Great Moments in Vinyl plays The Who

September 27, 2019 • Martyrs’ • Chicago, IL

Featuring Alton Smith, Scott Tipping, Kevin Campbell, Jim Barclay, Alex Giger, and William Lindsey Cochran.

Sound mixed by Dan Glomski. Lighting by Stan Pszeniczka.

For years, The Who had been creating collections of songs that had a unifying theme. On The Who Sell Out, they positioned their music between radio jingles and fake commercials as though the recording represented a radio broadcast. On the musical suite, “A Quick One,” the individual songs were stitched together to tell a story of infidelity and forgiveness. By the time they reached their rock opera Tommy, the idea of a unifying concept found the songs playing out a dramatic arc over four album sides. The response to Tommy was so huge that their chief songwriter, Pete Townshend, wanted to up the ante with something even more grand: another rock opera accompanied by a film and the means for audience members to interact with the music live. The project was called Lifehouse, and it was truly ambitious. Townshend pushed himself hard, and the rest of The Who followed suit in a handful of concerts to test drive the material. But fans were indifferent to the music. And when the project finally collapsed, Townshed later admitted it put him on the verge of a nervous breakdown.

The failure of Lifehouse turned out to be a blessing in disguise. It forced The Who to take their new songs and focus their creativity on creating just a single record. The results were the astounding album Who’s Next. It was only the fifth studio album the group had made, but it went on to become one of the most highly regarded and best loved albums in rock.