mail: daniel_fjall@hotmail.com
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the who sings my generation a quick one the who sell out
The Who Sings My Generation Yes, the debut album of The Who is harder than anything else at the time. At least that I know of. Loud, heavy drumming, furious distorted guitars and freaky, fast bass lines. However, the singing is far from impressive in places and downright annoying in “A Legal Matter”. Of course, vocalist Roger Daltrey has some good moments too. The classic “My Generation” features all the band members at their best. It’s loud, a song for the teenage rebel and the perfect youth-anthem. They even manage to throw in some feedback noise at the end, which was quite a risky move at the time. Had the song been a bit more brainless, I would declare it as the first punk-song. “The Kids Are Alright” is more mod than punk, but works good. However, the songwriting is uneven, and high moments relieves lower ones. The fact that ten of these twelve numbers are originals (all but one written by guitarist Pete Townshend), is not an excuse. People can rave all they want about The Beatles only having eight originals on their debut, The Rolling Stones only one and The Kinks merely six. If anything, it only proves the impact The Beatles obviously had, as My Generation is recorded two years after Please Please Me. Also, by this time The Beatles had already released an album with exclusively Lennon/McCartney-material. The barrier was already broken. The Beatles and The Beach Boys (who started filling their albums with their own material even earlier) were way ahead and The Kinks was catching up. This discussion is pretty useless, though. These things happened 40 years ago and no longer is a drastic deed. Respective, perhaps, but hardly a reason to enjoy the music. The Who, and Pete Townshend, were talented already here, but failed to be consistently good over a full album, which is only normal for a debut. They deserve credit for including “The Ox”, which took guts. It’s an instrumental and probably the loudest thing that ever hit middle-class England since the bombs during the WWII. I mean, it is crap, but it surely made the swinging kids fall out of their chairs when hearing it for the first time. Also, the heavier performances here (as opposed to the songwriting) surely opened up the doors for bands such as Cream and maybe even Jimi Hendrix. So, what we got here are great and not-so-great songs performed loud and hard. Sloppy mod-pop and R’n’B stuff recalling The Animals and The Rolling Stones. And a couple of rave ups in between, which makes the album at least somewhat original. Mostly thanks to the impressive and skillful musicianship which blew away their contemporary competition. Actually, it is still blowing away most of the bands around.
A Quick One (Happy Jack) The second album is often regarded as a weaker album than the debut, and I agree. Instead of continuing to develop the harder side of the band, they seem more interested in what other bands around them were doing. They’re trying to become more sophisticated (whatever that means) and whilst the playing every once in a while is hard and rough, the production, arrangements and songwriting appears to be quite influenced from the psychedelic pop scene. Cream’s pop songs (“I Feel Free”, “Strange Brew”), Pink Floyd, The Byrds and The Kinks are bands that could easily be mentioned in the same breath as this album. Interesting, mayhaps, but not necessarily that exciting. The Who deserves their place in rock history as a loud band, not for semi-country pop with British accent (“Don’t Look Away”) or simply LSD-drained pop (“See My Way”) and strange stuff such as “Boris The Spider”. “Boris The Spider” is cool and goofy in its own right, though, but hardly a masterpiece. The Who are at their finest when rocking out, which is ironic as the best songs here are the Motown-cover “Heat Wave” and Townshend’s original, Byrds-esque pop tune “So Sad About Us”. The latter has a driving rhythm and is very melodic and catchy. In fact, so good I thought it was a cover when hearing it for the first time. I don’t think too highly of Townshend’s writing at this time. It’s solid and all, but compared to the other big bands at the time he was far behind. That is why “So Sad About Us” comes as a surprise. It is a pop masterpiece, 3 minutes of perfection and ranks among the group’s best songs ever. Also, Daltrey’s vocals are also a lot better on A Quick One than it was on the debut. There’s no magical moments such as the predecessors title track, but there are no embarrassments either. Other than mentioned “So Sad About Us”, “Heat Wave” and maybe “Boris The Spider”, only “Run Run Run” and perhaps “I Need You” are somewhat memorable. The rest is passable and ranks between dull and decent. Only “Cobwebs And Strange” is below average, but probably not intended to be taken seriously anyway. However, greater things waited around the corner, forcing me to withdraw all the badmouthing I have done so far.
The Who Sell Out The Who Sell Out is a concept album and their best effort so far. The guitars are back and the album doesn’t suffer from an overdose of psychedelia as the predecessor. Strangely enough, but going back to basics made them develop and take several steps forward. Yet, the album is very much pop. There are acoustic guitars and carefully arranged backing vocals, but most importantly; the melodies are strong and the lyrics are strong. Most songs have a pinch of sarcasm, cynicism, humor and it seems like there are more thoughts and work put into them than on their previously releases. The concept of the album is pretty vague and loose, though. The basic idea is to present the album as ordinary British radio. So, between some fantastic songs, you get fake, silly commercials. Most of them are amusing and joyful, and although I would have preferred if they weren’t there, I don’t mind them much either. In a way, they only give the album a unique character and separates it from your ordinary pop album. Highlights and huge personal favorites are “Armenia City In The Sky”, the haunting “I Can See For Miles” and the exceptional melody of “Mary Anne With The Shaky Hand”. All of them being performed flawlessly with great drumming, but also some of that trademark guitar sound of Pete Townshend. He would develop it further later on, but it sounds amazing here too. Not too far behind these three fantastic songs comes “I Can’t Reach You” together with the ballad “Sunrise”. The remaining songs are good, but compared to the perfect performances and songwriting of the already mentioned songs they appear less impressive than they might have done in a different environment. I do adore the harmony vocals in “Tattoo”, though, which also tells an entertaining story. The Who Sell Out has some stunning moments, magical and time stopping moments, mixed with some good, but not fantastic songs. Not a bad song as far as the eye can see (and I can see for miles and miles and miles) and overall a great album.
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