1963 – The Detours play at the Oldfield Hotel in Greenford
1964 – The Who play the Glenlyn Ballroom in Forest Hill
1965 – The Who’s first French EP is released featuring an alternate vocal to “Anyway Anyhow Anywhere” that is not released anywhere else officially until 2002. Some versions of the EP also feature the title “Bald Headed Woman” misspelled as “Blad Headed Woman”
1966 – The June 1966 issue of Beat Instrumental features an article titled “Not The New Who” by Alex Hayes
Transcript:
NOT THE NEW WHO
Down at Tiles, with girls being carried here and there in various states of mental and physical detachment, I nabbed Roger Daltrey just after The Who had finished a particularly stage-powdering performance.
“Do you think that there is any reason at all for calling your group ‘The New Who’?” I asked trying hard not to tread on the heads of several prostrate faint-merchants.
“None at all”, he answered through an exuberant smile. “We change all the time but that’s no reason to stick a label on us. ‘The new Who’ sounds like a completely different group”.
“But certainly there have been drastic personal and musical changes”, I went on. “Yes, of course”, said Roger. “Common sense has made us change our music and presentation, now that we are doing straightforward stuff like the Dion numbers. The new approach seems to appeal to a very wide audience instead of just those people who understood us right from the start. Personally, of course, we’ve all changed, but I can’t, and don’t, really want to give many details. Let’s just say that personally, I have grown up a bit. I used to be a real tearaway, I mean I was really widld. Now I have a load of laughs but I’m not as mad as I used to be. Pete’s the only other member of the group I can really comment on. HE’s got much deeper, more intellectual, although he always was on the brainy side. Sometimes, you know, you can walk into a room and say hello to him and he won’t answer, then half an hour later he’ll turn round and say ‘hi’.”
I asked next, whether the Who had ever regretted that they came in on the ‘mod’s group’ promotion bit. Roger commented, “The first few months we played round the London scene the Mod’s were the only ones to really ‘twig’ what we were doing. They bought our records and we were grateful. Since then I think we’ve become a group for all the kids. We don’t regret that we started off as an exclusively ‘mod’ group”.
AUDENCE CHANGES
If the Who have changed, so have the audiences. Said Roger, “They have been getting wilder and wilder. In the early days of feedback and things like that they stood and watched. Now they really go with us. Beat is definitely coming back”.
It’s paid off then. No longer does Pete T. go into 20 minute ear and eye dissolving guitar phrases. No longer does John Entwistle attempt to blow his speakers out of their cabinets and into the audience. Keith Moon well, I don’t suppose there’s much you can do to restrain such a great showman. Roger admits that his multi-tambourine smashing days are over.
Personally I like the Who much more now than I did when I first saw them in their amp-hacking era. Now that they’ve modified their act, they are getting themselves across much better. Their sound is better balanced, cleaner but still exciting and well … “Whio-ish”.
Gearwise there is always something new happening as far as this group is concerned. John Entwistle is after a setup consisting of many 15” speakers and a 200 watt amp. Roger wants to pick up some Swedish PA. He heard it on his last trip and thought it was great. On his forthcoming trip he’ll probably buy himself a setup. Keith will probably need a few new sets of drums if he keeps kicking his kits off rostrums, although just lately he has been pretty well-behaved on the whole.
Recording, that all-important part of group life, is at a standstill for the Who because of “Legal Matters”, but with “Substitute” still well-placed they needn’t be over-worried. Said Roger, “Studios are strange places. We have to force ourselves to be wild because of the cold surroundings. Sometimes it clicks, sometimes it just doesn’t and we all know we are wasting our time. We tried the party atmosphere thing for some of the tracks on our first LP but I don’t think it was very successful.. Now we treat sessions very seriously”.
