombs. but
bombs were what occupied
the Who’s minds for sev-
eral days before th ey
played Philadelphia. It all
began with the English Ex-
pression “go down a bomb."
which means the same as
“smashing success."

P e t e Townshend was
with the rest of the Who,
enroute from Memphis to
Atlanta. and was asked by
their English agent how
their n ew million-seller
“The Who Live at Leeds"
(Decca) was doing in New
York.

“It‘s going down a bomb
In New York." Pete replied
proudly.

A passing stewardess
heard those words and im- Pet. Iowmhend
mediately panicked. She
dashed to the cockpit and
alerted the pilot to the mad-
man who was going to
blow up the plane. The
plane was immediately re-
routed back to Memphis.

“They kept us there for
about 2‘5 hours," Keith es-
timated. “They even set
the plane down in a special
part of the airport. so if
the bomb went off. we
wouldn't blow up the rest
of the airport."

As Keith and John tell it,
the police and FPJ were
brought aboard and began
a hazzage search while
questioning Pete. Finally,
realizing their mistake. of-
ficials let the group board
a plane for Atlanta.

“The Who arrived in At-
lanta late for their concert,
only to find that their four-
ton public address system
and other equipment were ;
stuck somewhere along a i
read. The concert didn't go i

t

Continued on page A15