By: David Schultz
Tea Leaf/Galactic Photo: Jeremy Gordon


The set list included significant time devoted to Tea Leaf’s loose jangly side, notably “My Bastard Brother” and “Let It Go,” an increasingly powerful version of guitarist Josh Clark’s “Carter Hotel” and the groove heavy “Sex In The 70s.” It also contained quite a few new songs like “Training A Cloud” and “Germinatin’ Seed,” always a fine sign for an evolving band. For those who weren’t familiar with Tea Leaf Green before Friday night, their opening set was not the best introduction to the San Francisco based foursome. In their element, Tea Leaf Green masterfully builds off the excitement of the crowd, patiently letting the music evolve. A fair number of people arrived early to catch TLG but the cavernous warehouse known as Terminal 5 can make a sizable crowd feel sparse. Although hey had a little more than an hour to work with, they never seemed to find that zone that TLG fans rave about.

Labels: Galactic, Tea Leaf Green, The Who

By: David Schultz


Grace Potter & The Nocturnals: Not The T-Bone Burnett Album

U-Melt: Perfect World

Pavement Reunion

Peter Gabriel: Scratch My Back
With his last studio effort coming in 2002, Peter Gabriel’s most significant accomplishment over the past few years has been getting reverently namechecked by Vampire Weekend in “Cape Cod Kwassa Kwassa.” Not typically known as an interpreter of other’s material, Gabriel will release Scratch My Back, an album exclusively of covers, on February 15. Gabriel’s latest will include his take on David Bowie’s “Heroes,” Paul Simon’s “The Boy In The Bubble,” Bon Iver’s “Flume,” Arcade Fire’s “My Body Is A Cage” as well as versions of songs from Elbow, Lou Reed, The Magnetic Fields, Randy Newman, Regina Spektor, Neil Young, Radiohead and The Talking Heads.

Blues & Lasers New Album

Pete Townshend At The Super Bowl

Backyard Tire Fire: Good To Be

The Kinks Reunion

Vampire Weekend: Contra

A Genesis Reunion With Peter Gabriel

Labels: Backyard Tire Fire, Genesis, Grace Potter and The Nocturnals, Pavement, Peter Gabriel, The Kinks, The Who, U-Melt, Vampire Weekend

By: David Schultz

The Eighties proved to be an awkward era. Not only did it give us the Safety dance, purple rain, luftballons, the moonwalk, Wang Chung and Terence Trent D’Arby, it’s the decade that gave us the phrase “Domo Arigato, Mr. Roboto.” In addition to cringeworthy fashion statements like suits with pastel-colored T-shirts and teased, feathered hair for both men and women, the Eighties brought us into the computer age. In the arcades, we played Pac-Man and Missile Command and at home, we slowly converted our record collections to compact disc.

The emergence of MTV, which stressed an artist’s appearance as much as their talent, the widespread incorporation of synthesized and computer generated music and the initial growth of rap drove many established and iconic acts from the Sixties and Seventies into an identity crisis as they tried to keep up with the changing times. The Eighties may have served as the birthing ground for U2, R.E.M. and The Replacements but it also marked the time that the careers of many artists from the Woodstock generation went into a tailspin.

Since Oliver Stone has decided to bring Gordon Gekko, the decade’s archetype of amoral greed, into the modern day with Wall Street 2: Money Never Sleeps, it’s probably not a bad time to look back at the Eighties and see how it nearly dimmed some of the rock era’s brightest lights.

ERIC CLAPTON
By the Eighties, Clapton’s storied reputation as a blues-rock demigod had started to diminish as he battled drug and alcohol addiction. Where Slow Hand once dallied in the studio with the likes of Duane Allman, Steve Winwood and George Harrison, the Eighties saw him palling around with Phil Collins and releasing slickly produced albums like Behind The Sun and August. At his 80s nadir, Clapton found himself in heavy rotation on MTV with “It’s In The Way That You Use It,” his tie-in with The Color Of Money, and in Michelob commercials with his re-recorded version of “After Midnight.” Capitalizing on everyone’s need to replace their LPs with CDs, many artists had their greatest hits combined into comprehensive multi-disc box sets. Clapton’s Crossroads, which covered all aspects of his career, created the blueprint for such collections and reawakened interest in the master bluesman. Trading in the T-shirt and jeans that had become his stage wear in favor of dapper suits, Clapton stopped dabbling in 80s-style superficial blues-rock and once again found his muse.

