One of the bands that invented the rock opera is bringing back its legendary spectacle to the Columbus stage next month.
British rockers The Who come to Columbus with The Who: Quadrophenia + More Feb. 17 at the Schottenstein Center.
Released in 1973, Quadrophenia was The Who’s second rock opera and its sixth album. The band’s Tommy (1969) was the first work widely publicized as a rock opera, and the term itself is sometimes credited as being coined by a friend of Pete Townshend, the band’s lead guitarist and songwriter.
But rock opera was just one of the innovations The Who brought to the rock ‘n’ roll scene, says Graeme Boone, a musicology professor at
The Ohio State University. Among Boone’s courses is one on the history of rock ‘n’ roll.
Other rock staples that the band brought to the scene – or at least popularized – include instrument smashing, power chords, “windmill” guitar strumming and the “Marshall stack” method of stacking amplifiers.
“The Who is one of those bands that is considered one of the greatest bands in rock history,” says Boone. “If you’re going to be called one of the greatest rock bands, you have to have that feeling of really powerful, strong music – great traditional music with really loud, powerful drumming, strong bass and loud guitar playing with power chords. The Who has all that stuff.”
Townshend and bassist John Entwistle were performing together as Dixieland jazz band The Confederates in 1962 when lead vocalist Roger Daltrey asked them to join The Detours, an R&B group. In 1964, drummer Keith Moon joined the band, which changed its name to The Who. The four spent a brief time as Mod group The High Numbers before changing their name back to The Who and going on to create rock history.
Quadrophenia, the focus of the band’s current tour, is “an album that is sort of an autobiography of the band,” Boone says. The title is a variation on the medical term “schizophrenia,” indicating that the central character, Jimmy, has multiple personalities – four, to be precise.
Each personality represents one of the original band members. The “tough guy” was Daltrey, the “romantic” was Entwistle, the “bloody lunatic” was Moon and the “beggar” and “hypocrite” was Townshend.
Only Daltrey and Townshend survive to present the 2012-2013 tour. Moon died in 1978, and Entwistle died one day before the start of the band’s 2002 U.S. tour.
“They came out with these rock operas which have complete story lines and complex characters and developments of plot,” Boone says.
“They used synthesizers and all kinds of extra sounds, but did not sacrifice that feeling of straight ahead rock ‘n’ roll. It’s high concept, as it were, but doesn’t abandon that (rock ‘n’ roll) feeling, and that has everything to do with the players in the band.”
Townshend’s strength as a songwriter has helped the band land 27 top 40 singles in the U.K. and the U.S. over the last 38 years, and he has always considered Quadrophenia, which includes hits such as The Real Me and Love Reign O’er Me, one of his greatest works.
Quadrophenia was released as a double album in October 1973 and reached No. 2 on the British and U.S. charts. In 1979, a film of the same name and plot was released, featuring three additional Townshend-penned songs. The story is set in Britain’s Mod scene in the early 1960s.
“(The whole album) flows naturally,” Townshend said in a recent interview. “I always feel proud of my achievement as the writer, that I put it all together and gave the band a third wind. … Roger and I now stand almost alone together, representing not only the original band, but also its Mod audience, and of course all our other early fans.”
Several performances of the rock opera have been produced over the years, including a version by jam band Phish in 1995. In 1996, The Who performed Quadrophenia in London’s Hyde Park. This show was the first to feature Ringo Starr’s son Zak Starkey on drums. Starkey is also performing with The Who during the Quadrophenia + More tour, along with Simon Townshend (younger brother of Pete) on guitar and backup vocals, Pino Palladino on bass, Loren Gold on keyboards and vocals, Chris Stainton on keyboards, and J. Greg Miller and Reggie Grisham on horns.
Quadrophenia + More wraps up with some other well-known hits from The Who. The band’s chart-toppers include My Generation and I Can’t Explain from the 1965 album My Generation; 1966 single I’m a Boy; Pinball Wizard from The Who’s first rock opera, Tommy; and Won’t Get Fooled Again and Baba O’Riley from 1971’s Who’s Next. The band was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1990.
“One of the great things about The Who is not just that they have that powerful feeling to their music,” Boone says. “It’s the idea of them being songwriters – lyricists and composers and writing songs. It’s not an easy thing to do, put out a lot of songs that people love.”
Lisa Aurand is a contributing editor. Feedback welcome at gbishop@cityscenemediagroup.com.
