The Who Album-By-Album (& Single-By-Single) Thread

Oh no! I need to edit myself better. Although it was assumed by many Who-fans (myself included) that it is Keith, it is indeed Roger singing lead on "Armenia", joined by Keene in the chorus. This was confirmed by Roger himself in 2004. Sorry that mistake slipped into the write-up.

 

Killer Artwork-Killer Album-Monster smash hit single

 

DV writ:

"Still shaking from anxiety following his harrowing STP trip on the plane home from the Hermit's tour, Pete was introduced to the teachings of the Indian Avatar Meher Baba by his friend Mike McInnerney, and immediately immersed himself in Baba's teachings, having read the book The God Man. Pete was in a vulnerable and soul searching state, and it was a case of "When the student is ready the teacher appears" that according to Pete "completely and utterly changed my whole life, and through me, the group as a whole"."


So we can thank the Hermits and STP for setting Pete on His path as The Seeker? And thus helping so many of us through those lost teen years...

wow...




cheers,

 

As a second Generation Who fan, my introduction to Sell Out came when I bought the 1974 MCA reissue with A Quick One.

 

The beginning of a stellar run of WHO albums. An odd tune, but I have always felt Odorono was one of the coolest tracks on the album.

 

Each day there will be a new "Who" picture.

Today's picture:

 

WOW, they look like a bunch of kids...thanks for the pic.

 

I just love this album. After Who's Next this is absolutely my favourite Who album. For me "I Can See For Miles" is the ultimate Who record. Just stunning.

 

I JUST picked up the deluxe edition (I'm slow). After Quadrophenia and Who's Next, this is my favorite Who recording. Doesn't get enough respect from the "critics" .

 

I'm not sure that's been true for a long time now.

UK opinion was always strong for it.

The US, not so much originally. But I think that's undergone a serious revision since the late 70's as well...

 

True that.

Originally, the concept of "pirate radio" was very foreign in the US. We saw nothing special about playing hit records on the radio, and advertisers sponsering them. The uniqueness of UK pirate radio was... our regular radio.

It took decades for us "stateside" to just listen to the songs as opposed to wondering what was special about Heinz Baked Beans. Truthfully, I never knew anything more of Heinz than ketchup (one of the two most popular brands of that condiment in the US for you UK folks) until I first visited the UK about 8 years ago. Beans and toast are not a US staple anywhere in this country...

 

Well whenever you see one of those "greatest albums of all times" lists you never see "Sell Out" anywhere. I've seen "Who's Next" and "Live at Leeds" on them. Sell Out should make a top 500 album list, but fails to do so.

 

The Who Sell Out! is definitely my favourite album of theirs. I think what makes it stand out to me besides the songwriting is the humor. There are plenty of great albums with depressing songs or pathos or whatever, but this is one of the few that isn't only funny, but stays funny after many listens. Bits like Heinz Baked Beans or the 'Charles Atlas' ending of I Can See For Miles (With...DYNAMIC TENSION! will turn you into a BEAST of a man....)are quality comedy. Its something I miss when listening to later Who albums, which as good as they can be, lose out on the jokes and diversity. (Its cool having songs like I Can See For Miles and I Can't Reach You so close together and having it work.)

 

I just wanted to give a bit of love to "Sunrise," a really beautiful ballad tucked away on Side Two that, in my opinion, the record could easily have ended with, since the best parts of Rael would end up again on Tommy.

Thankfully Keith Moon didn't prevail, and it was kept on the album. Some of Pete's prettiest singing and very nice lyrics about being absolutely taken with a girl. Funny how after this album, he didn't really write any love songs for a while. Even Song Is Over and, to a lesser extent, Getting In Tune have some more "thematic"/bombastic/conceptual elements. I always enjoy Pete's early "relationship" tunes, as he put the experience of being a "teenager in love" into words really well—the feeling of inarticulacy, the problem of having to put up a front, the dilemma of wanting but not being wanted or vice versa, etc etc…

 

Our Love Was/Is... say no more

 

Such a fantastic record. I didn't pick up on it originally, but in 1973 the People's Drug Store in Alexandria near my apartment had a small budget rack of cut-out lps, and I grabbed a sealed copy for 99 cents. It had a chopped off corner, and I believe it was a stereo copy. Took it home and spent hours enjoying this early Who album I was unfamiliar with. A great album to get stoned to, that's for sure. To this day one of my "top 4" Who albums.
Wish I'd have picked up every copy they had for 99 cents and stashed them! Nobody, at least anyone I knew, even thought of things like that back then. Living in the moment only in those days, and that's a good thing, imho. I don't even know what happened to my original copy...

 

My favorite version of "Mary Anne" is not on the original release. I might be in the minority, but I prefer this one. Hit sticks and all!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UbWh6WltGRk&feature=related

 

"Tattoo" for me ,was one of those songs that drew you in and made you listen to the lyrics. Featuring the patented late '60's Who high vocal harmonies. An era of "artsy" indulgence that will for all eternity be frozen in time. The Who would expand upon this for the follow-up album in a way no one could predict . But the 60's boyish "innocence" ended here!

 

"Th Who" picture of the day:

 

Yeah, that's the one where Roger looks to have 3 arms! Of course on further inspection you see it's Pete. Though sometimes listening to Keith, it actually sounds like he had 3 arms!

 

"The Who" picture of the day:

 

How's the sound on the Deluxe Edition? Does it sound significantly better than the 1995 remix? The bonus material doesn't look that interesting and I'm perfectly happy with the 1995 stereo mix, so having the album in mono is not really a priority either.

 

The mono mix has enough differences to make it a priority. The DE restores the original running order, the 95 remix added a demo to the track listing, and messed up some of the cross fades.

I imagine you can find a copy of the DE cheap, spend the $10

 

I found it off a private seller on Amazon for $11 including shipping I'm thinking this is a must have!!

 

That is a great point! Pirate Radio was a fascinating phenomenon to me when I grew up in Norway. Although we've had local radio stations with commercials since 1925, we didn't get our first national commercial radio station until 1993! We were also the last country in Europe to have more than one national radio channel. That happened in 1982. When I was a kid, my favourite record was a K-Tel record called Pirate Radio, which was two programs from 1966/67 from Radio London and Radio Caroline. Loads of great music, and the commercials were indeed fun back then. It was magic to me!

Ain't that the truth? To me it's their best collection of songs, and certainly the most fun album they ever made. But much more than just being plain humourous. It's an incredibly uplifting album. Literally. It has gotten me out of bed to face life more times than any other album I can think of. It works on so many levels.

"Sunrise" is perfect! I think Pete would have liked the term "relationship tunes". He answered a Q&A for fans earlier this year, when this question came up:

---

I think you once said you've never written a "proper love song". This may be true (though fans may disagree), but I wonder if you could elaborate. What do you mean by "proper"? Defined by the listener, a critic, the rules of songwriting? Or defined by you, in terms of the song's origin?

PT: A love song is usually dedicated to another human being. I don't think I’ve ever done that.

---

I remember he once said about the word "love" that he tried to use it with caution in lyrics, because he felt it had been so mis-used that "there is nothing I can do to put that word back into its right place".

Many of the relationship tunes on The Who Sell Out were written on airplanes, which is a thing I often think of when I hear them. "... I write a lot of songs on airplanes," Pete said in 1968, "but they sound just like songs written in airplanes! Let me see: Our Love Was - "our love was flying, our life was soaring" and I Can't Reach You; "I'm a billion ages past you and a billion years behind you." It’s all spacy, cloudy, you know; sun glinting on the wings, big massive jet engines silently soaring through the quiet skies, you know all this stuff is great for lyrics."