When the music’s over By BILL McALLISTER

The Who: survivors and heroes

As Simon and Garfunkel once noted in a melancholy lament for Joe DiMaggio, heroes have been getting scarce.

This has never been more evident: a record number of moms are unmarried, baseball players are talking strike and most apple pie crusts are too sugary. Former idols like swashbuckling Errol Flynn and lusty Joan Crawford were actually fairly repugnant according to recent revelations. At least there is no doubt about where the ayatollah is coming from.

Things aren’t much different in music. Glitter singers wear those platform heels to hide the clay on their feet, you know. It’s depressing to discover that lightweights like Elton John, Billy Joel and Chicago really had something to offer when they were relatively obscure, or to realize that the fraudulent Knack has a shot at the rock and roll dream: Disco’s dying but MOR is hanging in tough.

And then there’s the Who.

It’s been 16 years, 11 of them at the top. Sure, they’ve been bruised — Keith Moon’s death was permanent damage, the Cincinnatti episode a tragic and undeserved twist of fate — but the legend endures. Monterey, Woodstock, Leeds, Winterland, Madison Square Garden and, on April 30 and May 2, the St. Paul Civic Center.

Surviving tragedies that would certainly have capsized lesser bands and enduring years and years in an industry fueled by turnover, the Who took on heroic proportions in its first concerts in the Twin Cities since 1976. Age has yet to sap its potency, though both shows were inconsistent, and it appears that there are a few good years left.

Indeed, the first impression was of an old band putting its faith in the “young as you feel” maxim, getting away with such a blatant ploy only through sheer enthusiasm. Roger Daltrey and Pete Townshend strutted out in black, punk jackets and the first two numbers, “Substitute” and “I Can’t Explain” were considerably grittier than the old studio recordings. Daltrey had his locks cut and Townshend had shaved, reinforcing the image that they were a couple of juvenile delinquents out on a day pass.

But if the Who opted to prove at the outset that it could out-Clash the Clash, the preponderance of the sets was more elaborately arranged and risky. In addition to Moon’s replacement, Kenny Jones (ex-Faces), the band included a keyboards player, John “Rabbit” Bundrick (ex-Free), and a three-piece horn section. All this could be ponderous (parts of “drowned”) or truly exhilarating (“5:15”).

Ironically it was often the material that would be included in a Who greatest hits collection that was least inspiring. “Pinball Wizard” and the “see me, feel me” excerpt from “Tommy” are both fine but were paced with noticeable premeditation. “Won’t Get Fooled Again” and “Who are You” have simply not worn well in any form, though the performance of the former in the first show was immaculate. The harmony singing in “I Can See for Miles” was typically strong but it needed Keith Moon to come alive.

Exceptions to this rule were “My Generation,” which offered an awesome vocal by Daltrey; the always exquisite “Behind Blue Eyes;” and “Baba O’Riley,” an immortal anthem. Other highlights included the instrumental “Underture,” featuring brilliant interchanges between Jones and bassist John Entwistle; “(Can You See) the Real Me,” a rousing first show encore; and “My Wife,” a favorite jamming number with an addictive riff.

Entwistle, probably the finest bassist in rock, held things together whether Jones was dealing with an intimidating drum part, the men on the boards were not mixing the horn section properly or one of Townshend’s guitar solos was going astray. His stoic dependability and Daltrey’s vigorous, dramatic singing negated, for the most part, the occasional flaws in the shows.

Visually, it was a subdued two-day stand with routine lighting and few of Townshend’s synchronized windmill chords and leaps. The irony of the lines “They’re all wasted !” and “Hope I die before get old” have certainly not escaped the band but it chose to meet the unstated challenges on its own turf: classic rock and roll. And with so few heroes to turn our lonely eyes to, that is enough.