GRATEFUL DEAD
Defying all logic, the Grateful Dead had a run of success on MTV. In 1987, The venerable jamband titans released In The Dark, easily their most accessible album and, in line with the times, made . . . shudder . . . a music video for its lead single “Touch Of Grey.” In between Peter Gabriel and Dire Straits videos, the shaggy manes of Jerry Garcia and Bob Weir played interchangeably with animatronic skeletons while Deadheads watched on with bemused horror. In line with the chorus of “Touch Of Grey,” the Dead survived the Eighties by persevering and simply outlasting the nonsense until it came full circle. Whatever fair-weather fans they attracted through their MTV exposure quickly fell to the wayside as the Dead remained on the road, paving the way for the modern jamband scene to flourish. Always a mighty live draw, the Dead toured regularly up until Jerry Garcia’s death in 1995. By that point, the brain cells in which Deadheads stored their memories of the Dead’s brief 80s flirtation with mainstream popularity had long been killed.

LOU REED
With classics like “Walk On The Wild Side” and “Street Hassle” a distant memory, the former leader of the Velvet Underground spent most of the Eighties churning out albums like Legendary Hearts and Mistrial, filled with formulaic, barely inspired three chord rock songs. Never the most harmonious singer, Reed got in into his head that he should be acknowledged as one of the originators of the burgeoning rap scene, insinuating as much on “The Original Wrapper.” At the end of the decade, Reed turned his razor-sharp intellect on two subjects on which no one would doubt his expertise, New York City and Andy Warhol. With the release of New York in 1989 and his collaboration the next year with John Cale on Songs For Drella, a eulogy for Warhol, their former mentor and patron, Reed found relevant topics to apply his blunt, streetwise poetry to, reemerging as one of America’s most prolific and outspoken songwriters. Like he had for the decades before, he continued to sort-of rap most of his lyrics but once Marky Mark & The Funky Bunch released “Wildside,” Reed seemed to lose all interest in drawing comparisons between himself and the world of hip hop.

GENESIS
Next to ZZ Top, there was no more unlikely MTV superstar than Phil Collins. Looking more lecherous old man than video icon, Collins worked ahead of the curve; his slick videos for “Sussudio” “Take Me Home” and “In The Air Tonight” defining the early 80s Miami Vice influenced video era. As a solo star, this was fine. However, as the de facto leader of Genesis, one of the titans of progressive rock, this influence resulted in the band that created The Lamb Lies Down On Broadway being represented by Spitting Image puppets on “Land Of Confusion” and hawking Michelob beer with “Tonight, Tonight, Tonight.” Unlike many of the other artists on this list, the Eighties didn’t almost kill Genesis, they put the band six feet under. After the unbearable We Can’t Dance, the band went dormant with Collins officially leaving in 1996, relegating them to a cult status amongst those who would flock in droves to see a reunion with Peter Gabriel. However, like all bands from the Seventies, there is always one word that generates gobs of cash: reunion. The 2007 Genesis reunion tour touched on their forgettable 80s success but wisely kept things focused on their pre-80s majesty.

DAVID BOWIE
David Bowie's descent into Eighties inanity didn’t take place during that decade – although some would be pressed to call shenanigans on “Blue Jean,” “China Doll” and his mincing prance with Mick Jagger on “Dancing In The Streets.” Rather, in 1997, Bowie engaged in the type of Wall Street chicanery that made Michael Milken the poster boy for Wall Street greed: junk bonds. Coming up with the novel idea of selling securities backed by royalties on his pre-1990 recordings, Bowie Bonds were initially greeted with optimism and an A3 rating. Coupling Bowie’s retirement from the stage with the digital revolution and its crippling effect on music sales in any medium, the lack of a sustainable interest in Bowie’s back catalog has resulted in the Bowie Bonds being continuously downgraded, reaching a level just a touch above junk bond status.

