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The Who may be to the British Invasion and the classic rock canon what Star Wars is to cinema: endlessly influential, but so much so that the art itself often gets obscured by that outsized reputation.
To compare apples to apples temporally, The Beatles get a lot of credit (mostly rightfully) for changing the face of rock and pop music during their heyday, but, somehow, I don’t think the Who get enough of the same shine. In addition to amassing a huge following on the strength of their live shows, they’ve been credited with originating the rock opera, power chords, instrument-smashing as a rite of passage, and windmill strumming theatrics.
And they did it all with one of music’s most volatile creative nuclei. You’d think that Pete Townshend’s angst-riddled songwriting and massive architectural ambitions would be in direct conflict with Roger Daltrey’s bruising brand of singing. Bassist John Entwistle was the epitome of melodic precision and control on the bass, while Keith Moon was anything but restrained on drums. One of my big takeaways as I went through their studio discography was that, on paper, nothing about those combinations should work, but on record, they’re frequently dazzling together.
I won’t spend a ton more time waxing poetic about the Who’s history or accomplishments. Instead, I’ll leave that to pros like Ian Paul Sharp, who literally wrote a damn book about one of their most popular projects. The last detail I’ll mention is that I have clear memories of doing the air-drum cymbal work along to the chorus in “Who Are You” every time the CSI opening credits flashed across the screen back in the day. That, and laughing my head off every time one of Caruso’s one-liners was punctuated by Daltrey’s screech from “Won’t Get Fooled Again.”
If you’re new here, the rules for my discography rankings are simple. I rank every official studio album from worst to best (reminder: “worst” doesn’t mean “horrible”), in ascending order of quality. No greatest hits, live albums, or bootlegs need apply, unless they’re absolutely indispensable to the artist’s career narrative (e.g., I would never discuss Peter Frampton’s discography without delving into Frampton Comes Alive).
Specific to the Who, Odds and Sods is a borderline case. As its namesake suggests, it’s a collection of studio outtakes that Entwistle put together and released to combat the rampant unofficial tapes people were selling of their concerts. I went back and forth on whether or not to include it and, because I’m a completist at heart, I’ve included it in my rankings, despite it being a quasi-compilation thrown together to have something to put out there.
That’s it. Enough babbling. Let’s get into it.
We begin:
13. A Quick One (1966)
Let’s make this a quick one for 1966’s A Quick One.
This record is, in a word, uneven. That’s not a symptom unique to this Who album, but it’s the moment in their discography where it was the greatest distraction. Like many of their British Invasion brethren, this was a sophomore record that was somewhat rushed to market to capitalize as much on the group’s burgeoning popularity on the back of singles like “I Can’t Explain” and “My Generation.” But, crucially, most of the pop and R&B sensibilities that made those and other early Who tracks accessible are scrubbed out of the arrangements here.
That difference is due in part to the new deal their then-manager Chris Stamp had signed with New Action Publishing. As part of the agreement, each band member received a £500 advance provided they wrote two songs for the new record. That incentive led the band to rely the least on Townshend songwriting as they would at any point in their history, with the guitarist’s popular singles “Happy Jack” and “I’m a Boy” excluded from the tracklist as a result. The songs that did make it are psychedelic, bombastic, and, at 51 minutes, an endurance test.
The centerpiece, a nine-minute mini-opera “A Quick One, While He’s Away,” is the reason to listen. It’s the first tangible proof that Townshend was already looking to the future when it came to song structure, how multiple vignettes might blend into a stronger, more affecting suite of music. The rest of the album falls somewhere between forgettable and grating, including such shameless exercises in novelty as a cover of the Batman theme. Just, why?
12. Endless Wire (2006)
Endless Wire ended a 24-year break between studio releases for the Who, one that came on the heels of extreme tumult in the band’s history. Entwistle died of a heart attack the night before the first stop of a scheduled US tour in 2002, an event that didn’t stop Townshend and Daltrey from pressing forward with the rest of the dates. Controversial, to say the least. Then, in 2003, Townshend was arrested in conjunction with Operation Ore, a UK-wide crackdown on internet child porn. He later admitted to using his credit card to access images of child abuse, though he claimed it was part of research into the British banks’ connection with the trade. No criminal charges were laid against Townshend in the end, but he did have to register as a sex offender.
