The Who: 2000 Interview
The Who: No Middle-Aged Wasteland
Best of 2000: In 2000, the Who returned with a live album and a tour. In this CDNOW Interview from July, its members talk about keeping up with the kids.
By Gary Graff
CDNOW Contributing Writer
During the past three and a half decades, the Who has given new meaning to the term "Long Live Rock." Though it's broken up and reunited more times than a hockey player and his teeth, the veteran British troupe has enjoyed not only sustained radio play, but also the regular embrace of younger audiences who recognize the continuing validity of "My Generation" and the "teenage wasteland" refrain of "Baba O'Riley."
These days the Who is very much an active entity, too: While the individual members work on their assorted solo projects -- most notably Pete Townshend's resurrection of the abandoned Lifehouse concept album from the early '70s -- the band is celebrating the recently released BBC Sessions. The band spent the summer on the road to promoe it, and talk of the band entering the studio to record a new album continues.
While the late Keith Moon smiles somewhere from the great beyond, Townshend, Roger Daltrey, and John Entwistle are certainly taking steps to make sure their rock lives longer.
CDNOW: You guys are pretty busy. I guess you don't hope you die before you get old anymore?
Roger Daltrey: I've always kind of laughed at people who say 'You're too old to rock and roll.' To me, it's got nothing to do with your age or any of that. It's to do with the music and what that music itself generates.
Why do you think people still want to listen to the Who?
Daltrey: Obviously there's a uniqueness in the music. It's a very, very unique style of band; you can hear all the influences, but it's not derivative. If you hear the Stones, they are derivative of Chuck Berry and early blues people. With the Who, you can hear the influences of those people, but it's become something totally, totally different. The way Pete wrote his songs, the structures, again, is totally unique.
And what he wrote about was something ... Where everybody else was writing about sex and "I'd like to screw you, baby," in various different ways, Pete was more interested in the psychological problems of the adolescent and the young man. And that, of course, is timeless, 'cause it doesn't change -- just a new generation comes around with the same set of problems.
"I've always kind of laughed at people who say 'You're too old to rock and roll.'" To me, it's got nothing to do with your age or any of that. It's to do with the music."
So what should the Who sound like in the 21st century?
John Entwistle: I hope it's going to go back to Who Are You rather than Face Dances and It's Hard. I think the feeling is it's going to be a lot more uptempo, up front. I've said that before, and I usually end up with the only rock-and-roll songs on the album. But hopefully it can be different this time.
Do you wonder what kind of relevance a band whose members are all in their 50s can have with a younger audience these days?
Daltrey: I can obviously understand that -- What does the Who say now? I've always been of the opinion that if Pete could write about the problems of adolescence, why can't he write about the problems of middle age? It's a different set of issues, isn't it? And our audience hasn't gone away; they're still probably going through the same things I am, that Pete is, that all people of our age do, all those little insecurities. No one is completely cleaned up and knows where they're going in their life -- ever, I don't think. They may think they know where they're going, but they probably won't end up there.
Your most recent release is the BBC Sessions album. What do you remember about those radio gigs?
Daltrey: In those days we were gigging every night, sometimes two gigs a night. The BBC sessions were always early in the morning, which is something we never used to see in those days unless it was a BBC session. In that sense they weren't enjoyable. And some of them were live in front of audiences; they were on a variety show where there'd be a live band and a big band that played some of the current hits. God knows what they thought of the sound we were making.
Entwistle: I always hated them. The whole thing about the BBC is that back then, it didn't matter how many No. 1 hits you had; if you couldn't play live, and you didn't pass their audition, you didn't get to play. Everyone was called Simon or Clive; they all had white shirts and red ties. It was horrible. It was like going back to high school; you have to behave yourselves, and everything's got to be prim and proper. If you had your own sound, then you damn well better produce it, 'cause they couldn't.
The Who had a bit of a rebellious edge at the time BBC Sessions was recorded, so it's surprising to hear that you actually did jingles for the BBC. How did that happen?
Daltrey: I can't remember actually ever doing them [laughs]. Something like that was always stuck under our noses while we were right in the middle of doing it. And then you just do it -- You couldn't quit. In those days, it was anything to be on the radio, 'cause it was so difficult to get on the radio in England.
There are some interesting covers on BBC Sessions. What led you to do "Good Lovin'"?
Daltrey: John was a very big fan of the Lovin' Spoonful, and so was Keith. [Editor's note: "Good Lovin'" was, of course, a hit for the Young Rascals, not the Lovin' Spoonful.] It was the first American group that had that kind of crossover between white and black music. When we first came to America, we basically copied all the black artists that we grew up with, all the early blues people and Tamla Motown, and James Brown, and white America didn't know this stuff. I think "Good Lovin'" was one of the first American white hits that really reflected black music. It was a great song.
"Where everybody else was writing about sex, and 'I'd like to screw you, baby,' in various different ways, Pete [Townshend] was more interested in the psychological problems of the adolescent and the young man."
"Dancing in the Streets" must have come from the same sensibility, then.
Daltrey: Yeah. We used to do the Martha & the Vandellas' version of "Heatwave"; and I think it was "Dancing in the Streets" as well, but we copied our version from a version that was done by the Everly Brothers, which we found very interesting. It was an album they did of covers, and they did a version of "Dancing in the Streets" with very interesting guitars on it, which we were kind of into at the time.
So is a new Who album a certainty?
Entwistle: There are tentative plans for an album. Obviously, if we don't like it, it won't come out. We've agreed to go into the studio and have a go at one.
Daltrey: We've talked about maybe doing an album, then doing a tour and everything. Then we said, "No, that's the way it's always done. Let's do a tour with some new songs in it and make the songs become organic to a live band," which is what we're great at, and then go in and make a record, or even record it live on the road. So we're thinking of working that way, but nothing's set in concrete yet.