The big “conflict within the group” image doesn’t seem to apply to the Who anymore. Roger told me that because of the chemical reactions brought about by success and time the four extroverts are getting on together much better. Each understands the other’s problems more fully than before. “‘Substitute’ has made us very happyy indeed”, said Roger. “As we told ‘B.I.’ a couple of months ago, we really thought we were in trouble but then ‘Generation’ broke for us and it’s been progress, progress ever since.”
1966 – The Who fly into Arlanda Airport, Stockholm. Pete is interviewed for a Swedish magazine at the airport. He tells them he is currently working on a musical called “Summer City”.
1967 – Beat Instrumental features The Who several times:
1) BI’s Chart Fax has “Pictures of Lily” at #18
2) A small article titled “Moon Kit”
3) A ad for Rotosound featuring a photo of The Who
4) An article titled “The Who Want Beatle-size Reputation in U.S.”
Transcript: (unverified)
THE WHO WANT BEATLE-SIZE REPUTATION IN U.S.
PROBABLY the most quoted remark in world pop-music circles in recent months is that of Pete Townshend, of the Who. He has said, probably ten-thousand times: “We never let our sound get in the way of our visual act”. Not entirely a true summary from Pete, but the Americans and the Continentals have had it drummed into them over recent months.
But Pete thinks it offers a warning to those who haven’t really sampled the indestructible Who’s act of total destruction. Says manager Kit Lambert: “At long last, the boys have become a really big pop export from Britain. It took plenty of time to crack the American market, but as ‘Happy Jack’ happily progressed up the charts there, so did the group as an in-person attraction. Their recent first tour there was a sensation.”
A smashing success, in fact. They threw guitars and mikes and drum kits at each other . . . yet also got high respect from their record-LISTENING public. Said Kit: “Of course there were so-called incidents. Same in Germany. But the boys generally did a most professional job in boosting their image in new parts of the world. They have, somehow, matured.”
STATUS
I talked to both Pete and drummer Keith Moon about the Who’s current status. Main thing from Pete is that he talks more sensibly about groups who he used to allege copied everything from the Who. “I’ve thought about this and realised that I’ve been influenced by other performers and writers. And if it happens to me, there’s no point in my having a go at others who come in the same category.”
“But most important is the way we’ve all got this deep respect for each other.
“Not so long ago we had some of the most diabolical rows. Up came the rumours of a split in the ranks and, really, listening to us go on at each other, you couldn’t blame people for making headlines out of it. But then it happened quite suddenly; we realised we were a GROUP, and a damned good one, and that each one of us had a big part to play in it.
“I believe we’re getting into a class of our own, and it’s nice to see that some of the reviewers are agreeing with that. ‘Pictures Of Lily’ was an odd sort of song, and it could have been put down by critics, but instead, they felt it was a step forward for us. Earlier, I’d listen to the Rolling Stones’ things, specially ‘The Last Time’, and they’d start off a flow of development in my own mind, as a writer.
“But what’s important to us now is to stay a self-contained group. I mean, the Beatles aren’t doing so much now, but we want to get somewhere near that reputation in America. A group with something different to offer—and singing our own songs.”
There can’t be much doubt that Pete Townshend, whose dad, Cliff Townshend was an alto-saxist and made several “sweet-corn” discs under his own name, is one of the few truly genuine songwriters in the British pop scene. He’d rather not write anything rather than turn out stereotyped material. And right now he’s working hell-for-leather on an operation bit, in the pop idiom, and with big language. But John Entwistle is also writing a lot of material for the next Who LP—and Roger and Keith are also kicking in ideas.
VIOLENT ACT
Said Keith Moon: “People call us a violent act but there is more to it than that. I don’t feel violent when I’m up there behind the drums, but the music leads us into sort of extreme visual ideas. America was the right scene for us. It really IS all happening there, and I think we’ve got a really solid following in the States. Only thing that scares me, sometimes, is when the fans get a bit out of hand. I start panicking . . . that’s when I may find myself chucking the kit about. Only self-defence, though. I mean to say, do I LOOK violent?”
