BUFFALO — If the Who’s concert at Rich Stadium here yesterday was the farewell performance they say it was, 80,000 fans received a farewell of passionate, intense, intelligent and rebellious rock ’n’ roll.

Twenty years in the business hasn’t diminished this band’s energy, charisma, or brilliance; in fact those elements have increased many folds.

The Who once again put in its bid as the best in rock — a status only the Rolling Stones can ever dispute. Surely no band has created a more unique, distinctive and original rock aura than the Who, and no band has continued to grow with such purpose and skill.

As the band demonstrated in nearly three hours of performance yesterday, its large catalog of songs, created over two decades, has a unity, a oneness of style that simultaneously works as a piece of contemporary music.

AFTER THE two opening bands — the first started at 2 p.m. — the Who went on at 5:20 p.m.

They plunged in with two of their earliest hits, Substitute and Can’t Explain, but moved swiftly to Dangerous, a rocker from their latest album.

They were a bright and colorful sight on stage, as the usually sedate bassist, John Entwistle, wore a shocking pink silk jacket over white, and vocalist Roger Daltry appeared in an aquamarine jacket about two sizes too large. Guitarist-composer Pete Townshend and drummer Kenny Jones held up the rebellious image, however, with leather jackets and jeans.

The crowd immediately cheered two Who trademarks — Townshend’s windmill motions as he struck guitar chords and Daltry’s continuous microphone twirling.

The band’s performances ranged from recent material like Sister Disco and Who Are You? to classics like Behind Blue Eyes and the powerful synthesizer-driven Baba O'Riley. Crowd-pleasers included a Tommy medley of Pinball Wizard and See Me, Feel Me, and a series of Quadrophenia tunes, including Drowned, 5:15 and Love Reign O’er Me.

THEY ALSO performed several songs from the latest album, It’s Hard, though, strangely enough, they didn’t do Athena, the current single. A much older song, conspicuous by its absence was My Generation.

Roger Daltry was in fine voice all night; beautiful and lyrical on Behind Blue Eyes, and reaching primal-scream levels on Love Reign O’er Me. Townshend’s guitar playing was excellent. Though he seldom played linear solos, his rhythmic chording is the core sound of the band. Entwistle confirmed his position as the best bassist in rock and drummer Kenny Jones now meshes with the Who better than he has since replacing the late Keith Moon in 1978.

The concert reached its emotional peak with the anthem Won’t Get Fooled Again, which was punctuated by carefully orchestrated revolving search lights and exploding smoke bombs.

THE SOLDOUT stadium crowd seemed largely well-behaved, though the crush of people at the apron of the stage was a continual problem. Scores of fans had to be lifted over barricades at the front by security guards to be saved from the crush. None was seriously injured, however.

Hoses and buckets of water were used to cool those jammed near the stage, however for the rest of the crowd, it was a cool, overcast day.

The fans ranged in age from young teens to veteran rockers in their 30s, though many in the audience probably weren’t born when the Who first recorded in 1964.

Banners and T-shirts indicated large pockets of fans from Canada and Rochester. (About 15,000 tickets were sold in Rochester.)

TRAFFIC FLOWED relatively smoothly into the stadium, with most fans reaching the stands or the field before noon.

Dr. James Ehinger, who headed the medical teams, said about 300 people were treated during the eight-hour event, “but none for anything serious; mostly alcohol, headaches, exhaustion.”

Ehinger said three young people were treated at area hospitals for overdoses of the drug PCP and several were treated and released with various lacerations.

“It was no worse than any other concert,” he said, “and those folks should be congratulated.”

THE WHO were preceded by the Clash, perhaps the finest of this decade’s British rock bands. The quartet played a slashing set of aggressive guerrilla rock that mixed their trademark leftist politics with a hard-edged mixture of post-punk-rock and reggae.

The set’s only flaw was its brevity — a band with its reputation and talent deserves to play more than 45 minutes, even if it isn’t the headliner. In that three-quarters of an hour, the Clash ripped through a dozen songs with the authority and power of a machine gun.

With so little time, the album band concentrated on the closest things it has to greatest hits — songs like London Calling, Guns of Brixton and the more recent Rock the Casbah (a satirical jab at today’s Iran) and Should I Stay or Should I Go? The band wrapped up its brilliant set with a high-energy cover of the old Bobby Fuller hit, I Fought the Law.

If this is indeed the Who’s farewell tour, the Clash showed yesterday they’re one of very few bands who could help fill the concert gap.

THE FIRST of the day’s three bands was fronted by former New York Doll David Johanson, best known today for the hit single, The Animal’s Medley, which combines three of the most popular tracks by 60s stars, Eric Burden and the Animals. Johanson’s concert version, which concluded his short, but energetic set, was the only time he inspired much enthusiasm from the Rich Stadium crowd. The Johanson band played for only 25 minutes.

Of course, it was the Who that people came to see — the stadium had been practically sold out before they even announced the opening acts. And those Who fans had to have gone home happy. They had had nearly three hours with the best there is.