1961 – John Entwistle performs at the Acton Schools Music Association Fourteenth Annual Music Festival. A newspaper report in the Hammersmith & Shepards Bush Gazette reports: “John Entwistle was the only soloist of the evening. He played the finale from the Horn Concerto No. 4, by Mozart. It’s a popular horn solo which calls for nimble fingering. John could have given it a little more volume without any injustice to Mozart.”
1965 – The Who play the Majestic Ballroom in Newcastle upon Tyne, Tyne and Wear, England
1966 – The Who were to have appeared at the Winter Gardens in Malvern but the show is cancelled and the disappointed audience is told that The Who could not make it due to a van break down. Some of the audience members aren’t having it and go on a window-smashing rampage. They are correct to be disbelieving. The van breakdown is merely a cover story for the fact that Pete, John and Keith have collectively refused to share a stage with Roger. Again he is out of the band
1967 – The Who’s manager Kit Lambert sends a telegram to the Monterey Pop Festival organizers telling them The Who have agreed to perform there in exchange for six 1st-class plane tickets. The Who, along with Jimi Hendrix, had been recommended for the festival by Paul McCartney during a U.S. visit the month before.
1967 – The Who were in Sweden playing two shows at Circus Lorensbergparken in Gothenburg. First show at 7:00pm followed by a second at 9:15pm.
1968 – The Who play the West Refectory at Hull University in Hull with the Amboy Dukes and Circus
1969 – The Tommy album is premiered in its entirety on BBC Radio 1’s Paul Drummond show
1969 – “Pinball Wizard” enters the Tio i Topp Swedish charts where it will peak at #12.
1980 – The Who play the International Amphitheater in Chicago, Illinois
1984 – Pete reviews Philip Norman’s new book Symphony For The Devil: The Rolling Stones Story for Time Out, calling it “essentially accurate.”
1989 – The New York Times interview Pete as The Who prepare for the Celebrating 25 Years of The Who tour. The article is entitled “The pop life: Old Grandpa Who”. Pete says when it comes to touring he feels like “an 80-year-old grandfather”.
Transcript (unverified)
The Pop Life
Stephen Holden
■ The Who is reuniting for a 25-city tour on its 25th anniversary ■ Rejuvenating rock classics
■ Donny Osmond is back, and he’s not smiling.
Old Grandpa Who
When the Who, one of rock’s most revered bands, reunites to celebrate its 25th anniversary with a 25-city North American tour this summer, no one will be more conscious of the distance the band has traveled than Pete Townshend. It was Mr. Townshend, the band’s lead guitarist and chief songwriter, who wrote what has become its most famous catch phrase, “Hope I die before I get old,” for the 1966 teenage anthem “My Generation.”
On May 19, the author of that boast will be 44 years old. Though Mr. Townshend’s youthful bravado may have subsided, he is still an intense, philosophically minded rocker whose capacity for outrage is balanced by a sense of humor.
“Imagine an 80-year-old grandfather at a party filled with pretty girls and young nephews and nieces,” he said in a recent telephone interview. “Someone stands up to make a speech and says: ‘Here’s someone we all love. Come on, Granddad, dance!’ Then everyone stands back, and watches the old guy dance an arcane little pagan dance that isn’t done any more and that looks a little ridiculous. That’s kind of the way the Who feel.”
In addition to the tour, the band is to give two performances of the rock opera “Tommy,” the first in Manhattan on June 27 at Radio City Music Hall, the second in Los Angeles at a date and place to be announced. Two days after performing at Radio City, it is to appear at Giants Stadium in East Rutherford, N.J.
A section of each regular Who concert will be devoted to songs from an ambitious new solo album that Mr. Townshend recently completed for Atlantic Records and that is to be released in June. An adaptation of Ted Hughes’s popular children’s fable “The Iron Man,” it is a musical song cycle similar to “Tommy.” The record’s all-star cast features Mr. Townshend as the story’s 10-year-old protagonist, Hogarth, John Lee Hooker as the Iron Man, Nina Simone as the Space Dragon, Roger Daltrey as Hogarth’s father, and Deborah Conway as the Vixen.
“I first read the book in 1976,” Mr. Townshend said. “I was attracted to the story because it’s a wonderful modern fairy tale that is simple enough to allow a very broad range of responses. On one level, it’s an allegory of Star Wars and ecological issues. On another level, I took it as the story of a mother and father and their breakup and how it affects the child. On a more personal level, it is the story of a young boy approaching adolescence, and beginning to deal with the issues of his burgeoning sexuality and finding a purpose for his life.”
Mr. Townshend has already begun expanding “The Iron Man” from an album into an evening-length musical-theater piece, and he has sketched a scenario with 20 songs, an overture, narrative and recitative.
“I think musical theater is where I belong as a songwriter,” he said. “I don’t like writing film music, and I’m not keen on video. Though rock music sometimes works in large stadiums, I don’t think it really belongs there. I envision a show in which you have the imaginative stage sets of ‘Les Misérables,’ the wonderful production ideas of ‘Phantom of the Opera,’ but instead of music from my parents’ generation, having music of today.”
[Photo caption:]
Pete Townshend, the Who’s lead guitarist and chief songwriter, is about to go on tour.
1996 – Pete appears on NBC-TV’s Late Night with Conan O’Brien performing “Barefootin'”
1996 – Pete plays the first of two nights at the Supper Club in New York City
2001 – The Hollywood Reporter says writing is complete on The Keith Moon Story. The writer is Sacha Gervasi, the planned director Brad Siberling. The movie does not make it to pre-production.
2006 – Pete announces that the Who mini-opera has changed its title from “The Glass Household” to “Wire & Glass”. On his girlfriend Rachel Fuller’s webcast In The Attic, Pete announces the upcoming release of an 11-minute version is the “short” version. The full-length “mini-opera” will be on the album. He also performs “Barefootin'” with guest Chris Difford of Squeeze.
2007 – Roger plays “Mick Keating” in the Season 4 opener, “Once Upon a Time on the Westway”, of ITV’s The Last Detective.
2009 – Pete Townshend makes The Sunday Times Rich List. He is considered the 1348th richest Briton valued at £40m. Roger Daltrey is listed at #1673 with £32m in wealth. The Who itself is considered to have earned “at least £100m”.
2012 – Roger Daltrey is a guest on Jimmy Kimmel’s late-night talk show. Roger admits The Who are “having a very long sabbatical” but at least gets to discuss the Teenage Cancer Trust and perform both “Young Man Blues” and “The Real Me”
2022 – The Who play the Moody Center in Austin, Texas