But the main ideas for the Who are created in a lavishly-appointed studio in the flat of Pete Townshend, in London’s West End. He’s been adding equipment to it over the past two or three years . . . says: “My original trouble was that I couldn’t read music, or write it. I had to get my song ideas down, so I started off the studio. I’ve got four recorders now—two stereo Revox jobs at £140 each, and two Vortexions which cost not far short of £200 each. And my pride and joy . . . an Anagra portable recorder, which cost well over £300.”
BRAIN CENTRE
This is, then, the “brain centre” of the so-progressive Who. And like ’em or loathe ’em, it’s obvious that we’re only in at the very start of the quartet’s achievements.
Led by Pete, who took to wearing an “electric” coat while in the States—bulbs light up at the touch of a switch.
As he now says for the 10,001st time: “We never let our sound get in the way of our visual act”. Said, though, with tongue-in-cheek.
—PETE GOODMAN.
1967 – The Who were scheduled to appear at the 1er Internationval Festival de Pop Music at the Palais des Sports, Porte de Versailles, Paris 15ème, France. but as Keith was still in hospital recuperating from his hernia operation and with no replacement drummer to take his place the group had to cancel. Appearing were Herbert Leonard, Baschung, The VIPs, The Pretty Things, Ronnie Bird, Jimmy Cliff, Cream, John Walker of the Walker Brothers, Dave Dee, Dozy, Beaky, Mick & Tich, and The Troggs. Here’s Cream onstage at the event.
1968 – Vibrations magazine features an interview of Pete by John Kriedl . Photo by Peter Simon.
You can find more photos (misdated) here
1968 – Disc and Music Echo carries an article about Pete’s recent wedding
Transcript:
Happily-wed PETE TOWNSHEND talking . . .
“I went to make my will
—and then I thought:
Why not get married?”
“The only basic thing that means a light is love”
“IT’S TRUE,” says Pete Townshend, “that marriage is on the way out.
“These days people seem to prefer just to live together.”
But Townshend is—since last week—the latest addition to a long, long line of married group members. And he recalls his wedding day to his lovely, tall bride Karen as “one of the happiest days of my life”.
So why get married—and then the week after admit that marriage is a dying institution?
Bliss
Sitting in the brightly-coloured lounge of his London flat with the lovely Karen attending to a tea-tray, presenting the perfect picture of marital bliss, pop-star style, he replied:
“Like most men I thought I’d never get married. I just never felt it was necessary. Karen and I had been living together for about two years and it was okay.
“But then I realised there were so many problems if you didn’t get married. Actually I went to make out my will, because I wanted to leave something to Karen, and then I thought, ‘Well, why not get married? Then she would get everything anyway if anything happened to me.’
“And if a girl is just living with you, you miss out on tax relief, and if you should die the girl gets nothing.
“So we got married. I wanted it to be a quiet sort of thing, but of course families love that sort of thing. And funny enough I had the time of my life at the wedding—I really enjoyed it.”
But there was another—and very important—reason for the decision too.
“I’d like to have some kids sometime, and you just can’t bring up kids outside the context of society. It’s true that illegitimate kids get the thin end of the wedge.
“And then again I might get a brainstorm in about 20 years time, when Karen’s gone a bit grey and got a few wrinkles. I might still have a million fans and I could still get pretty young chicks. So what would happen to Karen then?
“You can call it responsibility, but it’s not. It’s all down to love. No family can get on under all the strains and pressures unless there’s a happy union in the first place.
“You can’t love an anonymous benefactor—like Dad comes home from work, throws his wage packet on the table and then goes out to the dogs. The kids just don’t know who he is.
“You shouldn’t always be continually striving for a change—although ambition, drive and ego are ruling parts of life. You can’t keep away the bad times, but you can’t keep away heaven either.
“It’s everyone’s right to be happy, but then you could think you’d be happy if you had a million or if you were married to Sophia Loren—but in fact it wouldn’t make any difference. Just be happy with whatever happens.”
