lets talk about the Who!

Hey...the Who! What a cool band! A band which I find helped in some way to the process of early prog. Hows that?, you might ask yourself. The Who??? Prog? Am I going mad? Do I need new glaces??? The Who and prog...is it time to cut my vines??? Well, no you dont need to!!! Because Im going to tell you why, the Who (although not prog) helped creating this music. Are you ready?

First of all the Who were the first rock band to create a long suite!!! Yes thats right! It was 1966 and the Who finished a 9 minutes long song called A Quick One...hahaha you didnt knoe that, now did you? Then there is the fact that the Who begun ( after Sgt Pepprs...of course) the thing of concept-albums, you know I am talking about Tommy! Great album, right?...But I think we dont have to thank the Who for this, but Pete Townsend, the brain of this band. He had the idea of making an whole album with one idea/concept for quiet some time!!!

Well...what do you think?

And by saying this I dont mean to include the Who in the site!!!!!

Cygnus X-2 wrote: Ahem... <==== Resident Who expert posting. And Tommy wasn't the first Rock Opera, Pete Townshend openly admits the S.F. Sorrow was the first Rock Opera.

AAAA but I never said that Tommy has the first, I just said that they were one of the very first to started the concept-album idea!!!!!...hehehe, no you are right...didnt know that...

I love The Who. I have a vinyl copy of Quadrophenia waiting for me to pick it up at my local record store.

I would go so far as to say that Tommy wasn't even The Who's first concept album. That title would have to go to the highly underrated Sell Out, which was designed like a radio broadcast (complete with commercials).

kingofbizzare wrote: That title would have to go to the highly underrated Sell Out, which was designed like a radio broadcast (complete with commercials).

I wouldn't go with The Who Sell Out as their first concept. Townshend in remastering the album,  included a lot of outtakes  which seem to me remove any consistency for a concept - so I would suggest he didn't see the album as a concept. Further, this album represents the Who's management (Mr Kit Lambert) further exploiting a contract they had with the English pirate radio station Radio London (the BIG L), to write the advertising jingles and some station IDs (little known fact Townshend/Moon were responsible for the music of a long term British ad favourite for Heinz Baked Beans  - hence Daltry's cover pose!), by putting said ads etc. onto a record. Coincidently I Can See For Miles was only a no.1 in the Radio London  chart , (it was certainly played very heavily by the station) and at best No 2 was the highest position elsewhere in the UK charts. At the time Townshend claimed this single was the last chance they gave the British record buyers to give the Who a number one single hit - and as a result the Who decamped to played North America in preferences and amassed their significant fame over there in the next 2 years: what was America gain was the UK's loss.

As written elsewhere, A Quick One (Whilst he's Away), is a makeshift solution to Townhend having  few standard length songs ready for an LP. Lambert discovered PT had 5 or 6 songs only part started and suggested that these should bunged together to make a single tune to end fill the album (hence its disjoinedness). As an afterthought it was called a mini-opera.