Ticket 2 Ride

Pete Townshend sounds angry. This Wembley show is really Pete’s show. Although Daltrey fronts the band onstage and admits he takes care of the business-side of their partnership, Townshend is the musical and spiritual leader of this band. Townshend says that Daltrey would prefer to die onstage, he sees retirement sometime in the near future, perhaps after an Elton John type world tour.

The Who with Orchestra Live at Wembley, the product of a pre-Covid performance, represents The Who where they are, or were in 2019. Both Daltrey and Townshend seem pleased with the Wembley show. After listening to it a few times, I agree.

First of all, the sound is awesome. Even if you don’t own a fancy stereo, it’s like you are seated at Wembley. The orchestra is a great touch to many of these Townshend songs. He writes with a very broad brush, so the orchestra finds the textures in the songs.

Townshend said it was Daltrey’s idea to play with the orchestra. “You can have synthesized strings, but it won’t do the same to your emotion as a proper violin or a proper cello would,” Daltrey told USAToday. There’s something about a real orchestra that makes your hair stand on end.”

“I have loved working with the orchestra. It is something that I resisted at first. I didn’t think it would be very good. … so I was really pleased it worked so well,” Townshend said in an interview with Rolling Stone.

Roger Daltrey was age 75 when this show was recorded, and his voice is not the instrument it used to be, but so what. Deeper and rougher, yes. Impassioned and measured, yes. I’m okay with the aged whiskey of his voice. He underwent surgery on his vocal chords a few months after this concert and has been back on stage, so his voice is good.

I don’t know if The Who with Orchestra Live at Wembley is their best later career live album, it might be. I don’t usually like stadium venues but the sound on the stage that day was fabulous for us,” Daltrey said. “I’ve always felt that an orchestra and his music would work because of the complexity of his music and the fact that he writes from an inner perspective.”

Besides Daltrey and Townshend, their band is pretty tight. Simon Townshend (Pete’s brother) handles the other guitar and backing vocals, Zack Starkey (Ringo’s son) has been the drummer for many years, Loren Gold on keyboards and backing vocals, Audrey Snyder on cello, John Button on bass, and Billy Nichols on backing vocals.

Townshend takes lead vocal on “Eminence Front”, a solo acoustic guitar and vocal performance of “Won’t Get Fooled Again,” “I’m the One” and “Drowned.”

The two new songs, “Hero Ground Zero” and “Ball and Chain” sound really good with the orchestra. Quadrophenia is the featured album with seven songs out of 20. They should exquisite with the orchestra and the second guitar. “The Real Me” and “Love Reign O’er Me” are killers. “Love Reign O’er Me” may be the most majestic song Pete Townshend has ever written. The grand, sweeping musical swells and Daltrey’s vocals, shouting to the heavens is a moment that rock music transcends the art form to near artistic perfection.

“Baba O’Riley,” “Behind Blue Eyes” and “Won’t Get Fooled Again” represent Who’s Next. It would be criminal not to perform these songs at any Who concert.

There are a few interesting choices. “Imagine a Man” is from The Who By Numbers (1975), not a single, but a deep cut. “Join Together” was a non-album single from 1972, not exactly a classic, but sometimes a concert selection. “Tea & Theatre” is part of the mini opera from Endless Wire (2006), released as a single, but hardly one of their best know or acclaimed songs.

“We’re coming to winding the whole thing up, I’m sure, but who knows?,” Daltrey told uDiscover Music. “All the time I can do these notes and sing these songs with the energy they demand, and Pete can play the way he does, and he’s still one of the most original guitar players out there, we’ll carry on doing it. Whether everyone wants to carry on hearing it, I don’t know.”

The Who have been busy in recent years, massive tours, autobiographies, art projects, solo work, an album of new material, several live albums, and fundraising for their charities. In addition, they have combed the vault of live films and recordings, no doubt to definitively put a stamp on The Who’s legacy in their lifetime.

Included in this late career surge was The Who Live in Hyde Park (June 26, 2015) was recorded and filmed. It is more of a career spanning “hits” concert, and heavy on Tommy tracks. No orchestra, just the band, including three keyboard players, so the sound is fuller and textured. It’s not a bad album, more of a greatest hits collection. The sound of Wembley is fuller and clearer in my opinion, but Hyde Park is more representative of The Who’s career as they celebrated 50 years. There is certainly room for both.

Predicting the future of legacy bands is challenging. The future can turn on a dime. I’m reminded of another legacy band: Time waits for no one.