JETHRO TULL
When a band that’s made their career on English blues, sprawling progressive rock suites and flute-based epics becomes fascinated with the synthesizer, nothing good could result. In the case of Jethro Tull, nothing good did result. Instead of flirting with Bach compositions and mandolin solos from a prior century, Ian Anderson attempted to give the band a new wavish Eighties feel on albums like A, Under Wraps and their most Spinal Tappish effort, Broadsword And The Beast by including electric violins and decidedly non-rustic synthesizers. The extreme divergence from medieval acoustics and progressive rock digressions alienated all but the most loyal of fans. Tull came to its senses by the end of the decade but at that point it’s unclear if anyone was still paying attention. It surely baffled everyone when they won the inaugural Grammy for Best Hard Rock Album for the mostly acoustic Crest Of The Knave.

AEROSMITH
This is the band from the Seventies that proves to be the exception to the rule. Already in trouble at the start of the decade, the band was on the steep path to nostalgia tours and obscurity when Run DMC helped resurrect Aerosmith’s career with rock and rap music’s original mash-up, “Walk This Way.” Being associated with the groundbreaking rap trio and the emerging genre of music hardly hurt Aerosmith, nor did it do Run DMC any harm to get the rub from one of the hardest rocking bands of the previous decade. In the era before gangsta rap and Kanye West egos, a classic rock act reaching across the aisle in this fashion seemed more revolutionary than conciliatory or opportunistic. Once the singles from Permanent Vacation started to make their way into heavy rotation on MTV, Aerosmith became one of the first bands that actually was saved by the Eighties.

NEIL YOUNG
As if the success of Buffalo Springfield was an albatross hanging around his neck, Neil Young found himself a Vocoder and a synthesizer and let the world know what “Mr. Soul” would have sounded like if it had been recorded by robots. Embracing the new technology a bit too eagerly, Young released Trans, an album chock full of Eighties-style robotics and unlike anything Young had ever done before. Geffen Records, who released Trans, hated it so much, they skipped constructive criticism and sued him for making it. Young’s dabbling in computer rock was thankfully short lived but it sent him into a downward creative spiral and he spent the decade making the weakest music of his career, getting banned from MTV in the process for glibly mocking the network and its advertisers. Fortunately, the first Bush era awakened the rocker; when Young released Freedom and the incendiary “Rockin’ In The Free World,” the past decade faded blissfully into the ether and Young took his rightful spot as the flannel clad Godfather of Grunge.

THE WHO
The world’s loudest band presciently sat out the decade, saving the world from finding out what other synthesized epics Pete Townshend had in mind when he wrote “Eminence Front.” Instead, we got sappy fluff like “After The Fire” from Daltrey’s Under The Raging Moon and Townshend succumbing to the urge to rap on “Face The Face” and to the need to adapt The Iron Giant into a misfire of a concept album. To celebrate the 25th anniversary of Tommy, The Who reunited and embarked on the first of many, many reunion tours. Always a reliable draw, Townshend, Daltrey and, until his death in 2002, bassist John Entwistle, kept The Who’s legacy alive, waiting until the oughts to put out any new material bearing The Who’s mighty trademark. Daltrey’s voice may have lost its once-mighty power and Townshend battled tinnitus, but once they launch into “Won’t Get Fooled Again” or “Baba O’Riley,” people don’t seem to care, mainly cause Townshend remains one of the best guitarists alive.

ZZ TOP
In the Eighties, ZZ Top performed the nearly impossible task of transforming themselves from a gruff, rough-and-tumble Southern-rock trio into neo-lecherous, bearded purveyors of synthesized blues. It’s hard to begrudge them the success they found by reinventing themselves as it resuscitated their flagging career . . . but at what cost? Nowadays, when ZZ Top enters the conversation, it’s impossible to extricate the images of the three of them mysteriously appearing with a bevy of hot, leggy women to offer up the keys of their cherry red vintage Ford to some deserving soul. Beguiled by the synths, ZZ Top turned the blues into a cartoon wonderland, stripping the music’s back door man ethic of every ounce of its menace.

