The Who...let's be honest...

Loved the Who before I had ever heard of Pearl Jam. Been to a couple shows and was not that impressed, but they are a part of my musical history, growing up and finding my love of Rock n Roll. I'm sure if I saw them circa 1970's I would be Ga Ga over them. I would rate them in the top 15 of my favorite artists of all time.

Do I like that PJ loves them..... Hell yeah. I get to hear kick ass Who Songs from my favorite band in concert.

So far:

Love Reign O'er Me
The Real Me
The Kids Are Alright (Ed Solo)
The Seeker (Ed Solo)
Baba O'Riley


Keep em' coming boys!!!!

P.S. Loves me some Kinks. Wish the boys would play some of that. Hmmmm how would that sound?

whoprincess wrote:

Before the VH1 show, about 50 of the Wholigans had a pre-party on the UCLA campus. It was a fundraiser for the children of a Who fan who died in February of breast cancer. We had about 5 minutes notice and then Pete walked in. He spoke very briefly, thanked us for being so generous, autographed some posters to be auctioned, and left after about 10 minutes. He was modest, almost shy, very funny, and completely down to earth. We learned afterwards that his security people didn’t want him to come but he insisted on doing it. So yeah, I’m biased.

nice story

12345AGNST1 wrote:

BTW: Pearl Jam made LROM and The Real Me sound substantially better than the originals.

and thats cause your a die hard fan of pj and arent really a fan of the who. you have to appericate rogers voice. it will take time. yes i'm a huge fan of both bands. but i love the who versions better. i'm not trying to bias.but i will always defend the who.

I grew up on the who, pearl jam, and u2 (thanks to my dad)...didn't even know that eddie liked them until live at the garden came out

people are fucking nuts for thinking they were "just ok" I wont say the single handedly changed everything. But along with Zep they pretty much changed the landscape of rock music forever.

The Who in the prime with all original members= Untouchable

Post Moon= "Just ok"

Post Entwistle= meh

whoprincess wrote:

I was gonna stay out of this thread cuz I thought it would just piss me off but it didn’t. It did give me a lot to respond to.

I’ll admit I’m biased. The Who are my favorite band and I was into them long before I was into Pearl Jam . . . because Pearl Jam didn’t exist when I started listening to them. I’ve loved The Who since I heard “I Can See for Miles” in 1967 when I was 13. I saw them live in their heyday and I saw them as recently as the VH1 Rock Honors. Most of their albums have to grow on you but I’d say that Quad is the best. Pete Townshend considers it his masterwork. “Love, Reign O’er Me” and “The Real Me” are 2 of the great songs on there but I’d suggest giving a listen to some others: “The Punk and the Godfather,” “5:15,” “Sea and Sand,” “Drowned,” and one that easily gets lost in the crashing drums and pounding bass, “I’m One.”

As a long time fan I’ve had to answer a bazillion questions or hear all the arguments and complaints about how they’re irrelevant or carried on past their time. I can’t speak for the people who’ve posted in this thread but many of the people who tell me they should have hung it up when Keith died are too young to have seen the band perform when he was still alive. Moonie was incredible but he was also troubled. If he had lived, would he have sobered up? Would he have stayed with the band? Over the period of 45 years a band can be expected to go through personnel changes, in fact, frequently over shorter periods than that (for example, say, Pearl Jam?). Do musicians have a right to keep their band together, doing what they love? As for helping John Entwistle out financially, he didn’t ask for money—he asked his mates to take the band on tour to help him out. He liked living a rock star’s lifestyle but he also loved performing. Unfortunately, he also liked living to excess and we lost him too. Should the band have quit after John’s death? Pete later explained why they continued but my feeling is that he explained it a little late in the game. I don’t agree with everything Pete says and does.

No, Pete isn’t a brilliant guitarist. Not in the league of Hendrix, Clapton, Jeff Beck, or many others. But he’s an incredible songwriter and influential artist. His music has changed and evolved over time because he stretches his limits and constantly tries new things. I’m always amazed at the different artists he says he is listening to. However, that doesn’t mean I start listening to them.

What I mostly don’t understand about your initial post, jamie uk, is its purpose. If you don’t like The Who, just don’t listen to them. I think there’s no denying their influence on popular music in the 60s and 70s. But they’ve accomplished just about every musical feat there is so they can get along without your approval. Why the need to slam them?