With his incredible capacity for getting things together, Pete has obviously thought deeply about the whole subject of marriage and worked out the best way to act as a married man. So what’s the formula?
“If you’re married and your wife tells you to do something—just do it. Don’t start arguing about who’s she to start giving orders.
“Authority is out of place—and so is freedom. Neither exists in marriage. The only basic thing that means anything is love, which means everything.
“Marriage is basically hypocritical because it’s applying rules and regulations to something for which there can be no rules—the coming together of two people.
“Love goes beyond sexual attraction and glamour. In the States, Karen and I are reckoned to be a glamorous couple, but glamour soon goes away when it comes up against people’s dirty habits and little things, like you don’t like the way the other person talks sometimes or you think they talk too much.
“It takes a lot of guts to breach your privacy as an individual. But to be an individual is only building up your own ego—the big ‘I Am’—and that’s what makes people hate you.”
His marriage will not, Pete thinks, affect the Who’s fortunes—or fans—much at all. “The whole group thing has changed. Before, guys joined groups for just two reasons—to get fast bread and lots of women!
“I think in the States a lot of fans are just waiting for their idols to get married, so they can break their attachment.
“We’ve got two amazing fans here, called Linda and Lesley, who actually came to the wedding. They babysit for the group and giggle. And they seem to like pop stars AND their wives and girlfriends . . .”
• PETE with KAREN: “If a girl is just living with you you miss out on tax relief.”
1968 – The June 1968 edition of Beat Instrumental has The Who on the cover as well as an article entitled “Who live! by Pete Goodman
Transcript:
WHO LIVE!
The Marquee, in London’s Wardour Street, holds special memories for the Who. Though there are claims that the attendance records have been broken by various other groups, fact is that the “unofficial” record still stands to the boys. For, on one memorable evening, fire regulations and everything else was forgotten as a mass audience crashed in.
This information comes from drummer Keith Moon, who added: “Really we owe everything to the Marquee. This club, early on, was the place to play . . . and it was responsible for us really getting in touch with the pop world. It’s there that we started mixing with pop people, chatting to pop journalists. As soon as we got a booking there, having already made an ill-devised debut as the High Numbers, we used the place for rehearsals. It was then that the Who, as such, was born.
“Right, it’s a difficult place to play, in some ways. It’s very low-built, for instance. But this helps the group, if not the audience. On stage, the acoustics are such that you can hear what everyone else in the group is doing and that’s fine. Also you can only see the first four or five rows of the audience—everything else is a blur. But that helps in getting a good sound going.
“My most memorable moment at the Marquee was when Pete Townshend started smashing up his guitar. Really—you should have seen the audience. Mouths open, great rows of teeth showing. You could almost count the cavities. But when we started there, the audiences weren’t very big. Word-of-mouth recommendations helped and we ended up breaking all previous records . . . unofficially as I’ve said.”
Keith pondered momentarily. He said: “I’m not kidding about the influence the Marquee has had on us. Before that, we used to rehearse in bingo halls. You’d get into a groovy scene and then suddenly someone would appear and shout ‘Legs Eleven’ or something—and that was that. We had to pack it in”.
TRANSITION SCENE
“As a group, we were going through a transition scene. It had ended at the Scene club. When we went to the Marquee, the whole business changed for us. Our audiences there seemed to come mostly from the East End of London, from Shoreditch and Leyton and so on, but really the club gave us the chance to build a reputation.”
An example of how Keith feels about the Marquee. He told a journalist following me into the interview seat:
“America is fine. It’s like the Marquee Club, only ten million times larger”.
—PETE GOODMAN.
1968 – Life magazine carries a feature on “The New Rock” which includes a two page spread on The Who
1968 – Record Mirror carries a photo from Pete’s recent wedding
1969 – The Who play the Kiel Auditorium in St. Louis, Missouri with Joe Cocker and The Grease Band opening
1974 – Track Records releases A Quick One/The Who Sell Out as a low-price double album.
