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| From | "Sager, Greg" <greg.sager@bankofamerica.com> |
| Subject | Re: The Early Who By A Landslide |
| Date | Tue, 04 Apr 2006 04:17:34 -0400 |
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> Date: Mon, 03 Apr 2006 18:49:16 -0400
> From: rob@splitsville.com
> To: audities@smoe.org, audities@smoe.org, audities@smoe.org,
> audities@smoe.org
> Subject:
> =?US-ASCII?B?UkU6IFJlOiBUaGUgRWFybHkgV2hvIEJ5IEEgTGFuZHNsaWRl?=
> Message-ID: <200604032249.k33MnGjE083386@mmm1912.dulles19-verio.com>
>
> I've always felt that some of the earlier stuff you site, ie
> the Beach Boys-sounding stuff, while fun, was a bit silly and
> not really indicative of the band.
Sorry, Rob, but my mileage varies considerably. I think that the early stuff was *very* indicative of the band, precisely because silliness was one of the prime elements of their music back then. The more seriously Pete Townshend takes himself, the less approachable and enjoyable his music becomes. Silliness was a key ingredient to their magic; as aggressive, macho, loud, and confrontational as they presented themselves, no band with a healthy Keith Moon in it could ever lose its playfulness -- and the early years were the years of Moon's prime.
Moon had a lot to do with the "Beach Boys-sounding stuff", too, as he always considered himself to be the Wilson brother who had been separated at birth and carted off to England. When the Who found him he was playing in a Wembley surf band called the Beachcombers.
Humor is the most underutilized and underappreciated element within popular music. Too much rock consists of the self-styled profound trying desperately to hold in their flatulence. The early Who was not afraid to fart in public.
>
> In many ways they were still finding their voice and sound
> (surf music, James Brown covers, etc), or at least
> intentionally messing around with different styles.
That's precisely what makes their early music so vital. They were explorers, not careerists. I'd much rather hear a band tinker around with different styles and fall on their faces a few times than hear them mine an oft-tapped vein that meets the specifications of their fan base. And the Who had such innate talent that even their early failures were interesting. There was never a band less suited to play James Brown than the Who, but their goofy attempts still carry a considerable charm.
It wasn't
> until Tommy and after that they really found their voice and
> sound in a substantial, extended way, many Earth-changing
> singles excepted, of course, like My G, Anyway, A, A, Kids,
> etc. (Those who are familiar in my mentions of The Who know
> that I tout as often as I can that pre-Tommy Who invented
> both punk and power pop.)
"Substantial" and "extended" are two of the least-convincing adjectives in rock'n'roll, as far as I'm concerned. They flunk the Trashmen Test: Neither term can be used to described "Surfin' Bird", the most perfect rock'n'roll song ever recorded.
I think that the Who found their voice and sound almost immediately upon becoming a recording outfit; "My Generation", their fourth single, became their signature song. In fact, it was such a trenchant, perfectly-realized statement for the band that it became an albatross for Townshend. Not only did the fourth line of the first verse leave him with a career conundrum, the song itself (and the instrument-smashing that accompanied it) provided a visceral experience and statement of purpose that defined the Who and proved very, very difficult for poor Towser to top. And, sonically, it was like a 3:18 Who sampler: Drums that sounded like the contents of Fibber McGee's closet, clanging power chords, dive-bombing bass runs, goofy half-assed backing harmonies, guitar feedback, and the punk sneer of Roger Daltrey's vocals. They not only found their voice and sound in that song (you could argue as well that they found it in "I Can't Explain" or the vastly inferior "Anyway, Anyhow, Anywhere"), it contains their voice and sound like no other song that ever followed it.
Aside from that, you're almost making my argument for me. Those killer early singles (you left out two insanely powerful slabs of r'n'r brio in "Substitute" and "I Can See For Miles" and the call-to-arms masterpiece "I Can't Explain", as well as such other spiffy singles as "Pictures Of Lily", "Call Me Lightning", "Magic Bus", etc.) were indeed Earth-changing. So how can you turn around and wave them off as juvenilia inferior to the work of the "mature" band?
(And *Tommy* was much more of this period than of the succeeding period. The best song on *Tommy*, "Pinball Wizard", follows almost in a straight line in both sound and spirit from "I Can't Explain" to "My Generation" to "Substitute" to "I Can See For Miles". It sounds very much of a piece with the earlier singles, and sounds very little like "Won't Get Fooled Again", "Baba O'Riley", and all of the stuff that came afterwards. That Martian friend of yours would have no trouble picking up on the fact that the song about the deaf, dumb, and blind kid who played pinball was by the same band that sang about the kid who was dressed up like a girl by his mother and sisters; the child-tormented Manx imbecile; and the boy whose onanistic fetish centered upon a poster of a long-dead actress.)