Happy Thanksgiving. The daily Earfuls will return after the holiday.

Labels: Aerosmith, David Bowie, Eric Clapton, Genesis, Grateful Dead, Jethro Tull, Lou Reed, Neil Young, The Who, ZZ Top

By: David Schultz

Since making an appearance at Super Bowl XXXVIII, much has been said, written and debated about Janet Jackson's right breast. In the five years since Jackson flashed America, fines have been levied, speech and expression censored and decisions rendered by all sorts of judicial bodies, including the Supreme Court. Most devastating, the whole episode torpedoed Justin Timberlake's career. Poor Justin had to abandon his dreams of being a throwaway pop star and settle for the life of a credible multi-talented, legitimately funny, widely recognized superstar.

If anything good has come from the incident - besides making "wardrobe malfunction" a candidate for the O.E.D. - the Super Bowl half time shows have become showcases for rock and roll's biggest names. With The Rolling Stones, Paul McCartney and Bruce Springsteen all having taken their turn as midgame entertainment, it's time for The Who to take the field. Personally, I think HDTV will be the proper format to properly appreciate the disdainful expression on Pete Townshend's face as he vents his disgust over the audience hired to mob the stage and wildly overreact to everything The Who does. Forget Nipplegate; we could have Cranky Old Man Gate on our hands.

TONIGHT, WELL THIS AFTERNOON IF YOU ARE IN THE USA, Wilco will be Webcasting their show from The Paradiso in Amsterdam. Showtime is 8:45 p.m. Netherlands time which makes it a matinee here in America (2:45 p.m. EST)

Labels: The Who, Wilco

By: David Schultz

In 1997, Bob Dylan sent his most ardent fans into career retrospective mode when he entered the hospital with a near-fatal heart infection. At the time, Dylan's career was in one of its cyclical nadirs but upon his release, that would all soon change. In the studio, Dylan put the finishing touches on Time Out Of Mind, which would become a critically lauded, Grammy winning success; on stage, Dylan had once again become a potent force, assembling a band that was his best since The Band. When Dylan resumes touring on October, Charlie Sexton, who along with Larry Campbell anchored his stellar turn-of-the-century crew, will return to the fold.

IN MORE BIZARRE DYLAN NEWS, it appears that he will be following up the Mexican cantina-tinged Together Through Life with Christmas In The Heart, an album of Yuletide classics. While I'm still open to the possibility that this is a hoax, it looks more and more that if this is a put-on, it's a well thought out one. Fueling the "Christmas Creep," the album will be released October 13 with the proceeds going to hunger relief charities.

WITH ENDLESS WIRE, THE WHO tacked on an excellent final refrain, a coda if you will, to their legendary career with "Tea And Theater" possessing the right amount of sentimentality to serve as fitting last words. On his blog, Pete Townshend has revealed that The Who aren't done and he and Daltrey intend to take "the more conventional songs" from an upcoming rock opera, Floss, and compile them for a 2010 release. The new opera seems to revolve around a retired rocker who sheds his role as a house-husband and captures his generation's zeitgeist, much to his wife's chagrin.

Labels: Bob Dylan, The Who

"My Generation," The Who's 1965 classic in which Roger Daltrey sang that he hoped he die before he got old, was named the most popular teenage anthem of all time in a survey of 2,000 British adults. Cyndi Lauper's defining Eighties track "Girl's Just Wanna Have Fun" placed second and Alice Cooper's "School's Out" was third. The polling for youthful anthems was done to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the first use of the term "teenager."

You would have to imagine a Stateside version of the same list would have to include Bruce Springsteen's "Born To Run," Skynyrd's "Free Bird" and The Secret Machines' "Alone, Jealous & Stoned." Well, maybe someday for the Machines.