So, a lot of unsettling, potentially career-ending baggage. But according to interviews Townshend and Daltrey gave mid-decade, those struggles brought them closer together as creative partners, resulting in a year-and-a-half recording process to bring this 28-track monster to fruition. There’s a lot of legacy-affirming going on, both as subtext and, like on opening track “Fragments,” which lifts its main synth riff directly from a 35-year-old Who classic, text. For some fans, that will be enough. The few flashes of brilliance, like on “Mike Post Theme,” where the surviving duo turn back the clock with surprising ferocity, may also be enough to merit a recommendation. For me, it didn’t quite get there.
It’s due in part to a sequencing issue. There’s a lot of starting and stopping on this album, which undercuts a lot of the momentum and excitement they show they can build in two- or three-track sprints, but are unfortunately unable to sustain for much longer. The acoustic, more folk-leaning balladry sounds at odds with the heavier, livelier material on the tracklist, a dynamic that prevents everything from holding together as well as maybe it should. The second side, devoted entirely to a mini-rock opera, “Wire & Glass,” also doesn’t land with the urgency and potency of the band’s most respected work.
Does all this mean Endless Wire is bad? Not necessarily. Maybe “distracted” is a better word. For nearly an hour, the Who sound more interested in reminding you of what they were than in showing you what they still could be.
11. Who Are You (1978)
Out of all the rankings on this list, Who Are You slotting in this low pains me the most. Why? Because I adore the title track. The funky bass and synth work, the effects-drenched guitar crunch, the crisp-yet-manic maneuvering on the hi-hat and toms. Oh, and Daltrey’s full-throated performance on lead vocals. All exceptional, all coming together for one of the catchiest songs the Who’s original lineup ever made. It was also the last studio album completed before Moon’s death. He overdosed on a powerful sedative prescribed to combat his alcoholism only a few weeks after the LP’s release. He was 32.
It’s one of the most bittersweet “what if” moments in the classic rock canon. Had Moon been able to get and stay sober, continued to make records, continued to play as only he could, what would the 1980s have looked like and sounded like for the band? It’s difficult to say, but throughout this tracklist, you can sense the shift they were trying to make. The production style moved toward cleaner, more controlled lines, while still leaving room for their trademark brute-force energy. Theoretically, it makes sense, and plenty of bands went down that road in the post-disco era, but, on this record, it feels limiting, like insisting someone keep a powerful sports car in first gear.
Beyond the title track, the rest of Who Are You is mixed. “Had Enough” and “Trick of the Light” are the next-best offerings, though even those two tracks are sabotaged by this inexplicable thinness in the mixing, which takes a lot of their individual bite away. For a group that had been so obsessive, to that point anyway, on studio craft and prided itself on how well-calibrated those instrumental elements were, it’s a perplexing final result. Even the most recent 2022 digital remaster didn’t totally fix that issue. In a way, it’s a good example of what made the Who so frustrating at times. At their most awe-inspiring, you could make the case for them as the world’s greatest rock band. Sadly, the more they recorded, the harder it was to keep that switch turned on.
10. My Generation (1965)
Let’s put My Generation, the Who’s proper full-length debut, into perspective.
The underappreciated aspect of this album is that the Who hadn’t been the Who for very long prior to its release. Keith Moon auditioned for them in April 1964, when they were still calling themselves the High Numbers, replacing Doug Sandom as the band’s rhythmic anchor. In November, the group recorded “I Can’t Explain,” which, when it dropped a month later as a Decca single, popped off in the UK, peaking inside the Top 10. As that song was having its moment in the sun, the Who started work on this first LP, ripping through mostly R&B covers before shifting to original material in a second recording session in October 1965.
The end result, released in December 1965, is decent, occasionally brilliant, and, in a revelation that will probably not surprise you, an enormous mess. That’s not a condemnation, by the way, but an unavoidable symptom of a mercurial rock band trying and semi-succeeding at finding their identity. I don’t think you get the whole Who experience on this record, or at least not the one you’d associate with their best-known rock radio staples. The debt to Motown, late-50s and early-60s R&B, and even a little blues, as demonstrated by Daltrey’s abrasive cover of Muddy Waters’ “I’m a Man.” The Rolling Stones were “guilty” of the same cover-heavy mindset at around the same point in their trajectory, so let’s call it a residue of the era.
