Who Are We (statement, not question)

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The original title here was “Who am I” meant as an assertive to the question of maybe my second favorite Who album and completely missing the overlap with the title of the new book by Pete Townsend. So I changed it up just to keep my titles original. Sort of.

I’ll be wearing this t-shirt out soon.

What an unexpected thrill to catch The Who last night in Toronto on their Quadrophenia tour. Sure Giulia and I had nose bleed seats, but the point was to be there and hear the sound, which was fantastic even up in section 305 of the Air Canada Center.

cc licensed ( BY ) flickr photo shared by cogdogblog

I was rather late of coming to Who fandom, maybe 1979 when I was in high school, and it was my introduction to the film and album The Kids are Alright that lit me up- sad irony that it was during the sound editing of the film that Keith Moon went over to the other side.

That phrase “the Kids are Alright” came as sort of a rallying cry for my group of other misfits who became my high school survival support group.

My last (and actually first too) Who concert was with some of the same crew for the Philadelphia show at JFK stadium in 1982. Not really necessary, but this included a crazy weekend of me driving from Newark Delaware (where I was an undergrad), to pick up my friend Kevin at Virginia Tech in Blacksburg, up to Philly to see the show Saturday, and a reversal Sunday. I guess I did some illogical driving stints way back then too.

Somewhere at home are a few grainy photos from the concert, and I can barely recall it for reasons I am not going to blog about. Apparently The Clash and Santana also played, I cannot find any data left in my memory cells.

It’s been a lot of years and miles since then, for me, for the band, for everyone else.

Besides being there for the show, it was a treat to hear the entire performance of Quadrophenia, the story of which can still use unpacking, but plays out a fictional young Mod named Jimmy who is trying to grapple with his own 4 part personality split, each of which supposedly maps to the original band members.

The sound last night was solid and full, benefitting from additions from the original foursome of keyboards, horns, a second guitar player (Pete Townsend’s brother Simon). Zac Starkey brings a lot of energy to drums, with the intensity and Keith Moon, but still his own flavor. Roger Daltrey’s voice was powerful and strong for as long as he has been singing and twirling the mic. And Pete himself, still windmilling and chopping the strings with the heel of his hand, plays as good as ever, even if he was maybe wearing bifocals 😉

There wer touching moments when the band played along to the recording of Keith Moon’s Bell Boy, and the John Entwistle epic jam recorded that the band played with on 5:15 (that might have been my favorite song all night, one they ran with beyond the original song)

I’m not really aiming for a concert review, I just enjoyed it so much. Giulia managed to stream the bulk of it to #ds106 radio, so hope you got a taste of the sounds we enjoyed.

A little taste of one of my favorite songs, I’m One, a song that always spoke to me:

So this is just say, after all these years, the music still matters (at least to me). I find meaning still in the old stuff. Going to the concert meant so much for the memories, old and new, and for being able to enjoy music with others

cc licensed ( BY NC SD ) flickr photo shared by giulia.forsythe