Labels: The Secret Machines, The Who

Van Halen reunion with Roth? E! Online reports that a deal could be signed as early as today for a 40 city tour. An email I sent to Eddie Van Halen's rep on the West Coast this morning is unanswered. Given the time difference, I'll update later if this is confirmed.

MTV UK reports that Amy Winehouse and Jamie Callum were among a group kicked out of a London bar last night. The same report cites the Sun as saying that Jarvis Cocker and Ronnie Wood were also part of a group hanging around the bar's piano and apparently making too much noise for management. Perhaps the managers didn't realize they had the "next big thing" in their presence?

Speaking of Ronnie Wood if you've ever wanted to "jam with the Stones" as Spicoli would say, the next best thing might be a rock fantasy camp. Wood is reported to be among the instructors for a rock school that would also include Cream bassist Jack Bruce, Procol Harum singer Gary Brooker and Spencer Davis. Gigwise says that students paying the hefty tuition fee will also be taken to a recording session at Abbey Road Studios and play a gig at the Cavern in Liverpool.

Fall Out Boy is reportedly the latest victim of a leaked record. Pete Wentz told NME, "This isn't the end of the world, (but) it certainly feels pretty terrible." The band will reportedly add a bonus track to the official release to encourage fans to pay for the official version instead of downloading the leaked tracks.

Rumors are flying about the Who playing the monster Glastonbury festival. Artic Monkeys, Bjork, the Killers, Razorlight and the Smashing Pumpkins are also being tossed around as possible bands on the bill. Speaking of the Who, I read somewhere the other day that Pete Townsend sort of apologized for saying bands like the Stones were too old to tour anymore [insert your own "hope I die before I get old joke here].

I just got this mp3 from Chicago's Dearborn so I haven't had time to fully digest it. But, it sounded decent on a first listen and Jambase says: "Want to see a great rock band and dance your ass off? Then go see Dearborn, a rock and roll quartet from Chicago that knows how to blend killer riffs and catchy melodies with funky dance beats and flat-out grooves. This isn't emo, this isn't metal, this isn't prog. This is straight-up rock, and it's not to be missed." So, check them out!
MP3: Already Down

Philadelphia's Dr. Dog is readying their new release. We All Belong will be released in February and the band, who in the past have toured wth Clap Your Hands Say Yeah, My Morning Jacket and other big names will embark on their own US tour. Label mates The Teeth will be on many of those dates.
MP3: My Old Ways

The Ataris new record, Welcome the Night, drops on February 20th. I'm told that it is a bit of a departure from their previous stuff and that the record was produced by Nick Launay (Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds / David Byrne). If you listen carefully you may here hints of The Pixies and Sigur Ros.
MP3: Connections Are More Dangerous Than Lies

Labels: Amy Winehouse, Arctic Monkeys, David Lee Roth, Dr. Dog, Pete Townshend, Philadelphia, The Teeth, The Who, Van Halen

By: David Schultz

Under no conceivable set of circumstances could Pete Townshend and Roger Daltrey release a new Who album without facing intense scrutiny. Legacies can be tarnished by returning to the well one time too often (e.g. Jefferson Airplane/Starship, Pink Floyd's The Division Bell, Van Halen featuring Gary Cherone). With Endless Wire, the first studio album to bear The Who imprimatur in close to a quarter century, Townshend and Daltrey have recorded a satisfying coda, not an embarrassing footnote, to the band's storied career. While the album has its faults, Townshend's iconic guitar and Daltrey's signature voice give Endless Wire enough of a Who-ey quality to make it a satisfying addendum to a book long thought complete.

Musical partners for nearly forty years, Townshend and Daltrey's pairing predictably still yields magical results. On "Mike Post Theme," the sextogenarians (not what you think, it means they're in their sixties), show they can still be a bit randy while cranking out an anthem belying their advancing years. Townshend's presence dominates the album: the plentiful acoustic numbers thrive on his nimble guitar work and the themes are more typical of his pointedly socio-critical solo material. "A Man In A Purple Dress" confronts hypocrisy in organized religion and "Black Widow's Eyes" comes from the point of view of a hostage beset with Stockholm Syndrome.