What’s worth the price of admission are the well-known singles, “The Kids Are Alright” and the raucous title track. The former is a fascinating early example of a more sophisticated, pop-leaning sound from the Who that they’d dip back into only when they really felt it necessary, which is a double-edged sword of sorts because Townshend is such a masterful pop craftsman. There’s a world in which they pump out increasingly pop-forward fare and reap the rewards of a legacy that might hue closer to the Beatles’ overall. That said, do we want to live in a world where unhinged proto-punk and quasi-metal gems like “My Generation” don’t exist? From Entwistle’s lights-out bass playing to the feedback-drenched chaos that builds towards the end of the song, I don’t think there’s a scenario where I’ll ever tire of it.
9. Odds & Sods (1974)
I mentioned it off the top, but Odds & Sods is a borderline inclusion on this list. It’s a collection of leftovers—studio outtakes and last-minute cuts from other albums—that are culled from a 10-year period that’s looked at now as the Who’s most creatively fertile. Entwistle was the brainchild behind its assembly, stepping in to take over the project while Townshend and Daltrey were off filming the Tommy movie (more on that later). It was also created when the underground economy of bootleg concert tapes was starting to take off, much to the group’s chagrin, who saw it as a legacy detractor as much as a financial one.
So, on the one hand, I can appreciate the attempt to control the narrative. Exactly what Odds & Sods adds to said narrative, I’m still not entirely sure. The oldest cut on here is “I’m the Face,” which dates back to their High Numbers days, and the tracklist features material conceived during Townshend’s aborted Lifehouse project, whose recording sessions helped shape a lot of what you hear on Who’s Next. Along the way, you get official versions of live staples “Pure and Easy” and “Long Live Rock,” as well as the hard-hitting “Naked Eye,” which is arguably more potent than most of the material that made the grade out of the studio in 1969-70. Elsewhere, “Glow Girl” is one of several inclusions that serve as interesting half-baked snapshots, as multiple elements would later be recycled across multiple moments on Tommy.
If you can track down the original liner notes for Odds & Sods, they are hilariously revealing. Townshend appraises each track’s quality with such blunt bemusement that you question whether he actually thought the compilation was a worthwhile project to begin with. I don’t think any of the songs he skewers are anywhere near as bad as he makes some of them out to be. The quality floor is far too high. At this point in their story, the Who were too well-oiled a machine to descend into legitimately schlocky material. The more divisive question is how far above that bar the quality ceiling lies. Your answer will largely depend, I think, on how much of a fan of theirs you are to begin with.
8. The Who by Numbers (1975)
The Who By Numbers is a weirdly upsetting listen, and I mean that as positively as I can while still using the word “upsetting” as the main descriptor.
That’s because, in a first for the mid-70s iteration of the Who, they finally let listeners in and gave them a sense of the men behind the music, warts and all. Full of tales of struggles with alcohol (”However Much I Booze”), fame (”How Many Friends”), and women (”Dreaming From the Waist”), it features songwriting, once again primarily from Townshend, that’s so stark in its honesty that it works as disquieting, extemporaneous diary scribbling and darkly comedic tales you’d tell your friends or colleagues as a way to mask the pain, however thin that veneer may be. You’d be hard-pressed to find a cautionary tale about the rock star lifestyle that’s got this many laugh-out-loud lines in it.
Interior honesty wasn’t exactly a gear the Who were known for, and, even if they mostly pull it off, that lack of familiarity has led to this record being criminally overlooked in the decades since its initial release. Something like “Blue Red and Grey,” which is as light and airy as Townshend’s back catalog gets, belies a man who, deep down, is anything but whimsical. You can hear it in his vocal delivery and playing. It’s a song about grappling with depression by putting up a front, and it hurts to listen to on that level. And yet, in one of the singer/songwriter’s greatest sleight of hand moments, he shrouds that feeling in a composition so beautiful that most people hardly notice. That’s the point, after all. Let the listener in but don’t actually say the quiet part out loud.
