Book-Pete Townshend-Who I Am-Harper-October 8, 2012

He also referenced somewhere in the past that he wrote this for Bette Midler. Could it be that the song is written from a female perspective?

 

That's in the Scoop liner notes. Bette's manager commissioned Pete to write her a couple of songs and that the lyrics should be "a bit dirty", so Pete gave him And I Moved and You're So Clever. According to Pete, Bette's manager rejected them cause he thought they were "smutty but not dirty."

 

Yeah, and that's a good thing too, imo, . Nothing against Bette, . I wouldn't want to anger Kramer, . Did not know about You're So Clever being sent out to (her) another recording artist. That is one of my favorite PT demos of that era. Might have been a good Who number for Face Dances too. Prefer it over Did You Steal My Money.

 

Yes, I've read/heard the same. Along those lines too with re: to perspective, isn't there the comment of the I know what's it's like to be a woman remark PT made that caused a small uproar among fans too. It was funny reading some of the quotes in the new Times profile. It is Daltrey who has been on record as saying Pete gets his head so far up his **** he...and so it was funny to hear Pete repeat that about himself. I can see how that could be true in certain respects. Perhaps this is one reason why it's been more difficult for him to either write and/or record as many new pieces as he used to and really get new material out into the public eye? One of the reasons he's fascinating, to me, to listen to in interviews and to read what he writes, comes down to as already said upthread, the mass of contradictions and seemingly uncensored personal confessions he offers.

 

From the Rolling Stone excerpt, the book looks great.

 

So this is why CBS Sunday Morning is doing a profile next week. Okay.

 

I picked this up yesterday & I'm already about 1/3 of the way through it. Pete is a great writer & he's certainly given me an even greater appreciation for his work. The book is very anecdote driven and very personal. It puts the whole Who story/myth in a fresh context. Hopefully now that the book is finished Pete can get back to putting out some more new music.

 

Have read a few pages so far. Very well written and engaging.

 

haven't read the book
curious if he does the revisionist writing


keith genius to keith lost cause

Today Show had him on monday

what a pathetic missed opportunity
too short, all they talked about was abuse as a child, the pornography scam and how he started smashing guitars

quick delete on the dvr

 

I got the audiobook version, it's like sitting at a pub with Pete while he relates his life story, pretty casual but I did hear a few stories that I hadn't before. There's a great story about meeting Rahsaan Roland Kirk in 1969. He doesn't seem very bitter while reading from his book, in fact he laughs frequently.

 

That's the kind of stuff I'm interested in hearing. Always enjoyed him talking about fellow musicians and the musical climate in general. They certainly played their share of eclectic bills in 1969.

 

Quite a month with two of my favourite musicians issuing biographies - Neil and now Pete.

Two very different books. Neil's book ambles around, almost too much, in a non-linear conversational way. Flashes of brilliance (e.g. the last chapter) mixed with questionable emphasis choices (Pono,trains)

I'm about 1/3 through Pete's book, which proceeds chronologically from childhood. I'm enjoying the stuff on his early influences and how the early Who got together. If you're at all a Who fan it's worth picking up

 

So far, it is a good read. Just made it up to the chapter about The Detours. The real interesting stuff is right around the corner.

With these autobiographies, one always has to be concerned about revisionist story telling. On some level it is impossible to avoid - it is only human nature to look back into the past with a different perspective on certain things.

 

As far as revisionism goes, that's never an issue for me. I primarly read music related books to learn more about myself and my relation to an artist and their influences. I guess I really don't care how truthful it might be because I'd never know the difference anyway. People who were there though certainly have the right to expect a fair and as honest treatment as possible.

 

I had a look through the book today, reading sections about albums or incidents I was interested in. It seemed a bit disappointing to me.... with almost everything I read about I was thinking "I thought Pete would have a lot more to say about this." I guess I was expecting a much bigger book -- Pete is nothing if not verbose. I mean, it is 500 pages but the print is pretty large. Maybe the manuscript was really chopped down by his editors. As with Keith Richards' book, there are a lot of decades to cover so I suppose there was only so much space for any one thing.

He might write more passionately and in more depth about the early part of his career; for some reason I am often drawn to the less well-traveled parts of artists' lives when I read books like this so I was looking at what he had to say about the later days of the Who. Maybe he felt nobody would care about this. But it was surprising to me to find him only spending a paragraph or two talking about recording an album like Empty Glass.

(I spotted a couple of bits where he says "You can read more about this on my website"!)

 

It was originally a 1,000 page manuscript that he turned in. Due to legal reasons, the book got cut down by half.

 

I agree it does seem truncated... I'd love to read the full thing.

 

Whoa, did they ever say what legal reasons, specifically?

 

Pete was on Jon Stewart last night.

I thought it was an interesting talk.

I specifically had to laugh about Pete's thoughts on his blogging days ("way back before everyone had computers.." - his words - not mine)

He said he enjoyed it for a while and would get a rush when he saw that he had "10,000 hits" on his blog - but then he eventually realized it was the "same 30 guys who kept coming back to check if (he) had anything new to say."

That's probably correct - LOL

And I was probably one of those who was forcing his hit count to skyrocket - LOL

Blogging was a great medium for him. I'm not sure reading a book will be as fun... I remember a long tale about he decided early on to focus on MALE fans - because he realized female fans were very fickle - and you couldn't build a career past a brief 12-18 month rise and fall cycle...

He said he realized this watching some teenage heart throb singer whose career ended fairly quickly in his formative years... and then compared this with the guys who can still name every player on their favorite sports team - thirty years after the fact - even when the sports club finishes in last place every year. He realized pretty quickly he needed to find THOSE kind of people if he wanted to make a career out of it.

I thought his comments on Stewart last night about using the internet to discover tons of wonderful talented musicians today was very interesting.
He then laughed and said depracting about how there really were only 5 groups in his day - LOL I think he named The Who, The Stones, The Beatles, The Kinks and one other that escapes me

 

I'm sure some stuff was taken out for legal reason, but my guess is that a lot was taken out to keep the book to a certain length that would hold the average person's interest and wouldn't have to be broken up into two volumes.

 

My dad read Keith Richards' book and enjoyed it... he probably wouldn't have enjoyed it so much if he had had to read an in-depth exploration of the making of "Steel Wheels," or even "Sticky Fingers." I get that.

Still, Pete's thoughts on his own music are pretty interesting. I was impressed by the depth and detail of the writing he did on the Quadrophenia reissue -- a far cry from the Beatles' "What album was that on again?" vagueness. So I might have wanted a bit more of that from his book.

 

Yeah, I never heard anything about legal issues relating to the book.

 

Up to page 90 and really enjoying it.