Townshend's efforts are notable but Daltrey is hardly a guest on his own album. On "Fragments," the opening track, nothing but Daltrey's familiar howl giving voice to Townshend's Zen-like koans could follow the "Baba O'Riley" style cascading synthesizer rolls. Time may be depriving Daltrey of the ability to belt out The Who's songs with the same power for the entirety of a two hour show but in the studio, no such limitations are present. Daltrey's voice gives life to songs that might otherwise lack for sustenance, getting the blood boiling on "Mike Post Theme" and "Two Thousand Years" and giving warmth and depth to "Tea & Theater." Townshend shares some of the singing duties, including the extended version of the disc's title track. On "God Speaks Of Marty Robbins," a song that could have come from any of Townshend's solo records, the guitarist equals his prior vocal efforts. However, Townshend misguidedly adopts Tom Waits' gravelly vocal style on "In The Ether," rendering the song practically unlistenable.

The second half of the album consisting of "Wire & Glass," a mini-opera containing a number of songs timing in at less than two minutes, could easily be mistaken as a number of unfinished demo tracks. As long as Townshend's pretentiousness doesn't bother you, the ten song suite has more winning moments than misfires. Essentially some odds and sods cobbled together, many of the songlets end just when they are picking up steam; "Sound Round," and "We Got A Hit," fading just when the feet get tapping. On the other hand, some of the more artsy efforts, "Trilby's Piano," "Unholy Trinity" and "They Make My Dream Come True" bid their farewell before their shortcomings become shockingly evident.

In all likelihood, Endless Wire marks the final creative outburst of The Who. As any writer will tell you, satisfying endings are hard to come by. Even with its faults, Daltrey and Townshend have crafted a fitting potential finale with the album's closing pair of songs "Mirror Door" and "Tea & Theater." Picking up where It's Hard and Face Dances left off, "Mirror Door" honors the landscape The Who helped create by acknowledging the overarching power of music, Daltrey and Townshend wringing one last distinctly Who song out of their souls. With "Tea & Theater," Townshend seems to have written the eulogy for his legendary band. With Daltrey powerfully singing that "the story is done" over Townshend's acoustic guitar, the two issue possibly the last word on all things Who: "a thousand songs - still smolder now/we played them as one - we're older now/all of us sad/all of us free/before we walk from the stage/two of us/won't you have some tea?"

Labels: Pete Townshend, Roger Daltrey, The Who

By: David Schultz

With nothing left to prove, Pete Townshend and Roger Daltrey, the two surviving members of The Who could easily ride out their career resting on their laurels as one of the greatest rock bands of all time. Since their first farewell tour in 1982, The Who have showed impeccable timing in parsing out their reunion performances, mixing benefit sets at Live Aid, Live 8 and The Concert For New York City with tours in which they played Quadrophenia in its entirety or simply scratched people's collective itch to hear "Behind Blue Eyes," "Baba O'Riley" and "Pinball Wizard" one more time.

Shortly after John Entwistle's death on the eve of a world tour, Townshend and Daltrey completed the dates and intimated, as they have many times before, that they were unlikely to tour again in the absence of anything new to perform. Well, more than two decades since the release of It's Hard, their last studio album, there will be a new Who release. With new material to debut, Townshend and Daltrey are taking to the road once more as The Who, enticing fans to listen to the new by offering a few of the old. Their recently commenced North American tour came through New York City last week with a pair of shows at Madison Square Garden. Anyone wondering if The Who have slowed down in their old age, (Daltrey is 62, Townshend 61) can rest easy. Townshend still windmills with a fury and although he seems to have a little more difficulty keeping it under control, Daltrey continues to be a microphone-swinging fiend.