Your mileage may vary depending on how much you enjoy and can sit with that approach to making music. If you find such confessional storytelling awkward to the point of being alienating, The Who By Numbers may not be the best fit. However, if you’re willing to sit with it and peel back multiple layers of oblique meaning, you’ll get a lot more out of this one than you might think. If you give it a try, there are some genuine arena-sized rockers to whet your appetite, including “Success Story,” an Entwistle joint, and “In a Hand or a Face,” which features Daltrey’s best moment on the album.
7. Face Dances (1981)
The first studio album released by the Who following Keith Moon’s passing, Face Dances is more of a continuation of Pete Townshend’s 1980 solo record, Empty Glass, than Who’s Next. On that record, the band’s leader sounds like he’s coming to terms with all the existential conflicts in this life. That’s not the same as resolving them, but there’s enough ethereal shimmer added to tracks like “And I Moved” and the excellent “Let My Love Open the Door” to at least nod in the direction of some kind of spiritual awakening. His songwriting evolved to match, becoming more polished and astute and somehow calmer, as if extracting these thoughts and feelings from his mind and soul was no longer such a labor-intensive exercise.
I bring all of this up because a lot of the criticism Face Dances drew on its initial release didn’t necessarily take this shift into consideration. Compared to most of their output from the 1970s, this LP is moodier, more oblique in its meaning, and, dare I say it, approaching subtlety? The Who? Based on the lyrical content, I have a feeling that’s what Townshend was going for in the first place. Deep down, the surviving original members knew you couldn’t replace Keith Moon, and, in the Small Faces’ Kenney Jones, they clearly didn’t try to. He’s more than capable of holding down the rhythms asked of him on this tracklist. But he’s a veteran of the industry, another consummate professional in the room alongside the others. The trade-off is the sense of danger that emanated from previous Who records.
Is that such a crime? The opener, “You Better You Bet,” is the best song off Face Dances and one of the strongest post-Moon singles the band released. Deeper cuts like “How Can You Do It Alone” and “Cache Cache” benefit from Townshend’s increased introspection, an ode to his continued growth as one of the genre’s consummate craftsmen. And yet, once you’ve tasted those morsels of near-greatness, you get a sense that there was an even more powerful story simmering just beneath the surface of this record. On that level, the biggest disconnect is Daltrey, who struggles at times with the more nuanced material he’s given. He’s a frontman who’s always painted in such broad brushstrokes that he can come off as smug or leering when the writing nudges him in a wounded, self-deprecating direction.
6. WHO (2019)
In almost every meaningful sense, 2019’s WHO is a two-hander. No disrespect meant towards drummer Zak Starkey and bassist Pino Palladino, both well-known artists in their own right, but this is a Townshend and Daltrey record. Their chemistry is undeniable here, a must for a tracklist that looks back more than it looks forward, but it’s also the first time in decades where they sound like they’re having a good time in the studio together. Those factors, combined with a long break following Endless Wire, fueled an improbable commercial success for the veteran Brits. WHO peaked in the penultimate spot on the Billboard 200 in the US and No. 3 on its UK equivalent, proving that, more than a half-century after they formed the Who, music fans still cared about what they had to say.
The best material here is as direct and emotionally clear-eyed as anything in their entire studio discography. The writing is almost uniformly witty, blunt, and, crucially, without an ounce of self-pity to be found. A lot of reviews got around of some version of, “If this is the last album,” yada yada, but Townshend and Daltrey clearly aren’t here for the ceremonial pats on the back. They know their heyday is behind them, and, as on “All This Music Must Fade,” that whatever residual pop culture cache they have left is getting close to its expiry date. Elsewhere, “I Don’t Wanna Get Wise” turns the same sarcastically realist lens on the aging process, how it shapes one’s relationship with mortality, and how decades touring one of the loudest shows in rock may have accelerated that timeline. There’s no waffling or circumnavigating, which I appreciate.
When the record stays in that register, it works surprisingly well. Unfortunately, it doesn’t stay there for its entire running time. The back third of WHO loses some of its heft and focus, which makes the runtime feel a bit overextended. Not perfect by any stretch, but there’s enough compelling songs in this collection to merit the warm critical and fan reception it’s received. Sometimes, I wonder if it’s 100% genuine, or merely an overreaction by people protecting an artist’s legacy simply because the album wasn’t a complete disaster. See the latest couple of Rolling Stones LPs, Hackney Diamonds and Foreign Tongues, as more recent examples of this dynamic in action (or not). Either way, this one’s worth a listen.