1979 – The May 16th Who performance is broadcast in its entirety on French Radio.
1980 – The Who Anthology, a collection of Who songs in sheet music form, is published in the U.K.
1985 – Pete takes his family to see Bruce Springteen at Slane Castle in Ireland. He declares Bruce “the greatest rock ‘n’ roller in the world.” Afterwards he appears live via satellite on the U.S. ABC-TV program Nightline where he also praises Springsteen.
1989 – The book Standing in the Shadows Of Motown: The Life and Music of Legendary Bassist James Jamerson is published. It is accompanied by two cassette tapes containing famous bass players, including John, playing some of Jamerson’s famous riffsIt is now available with 2 CDs rather than tapes, check Amazon for more information here
1990 – Pete is interviewed in this month’s issue of Musician. He disassociates himself from the recently released Join Together boxset: “I didn’t pick the title, cover or collection of songs, and I wouldn’t be hurt if a Who fan told me they weren’t going to buy it.” He also says he is responsible for The Who not extending their 25th Anniversary Tour to Australia and Japan and that Atlantic Records wants his next solo album to be a “formula” album: “I could create a lot of red faces by asking what the formula is.”
1991 – During this month “McEnroe & Cash with The Full Metal Rackets” release the charity single “Rock and Roll” featuring Roger Daltrey. It is done for Rock Aid Armenia
1996 – During this month Geoffrey Giuliano’s unauthorized biography of Pete, Behind Blue Eyes: A Life Of Pete Townshend is published in the U.K.
1996 – Sometime this month Listening To You: The Who At The Isle Of Wight, Murray Lerner’s movie of The Who’s concert at the 3rd Isle of Wight Festival in 1970, is released in Europe and Japan on videotape and laserdisc
1999 – The soundtrack to Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me is released containing the first official release of a live at the BBC recording of The Who performing “My Generation” in 1965. The soundtrack peaks at #5 in the U.S. charts and #6 in the U.K. charts.
1999 – Early in the month, Roger travels to Los Angeles to shoot an appearance for the Showtime cable television program Rude Awakenings
2001 – Rhino Video begins showing the movie Quadrophenia in movie houses in select U.S. cities to promote their forthcoming DVD
2001 – John Entwistle plays The Chance in Poughkeepsie, NY
2004 – Silverline Records releases From The Front Row…Live! John Entwistle on DVD-Audio
2006 – The first day of rehearsals for The Who’s new set at Bray Studios in Windsor. According to keyboardist John Bundrick, 8 or 9 songs are rehearsed after lunch and a long nostalgic reunion. Rehearsals continue through the 5th. See a short video from the rehearsal studio on YouTube here
2007 – The Who play Liberty Stadium in Swansea
2007 – The Who, or at least Pete and Roger, were to begin the month with an appearance on the BBC TV show Later… with Jools Holland, but they postpone it to save Roger’s voice for that night’s concert. The White Stripes take their place and sign a big sympathy card for Roger.
2010 – The Melvins release their album The Bride Screamed Murder with a cover of “My Generation” and JFA releases Speed of Sound with a cover of “My Wife” Listen to The Melvins on YouTube here and JFA here
2011 – Pete Townshend checks in with the fans on thewho.com: “WHAT I’M DOING EVERYDAY
I am shut away in my home studio at the moment working to restore the demos of Quadrophenia. Bob Pridden is doing surround-sound mixes of selected tracks. Jon Astley is remastering the original vinyl mix, and evaluating his own 1996 remix (the one where you can properly hear Roger’s astonishing vocals). I am sitting in a pile of notes, desk diaries, photos (I took a lot of my own between 1971-1973 when Quadrophenia emerged), original lyrics and writing liner notes…You are going to love it. I hope so, because I am missing this summer shunshine to get it completed on time.”