Even though Keith Moon and John Entwistle have passed away, Townshend and Daltrey touring as The Who doesn't ring false. Standing well out in front of a backing band consisting of Beatle descendant Zak Starkey, bassist Pino Palladino and Pete's brother Simon, Townshend and Daltrey churned out the songs upon which The Who's indomitable reputation has been built. Even though all of the jokes about The Who hoping to die before they got old have been told, it's fortunate that they never heeded their own advice. The two are a bit older, Townshend occasionally put on a set of headphones and Daltrey doesn't belt out the songs exactly like he used to, but no less entertaining. With the exception of Quadrophenia, The Who reached back into their estimable catalogue, hitting every major period: they covered their early days with "I Can't Explain," "Anyway, Anyhow, Anywhere" and "My Generation," featuring Palladino getting his one moment to step forward; the conceptual era seventies with an extended encore of selections from Tommy and with "You Better, You Bet" and "Eminence Front" they hit their post-Moon period. Even though they have always had a predilection for a good synthesizer break, The Who never had a keyboard player as an official member of the band. Though entertaining, the prominence of the keyboard riffs on late-era songs like "Eminence Front" and "Who Are You," played this night by John "Rabbit" Bundrick, brought the reflective thought that The Who fortunately said farewell before the seemingly inevitable creation of a mid-to-late eighties synthesizer heavy "masterpiece" that would have hung on The Who's neck like an albatross.

Townshend and Daltrey's The Endless Wire, the first Who album in more than two decades comes out next month. While it's definitely refreshing that a classic rock dinosaur is offering more than high-priced nostalgia, peppering the show with new material does remove the most dependable component of any Who concert: familiarity. Far from sub par, the best way to describe Townshend and Daltrey's new Who material is that, unlike the rest of the show, the audience hasn't had three to four decades to absorb them into their interior rock circuitry. Even without Entwhistle or Moon, The Endless Wire material retains its unmistakable Who sound: "Black Widow Eyes" and "Mike Post Theme" have Townshend's distinctive guitar and Daltrey's trademarked howl and the mini-opera "Wire And Glass" recalls previous mini-suites like "A Quick One." Rather than soften the marketplace by playing unfamiliar tunes for an audience near guaranteed to buy the album anyway, a better idea would have been to tour after the album's release, building anticipation for their live performance of new material.

As opposed to their past tours, The Who aren't releasing the crowd onto the streets with a final Townshend guitar blitz. After completing "Listening To You," the backing band left the stage, Townshend retrieved an acoustic guitar, Daltrey picked up a coffee mug and the two closed the show with a new song, the sedate yet charming "Tea And Theater." The new boss may still be the old boss: they just work a little differently these days.

Labels: Pete Townshend, Roger Daltrey, The Who

Owen Wilson seems to be taking delight in the hopefully tongue-in-cheek open letter that Steely Dan's Walter Becker and Donald Fagen recently penned to his brother Luke. In their missive, the aging rockers express their sorrow and disapproval of the usurpation of their "Cousin Dupree" character in You, Me and Dupree, claiming Wilson's a fool to do the dirty work of movie studio executives. Through his spokeswoman, Wilson responded accordingly:

"I have never heard the song 'Cousin Dupree' and I don't even know who this gentleman, Mr. Steely Dan, is. I hope this helps to clear things up and I can get back to concentrating on my new movie, 'Hey Nineteen.'"

In other "Internet hoax" news, Pete Townshend now claims that he fabricated a squabble with fellow surviving Who member Roger Daltrey in order to deflect attention from the fact that their recent Webcasts sold poorly. In his original statements, Townshend claimed that Daltrey and he aren't "social buddies like Bono and Edge" and that the two differed on their view of the income making potential of the Internet. Townshend even set up an e-mail address for Daltrey; encouraging fans to let the singer know of the wonders of the Internet. Veracity aside, Townshend's diaries make fascinating reading.

While Becker, Fagen and Townshend surely seem to having fun with their computers, such follies should remind us all why we never encourage our parents and grandparents to explore all the possibilities the Internet has to offer.