5. It’s Hard (1982)
Here’s where I go (ahem) hard against the consensus opinion: It’s Hard is good, y’all. Arguably very, very good.
I went back and read a bunch of contemporary reviews using the good old Wayback Machine, and let me tell you, early-1980s music critics had it in for this album. Some called it plodding and uncertain, a thinly veiled contractual obligation, while others didn’t lament the effort, just the execution. They couldn’t hack it anymore. They weren’t the same band, and that was the Who that they missed so terribly and blah, blah, blah. I was stunned to read these diatribes. Had I listened to the same record? Had I missed the cataclysmic trainwreck that somehow whizzed by my ears, undetected? All I heard was a band finding their center again and, in some ways, learning how to play together again.
Off the top, Jones sounds far more at ease behind the drum kit than he did on Face Dances. No longer saddled with the one-note “he’s not Keith Moon” appraisal, you can hear the renewed confidence on the arena-worthy “Athena,” where he’s the driver of one of the most slept-on tracks in the group’s history. Daltrey also bounced back nicely from what was a subpar outing on the same preceding album. He sings with a weight and urgency that hadn’t been in his work consistently since Who’s Next. See “I’ve Known No War” and “Cry if You Want” as prime examples of this dynamic in action. As a whole, It’s Hard makes a fascinating double feature with Face Dances. It’s two years later, but what a difference in execution.
The single strongest point is “Eminence Front,” featuring an Entwistle bass line that can groove for ages. Seriously, I’ve literally played this song four or five times in a row and that low-end refrain never, ever gets old. The vocal harmonies on the chorus are a lot of fun, too, and have only been enhanced by the recent digital remasters now available on most streaming services. The crowdpleasing elements have (finally) been given the presence in the mix they always deserved. That leaves Townshend, who continued to claw his way back from the brink lyrically, though perhaps less bracingly direct than he had been a year or so prior. If you want to hear something even wilder, check out All the Best Cowboys Have Chinese Eyes from 1982.
Now that’s a divisive record.
4. Tommy (1969)
There’s no disputing that Tommy is a legitimate music landmark. The first rock opera of its kind to gain worldwide commercial and cultural traction, it features a sprawling, 75-minute narrative built around a central character who’s deaf, dumb, and blind. Against all odds, he becomes a spiritual leader and travels far and wide, spreading his gospel. The structure alone spawned countless imitators in the decades that followed, most of which paled in comparison, which only reinforces how difficult what Townshend pulled off as a storyteller really was. To name-drop one example, I don’t think Pink Floyd have quite as successful a run as they did with concept albums if Tommy doesn’t set such a clear, ambitious blueprint for the future of rock and roll.
The best stretch of Tommy runs from “Amazing Journey” and “Sparks” through “Cousin Kevin” and “The Acid Queen.” The pacing across the entire sequence, the way the narrative builds momentum before releasing it in small, controlled spurts, all while delivering one dazzling solo or melody after another—it’s hard to top. But, if I’m being completely honest, the Who can’t keep that kind of momentum up for the album’s entire running time. Few bands could, if we’re honest. It’s not that anything is egregiously bad. It’s more that the seams holding the production together show more than they should. Some songs, and sequences in the eponymous film adaptation from 1975, exist more for logistical reasons than anything else.
“Pinball Wizard” is a prime example. It’s a really fun pub rock stomper with a conceit so delightfully nonsensical that you can’t help but sing along to a chorus about a man with Tommy’s physical limitations somehow being an exceptional pinball player. The same sequence in the movie looks like a million bucks, complete with a 20-foot-tall Elton John and a crowd of extras struggling to wave their hands side to side in unison. It works better as a glam rock vehicle for him anyway, which says a lot about its place in the Tommy tracklist. Is the album more enjoyable with a song like this in tow? Sure, you could argue that. But does the narrative and overall effect of the record lose any of its power if you cut “Pinball Wizard” and a few other bits of flab? I’d wager no, though I’m sure longtime fans may disagree.
