The Who Cavort at Cobo - Complete with Frisbees
By Mike Gormley

The Who is an obvious topic after this weekends activities. Their concert at Cobo Hall Sunday night was excellent. There have been more exciting concerts. I think The Doors had more heads spinning but The Who's music still made Cobo Hall employees nervous. When any group plays music so well that people are unable to keep still, Cobo Hall people shiver.

The James Gang, a Cleveland band, the show's opener, was competent, displaying some fine musicianship. But there was absolutely no life in the band whatsoever. The second act, which consisted of the audience, Cobo ushers and several frisbees, was much better. The biggest ovation of the concert went to the usher who liberated a Frisbee after confiscating it. From then until The Who went on, the Frisbee show was worth the price of admission.

From the moment they went onstage The Who held the crowd in their sweaty palms. Each individual member of The Who was incredible. Townshend, wearing his Woodstock white jumpsuit, went through all his well known gymnastics. He seems to direct the band with his legs and feet. The songs end when Townshend comes crashing down from a high leap-and-leg-split. Sometimes it's just a simple pounding on the floor with one foot that smashes a song to the finish or simply lets the group know when to accentuate a particular note. Lead singer Roger Daltrey, who hasn't sounded better than he did Sunday night, is still swinging the microphone, an act he's developed into an art.

After playing two tunes, "Water" and "I Don't Know Myself," from their upcoming album, plus a couple of other songs, The Who broke into the infamous rock opera "Tommy." That went on for an hour, brining the crowd to their feet and the front of the stage. Then it was "Summertime Blues", "Shaking All Over" and "My Generation" before they left the audience yelling for more, as the old saying goes. Except The Who, one of the most disciplined bands performing today doesn't usually give more. When they've finished playing the set they worked out, that's it.

The "misinformed media" as Townshend put it, said that The Who would not be playing "Tommy" anymore. Their performance a month ago at the Metropolitan Opera in New York was supposed to be the final performance fo the rock opera. Townshend later told me that in fact it was his management that had "misinformed" the press, who later informed the people of the end of "Tommy." "We wanted to let "Tommy" sort of gradually disappear," Townshend said, referring to the group.

"Our management wanted to cap the whole thing, have one final performance. So we did the Met thing, but that dated moved the starting time of the tour up a lot and cut our rehearsal time down from two weeks to three days. So without "Tommy" we didn't have enough material to play on this tour."

Townshend himself is just a bit incredible off-stage. He's surrounded by dedicated freaks who love him. His group is made up of strange people, a la Roger Daltrey. Yet you'll seldom see Townshend in bell-bottom pants or any such frills. Sunday night he changed out of his jumpsuit -- that doesn't fit him anyway -- and put on a torn blue T-shirt and black pants that accented the beautiful yellow laces on his construction boots. He is completely businesslike, but friendly if things get done his way. If Townshend promises to do something he'll carry it through, and he's about as easygoing as a man can be who leads one of the top rock groups in the world as well as other seemingly full-time activities. The Who is obviously his group. Whether it was planned that way or not is incidental. He is the backbone of a group of people who, if fate had wanted, could individually be backbones in other organizations. The who is a combination that makes for something great, beyond the music.