Labels: Pete Townshend, Roger Daltrey, The Who

By: David Schultz

Pete Townshend's rock opera Tommy has been a multi-platinum selling album, a 1975 star-studded Ken Russell movie, a magnificent concert set piece and a Tony winning Broadway musical. The existence of so many different variations begs one question: what more can be done with The Who's saga about a deaf, dumb and blind kid that sure plays a mean pinball. Surprisingly, there's an answer: release The Who's guest star laden 1989 concert performance from Los Angeles' Universal Ampitheatre and add modern-day commentary from Pete Townshend and Roger Daltrey.

Not that either has aged badly, but the DVD is notable for how young everyone looks; Roger Daltrey has a full set of hair and Pete Townshend, well, he has hair. Musically, there's nothing to quibble with; by the late eighties, the surviving members of The Who, Roger Daltrey, Pete Townshend and John Entwistle could do Tommy in their sleep. Nonetheless, the performance captured on the DVD, complete with a full horn section, captures an inspired performance. From Townshend's jawdropping acoustic guitar work in "Overture" that opens the show to the finale of "We're Not Gonna Take It," Tommy Live is a fine document of the late eighties version of The Who.

The Who's rock operas have always been good vehicle for guest appearances; their 1996 recreation of Quadrophenia featured well-placed cameos from Gary Glitter and Billy Idol. Like the film, The Who turn over a handful of Tommy's songs to the capable hands of others. Steve Winwood, with a dated eighties spiky buzzcut, handles the preacher's "Eyesight To The Blind," tearing through an all-too-brief guitar solo. Taking her cues from Tina Turner, Patti LaBelle delivers "Acid Queen" with an assertiveness that Townshend never intended for the character. Elton John reprises his role as the Pinball Wizard, sadly dressed more conservatively than in the movie. While Billy Idol became the sadistic Cousin Kevin by simply showing up in his normal clothes, Phil Collins, who in 1989 was making a serious foray into acting, went overboard in dressing for the part of the pederast Uncle Ernie.

The DVD extras are sparse: a set list; a photo reel and a commentary track. However, Townshend's contributions to the commentary track make the DVD worth the effort. Rather than reduce Daltrey and Townshend to disembodied voices prattling on over the concert, the DVD superimposes each one along the side of the screen. The occasional disconcerting images of Daltrey or Townshend sharing the screen with their younger selves does not diminish the strength of their annotations. While Daltrey offers some interesting insights, it's Townshend's thoughts that are the most illuminating. With years of hindsight, Townshend reflects on Tommy's place in rock history, the sociological circumstances that brought Tommy's themes about and the narrative devices he tried to employ. One of Townshend's most illuminating stories involves the relationship between the inspiration for "Sally Simpson" and a near-disastrous double bill that The Who played with The Doors. Tommy Live makes good use of modern DVD technology: if at any point you feel Townshend's getting to pompous, with one button you can turn him off and just listen to one of the greatest bands in rock history.

Labels: Pete Townshend, Roger Daltrey, The Who

In addressing rumors related to The Who's 2006 activities, Pete Townshend confirmed on his blog that not only will The Who tour in 2006 but they will also release an album of newly recorded material. In quashing rumors that the album and tour had been scrapped, Townshend announced The Who's June and July participation in unnamed "European Festivals" and an American tour to take place in the fall. The new album will be the first since 1982's It's Hard and the tour will be their first since 2004.

The announcement of the Festival performances marks The Who's first non-benefit, general admission performances since the 1979 tragedy in Cincinnati, Ohio, where eleven fans were trampled to death in the onrush to enter the arena. Out of respect, The Who have made an effort to avoid "festival" seating at their shows.

Labels: Pete Townshend, Roger Daltrey, The Who

Pete Townsend speaks directly to fans on his blog: "The Boy who heard Music" - and unlike many celebrity blogs, Pete's allows comments back from the fans. Of course, this site isn't dedicated to the Who's glory days. Rather, its a blogging of his novella.

This is a terrific marketing tool used in an expert manner. Kudos to Pete (and whoever advised him to use blogging in this fashion!).

Labels: Pete Townshend, Roger Daltrey, The Who