Where does that leave us? Well, if you’ve never listened to Tommy all the way through, you owe it to yourself to do it at least once in your life. It’s one of those records you’ll want to carve out time for and give it your undivided attention while it’s on. Put the phones and other second screens away, get some coffee or tea and snacks, make sure your media device is fully charged, and let the waves of psychedelia hit your ears like you would a tide rolling into a pristine beach. Immerse yourself as best you can. Ditto for the film, which is replete with eye-popping imagery and more than a few regrettable haircuts. It’s considered a cult classic for a reason.
3. The Who Sell Out (1967)
Let’s keep the hot-take energy going: The Who Sell Out is, for my money, a stronger concept album than Tommy.
It’s strange and out-there and, due to its episodic nature, treated as more of a novelty project than a compelling long-form release. Cherry-pick the best moments and skip the rest kind of deal. But I couldn’t disagree more. Built around fake radio ads, this album’s framing device holds up much better than you might think 50-plus years later. By melding each individual moment into a fluid, evocative listening experience, the pacing and texture are much more harmonious than in their later releases. Tonally, it’s full of snark and aggression, taking aim at the dead-eyed capitalism that underpins how most people of a certain age encountered pop and rock music. Were the baked beans ad reads shoehorned in between the records DJs played or vice versa? Your answer will say a lot about your relationship to the notion of “selling out.”
Even if you were to strip all that meta-commentary out of the tracklist, you’d still be left with an ace collection of songs, up there with the Who’s best melodic achievements. On one side of the intensity dial, you have “I Can’t Reach You” and “Sunrise,” important reminders that, even with an increasingly anarchic reputation, the British foursome could land material with the softest of touches. They, along with a few other moments on this LP, have more in common with the Monkees or the Beach Boys, two comparisons that may not come up that frequently in discussions about the Who, which I think is a shame. Their range is the most underrated part of their collective talent.
On the other side of that intensity dial lies “I Can See for Miles,” a jaw-droppingly unhinged, unrelenting rock song. It rightfully ranks among their finest singles, due in no small part to Moon’s performance on drums, which rivals anything else he put on tape while recording with the band when it comes to sheer force of will. It earned its critical reputation at the time as the “heaviest” song around, inspiring one Sir Paul McCartney to, sight unseen (or, in this case, unheard), write a Beatles classic that would top it. “Miles” famously underperformed on the UK singles chart compared to expectations but peaked inside the Top 10 on both the Billboard Hot 100 and its Cashbox counterpart. The US success was attributed to Moon’s stunt on The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour, where he set off an explosive during the taping.
How very rock and roll of him.
2. Who’s Next (1971)
The Who’s most beloved album, Who’s Next, rose out of the ashes of a much more immersive, ambitious project. The recording sessions were originally intended to lay the groundwork for Lifehouse, a multimedia extravaganza that, for 1971, was way ahead of its time. And if you think Tommy was trippy, just listen to Townshend describe the narrative concept:
“In Lifehouse, humanity would survive ecological disaster by living in pod-like suits, amused and distracted by sophisticated programming delivered to them by the government,” explained Townshend. “Because of its potential to awaken the dormant masses, rock music would be banned.”
The plot supposedly included a roadie named Bobby who, harnessing technology that sounds a lot like the algorithms that drive streaming services, devises sounds curated to each individual based on their astrological sign. Unsurprisingly, the concept didn’t sit well with the rest of the band. “It didn’t make any sense,” Daltrey recalled. “None of us could grasp it. But it did have some good ideas in it. The one I picked up on was that if we ever did find the meaning of life it would be a musical note. I thought that was a great idea.” A few starts and stops later, the band eventually made it into Olympic Studios in London to salvage what material they could from Townshend’s growing glut of material and package it as a more conventional Who album. It would go on to become one of their greatest triumphs.