>
> However, if you were to meet a Martian and he asked what the
> big deal about The Who was, I don't think you'd play him (it)
> 'I Don't Mind', 'Please Please Please', 'Bucket- T', 'Kids',
> 'The Good's Gone' (those aren't bad places to start, mind)-
> the best representation of The Who is 'Won't Get Fooled
> Again', 'Baba', Leeds version of 'Summertime Blues', 'The
> Real Me', '5:15', 'Slip Kid' and the like.
The fact that oldies rock stations are much more obsessed with the later Who than the earlier Who means nothing to me. After all, the latter-day Who ruled the airwaves in the United States; the earlier Who was mostly learned about in hindsight in this country, except for "I Can See For Miles". Which, incidentally, is *the* best representation of the Who, bar none. Heck, there may not be more than a tiny handful of songs recorded since 1950 which can match "I Can See For Miles" as the best representation of rock'n'roll, period. After a zillion listens now, whenever I hear the opening to "Stairway To Heaven" or "Free Bird" I reach for the off button on the radio. But even after a zillion listens, whenever I hear the opening to "I Can See For Miles" I reach for the volume knob to turn it up.
How many songs are there that you hear two or three times a month for forty years straight that still make the hair stand up on the back of your neck every time? I hold a lot of affection for many post-*Tommy* Who songs, but nothing they ever did before or sense was as stone-cold deathless in a purely rock'n'roll sense as "I Can See For Miles".
Any Martian who shows up on my doorstep will probably hear "I Can See For Miles" somewhere in between "Louie, Louie", "September Gurls", "Surrender", and "Hey Ya".
>
> Townshend and the band were looking for power, volume and
> agression, and while it's always been part of their nature as
> a band, in this regard I don't think anyone can touch their
> output 1969 on.
"I Can See For Miles" has all three in spades, and unlike their later stuff it also has a sense of economy, youthful panache, and lightness of spirit that the group lost once the Who became A Really Important Band and Townshend became A Spokesman For His Generation.
> Date: Mon, 3 Apr 2006 22:29:17 -0400
> From: "Holmes Online" <bholmes_fm@msn.com>
> To: <audities@smoe.org>
> Subject: Re: The Early Who By A Landslide
> Message-ID: <BAY106-DAV19DFA9919E78D50F0DAF59E3CA0@phx.gbl>
>
> If this is correct...
>
> 1965 The Who Sings My Generation MCA
> 1966 A Quick One (Happy Jack) Reaction
> 1967 The Who Sell Out MCA
> 1968 Magic Bus MCA
> 1969 Tommy MCA
> 1970 Live at Leeds MCA
>
> 1971 Who's Next MCA
> 1973 Quadrophenia MCA
> 1975 The Who by Numbers MCA
> 1978 Who Are You MCA
> 1981 Face Dances MCA
> 1982 It's Hard MCA
>
> ..then I stand by my "early Who" vote. Even more so of I
> split it by time
> or if I discount Live At Leeds for being a live album.
>
> Who's Next is just effin awesome. And there are certainly
> moments on Who Are
> You and Quadrophenia (I'm not in the camp that reveres
> Quadrophenia). But
> Sell Out is brilliant,
Their best album, as far as I'm concerned, and one of the best albums *anyone* ever recorded -- both as a collection of songs and as a concept.
Tommy still packs a punch and the
> early stuff on
> those first few records are among the best rock (and dare I
> say powerpop)
> singles ever recorded.
Dare it, Bill. Heck, Townshend invented the term "power pop" to describe the Who of the "Pictures Of Lily" pop-art period in a *Hit Parader* interview ... so who better to wear the mantle?
Anyone who's read my posts on Audities over the past few years knows that one of my persistent hobbyhorses is the irritating fact that the term "power pop" is often used to describe music that's long on "pop" but skimps on "power". Well, nobody ever accused the Who of reining in the crunch factor when they were recording three-minute pop singles.
> Date: Mon, 03 Apr 2006 18:51:13 -0400
> From: rob@splitsville.com
> To: audities@smoe.org, audities@smoe.org, audities@smoe.org
> Subject: =?US-ASCII?B?UkU6IFJlOiBDYXJlZXIgZXF1YXRvcnM=?=
> Message-ID: <200604032251.k33MpDr6084053@mmm1912.dulles19-verio.com>
>
> Live at Leeds may be the greatest live document in history.
That's like saying that "Carrie Anne" is the greatest pop song in history that has steel drums on it. Sure, you're probably right, but it's not as though there's a lot of stiff competition for the title.
Gregory Sager
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