And I’m truly sorry you find Pete “creepy.” One thing I’ve enjoyed about Pete over the years is his sense of humor, which comes through in his banter on stage and his witty responses whenever he’s interviewed. He and Roger are very successful at this stage in life but they’re not nearly as wealthy as they could be because they do so many benefit shows for their charities. Before the VH1 show, about 50 of the Wholigans had a pre-party on the UCLA campus. It was a fundraiser for the children of a Who fan who died in February of breast cancer. We had about 5 minutes notice and then Pete walked in. He spoke very briefly, thanked us for being so generous, autographed some posters to be auctioned, and left after about 10 minutes. He was modest, almost shy, very funny, and completely down to earth. We learned afterwards that his security people didn’t want him to come but he insisted on doing it. So yeah, I’m biased.

this is a fantastic post. you said it better than i ever did or could.

catefrances wrote:

sorry... the doors arent the doors without jim.

& The Who isn't The Who without Keith Moon.

LavaLamp_GuitarTramp wrote:

& The Who isn't The Who without Keith Moon.

aah but drummers are easily replaced. just ask pearl jam .


i am quite a fan of moon the loon.

Don't Know Myself wrote:

First of all... whoever said The Who were a singles band... thank you for showing me that you are an idiot.

The Who are a singles band. How dare you call someone an idiot for having a more discerning taste in music than yourself? My Generation is an album characterised by abysmal cover versions of James Brown dross ("Please Please Please" on the UK release), self-indulgent jams ("The Ox") and self-plagiarisms. (Have you compared "Out in the Streets" with "Anyway Anyhow Anywhere", their vastly superior single, recently? I suspect not. Naming yourself after a Who B-side shows you're not too picky.) A Quick One is a badly recorded, badly produced abortion featuring tinny, fey covers ("Heatwave"), laughable Daltrey compositions ("See My Way") and wankfests such as Moon's "Cobwebs and Strange". This was roughly at the same time as their superior singles "Substitute" and "Happy Jack". Point getting proven? No?

The Who Sell Out introduced that horrific rock-killing abomination, the concept album, into a heretofore fun medium. (Concepts obviously work in classical music and jazz, though, by and large.) This is where Pete lost the plot and thought he was capable of "High Art". The thing is, he couldn't even sustain the concept for a whole album. It starts off with tenth-rate psychedelia (Speedy Keen/Keane/whatever's "Armenia City In The Sky"), and then we get a couple of "Sell Out" themed songs. The single from the album, "I Can See For Miles", just about saves side one of the LP (even if it's nothing to do with the "selling out" theme). Then, on side two, the jingles abruptly disappear after a bit, and midway through, we get "Relax" (nothing to do with the theme of selling out, except that it's ironically a flower-power cash-in): another sub-psychedelic noodle. Again, this was the band who released some good singles in 1967 ("Pictures of Lily" too), making a shit album.

Ironically, The Who released a good album's worth of material in 1968, which ended up later on on the US-only Magic Bus - The Who on Tour release (except for the crap from The Who Sell Out on there, such as the creepy "I Can't Reach You", about a grey-haired narrator and the golden-haired object of his unrequited desires).

Tommy has some good songs, but the curse of the concept album is that good material is sacrificed to linking filler, and I haven't time for "Do You Think It's Alright?", "Underture" (which is The Who Sell Out's "Rael" rehashed and dragged out ad nauseam) or "Welcome", when I could be listening to a proper, cohesive and themed album release such as Coltrane's A Love Supreme. There was a good single from the album though: "Pinball Wizard". To his slight credit, Townshend had, however, at least by now realised that he could take love songs such as "She's a Sensation", reword them in the first person, and fit them vaguely into his story. Pity, though, in some ways. "She's a Sensation" would have been better than "I'm a Sensation". And maybe, even a single...

The success of Who's Next was due thankfully to the failure of the "Lifehouse" project. Nearly every song on there was single-material. It was a collection of the best of the period. One only has to compare it with the dreaded Who Came First solo LP to see this.

As for 1973's Quadrophenia, it was greatly improved in 1979 when, for the film soundtrack, a lot of the barrel-scrapings were removed and replaced, on side four, with a compilation of soul tunes from the mod days.

I can't be arsed to suffer reviews of Odds and Sods or their rarities albums, or their later material, except to say I very likely have a far wider, encyclopedic knowledge of The Who's output, and that my conclusion they are a singles band is based on considered, judicious opinion. It's the blind love of a second-division UK band who were always more popular in the States that, in my estimation, borders far more tangibly on the idiotic. Good day to you.


"Know thyself."

They are, indeed, just an "okay" band. I find that I can't stand at least few songs from each of their albums, even the most highly acclaimed ones. They were a singles band, not an albums band.

It's sad that Pearl Jam is so "in awe" so to speak of The Who all the time. They really are leagues better than The Who. They played better than The Who themselves at Rock Honors.

LavaLamp_GuitarTramp wrote:

No I like it my way better. I think Pearl Jam are average musicians with great songs, whereas the Who are great musicians with average songs.

well i'm just telling you that the history of the band, and words straight out of petes mouth contradict what you say.
and we aren't talking about pearl jam so i don't know why that was even brought up.