If you’ve interfaced with the classic rock industrial complex at any point in the past 40-50 years, you know the bookends. “Baba O’Riley,” with that genuinely iconic arpeggiated synth opening, remains a transcendent portrait of generational disillusionment. “Won’t Get Fooled Again” is the science-fiction knockout punch, closing the record with a stunning eight-and-a-half-minute pressure build that only releases when Daltrey’s towering shriek (side note: If you want to feel exhausted after watching a YouTube video, peep Chad Smith of the Red Hot Chili Peppers bash through a cover of “Fooled”). Both serve as testaments to Townshend’s stature as a proficient tinkerer with cutting-edge technology and the group’s ability to pack an unforgettable wallop around those elements. The songs sound like controlled chaos but are also deceptively intricate in their detailed arrangements. The wilder the exteriors, the more deliberate the structural choices.
What gets underplayed is how strong the rest of Who’s Next is. “Bargain” and “Going Mobile” are two of the best pure rock songs in the band’s arsenal, with taut, focused playing and direct, utterly charismatic performances from Daltrey. “Love Ain’t For Keeping” has always been one of my favorite Who cuts, featuring some insanely catchy acoustic riffing from Townshend, and “Behind Blue Eyes” comes through with one of the most memorable gear shifts in the genre’s history. Every time I hear the latter’s switch-up moment, it never fails to give me goosebumps. The same could be said for the tracklist as a whole, especially as I get older and hone in on specific aspects of the album with each listen. From Moon’s polyrhythmic tornadoes to the power chords that hit you like a freight train, there isn’t a dull moment to be found here.
1. Quadrophenia (1973)
Quadrophenia takes the top spot in the Who’s discography because it represents the moment when they perfected the rock opera as both a rock delivery system and a sonic vehicle for utterly cinematic creative expression.
The boxes are ticked in favor of this being the band’s apex pretty much across the board. The writing from Townshend is more mature and cohesive, Entwistle and Moon are at the very top of their respective games, and it’s the best outing that Daltrey’s ever had on record with them. More than those individual aspects, the heft of the core narrative, centered around a young mod named Jimmy who’s unable to fit in no matter where he turns, earns every ounce of catharsis it builds to.
Here’s a snippet from my original album review of Quadrophenia, breaking down some of my favorite moments:
“Those familiar with the Who’s hard rock prowess will find plenty to love here, from [Moon’s] thundering intro on “The Real Me” to the prog-meets-honky-tonk “5:15” to the punk precursor “I’ve Had Enough.” But, as excellent as those records are, the jewel in Quadrophenia’s crown is the closing 20 minutes. Beginning with “Bell Boy,” protagonist Jimmy’s worldview shifts dramatically as he realizes how limiting the mod lifestyle can be. These revelations lead to “Doctor Jimmy,” one of the angriest songs the Who ever committed to tape, which sees the character descend into violent outbursts as he hits his emotional rock bottom. Then, when the proceedings feel like they’re getting too dark and unsettling, the clouds part, and the sun shines through on “Love Reign O’er Me,” [one] of the best redemption moments in the classic rock canon […]”
It’s worth mentioning that Quadrophenia was also turned into a feature film in 1979, with the biggest difference between it and the Tommy adaptation being that it’s not a musical. The band doesn’t appear on screen at all, either. Instead, it’s a gritty, quasi-neorealist drama with an unbridled firecracker energy. As a portrait of male teen angst, it gets a lot right, from the confused, misguided romantic impulses to the violent outbursts that always threaten to bubble up in the dark alleys of working-class neighborhoods. I dug into my collection and rewatched most of an old copy I had, and it was a lot more poignant than I remembered. It’s not a direct translation of the group’s masterpiece of a concept album, but more of a companion piece, putting vivid images to the gut-wrenching feelings of loneliness and alienation that have become the hallmark of Townshend’s persona as a songwriter.
Which album still hits you hardest? Drop it in the comments.
Thank you for the link and mentioning my Lifehouse book. Much appreciated, Matt.
More than that, though, what a great Who list. Accurate and engaging details for each album. I agree with much of what you say, especially about It’s Hard. The links with Townshend’s solo albums of the same period are worth noting.
The best Who album? Well, it’s tempting to sit on the fence and say it’s a draw between Who’s Next and Quadrophenia. Oh, I’m not allowed to fence sit? Okay, I’ll go for Who’s Next, purely because Townshend was pushing rock into properly ground-breaking areas with his use of synths and his song structures. But the performances and the songs on Quad are incredible, too.
A terrific piece. Thanks for writing it.
It's still Tommy for me. Maybe because I loved the musical too.