“Actually pretty good”: Pete Townshend on the 1980s bands who looked like prats
The 1970s was a fruitful decade for music, where genres from glam-rock and prog-rock all the way to disco and funk were given space to flourish. As such, it’s a hard period in history to assign one single band as spearheading soundtracks. Unlike the 1960s, which can easily be given to The Beatles, or the 1950s, which belonged to Elvis, the ‘70s was more competitive – for want of a better word. But if you were to make a case for any band, The Who would certainly have a strong one.
Keith Moon’s rolling drums sent forth Pete Townshend’s expansive guitar that beat a path for Roger Daltrey’s rousing vocals to run through. It was vast, vibrant and ultimately fitting for a decade brimming with experimental energy. Not to mention the fact they were a walking embodiment of hedonism and debauchery; ever since their emergence, their hell-for-leather live show attitude was only matched by their enthusiasm for smashing up hotel rooms.
When they emerged in the 1960s, they vocalised feelings of disenfranchisement among the youth with ‘My Generation’ before moving into the more expansive and experimental with their iconic 1971 hit, ‘Baba O’Reilly’. Ultimately, those two decades suited their sensibilities well. Their sound straddled the free-thinking of the 1960s while also harbouring the sort of power that could carry the loftier and more sweeping sounds.
After a prolific decade, the band reached somewhat of a turning point in 1978 after drummer Keith Moon died. In the following year, tragedy struck once again when 11 fans were sadly killed at their concert in the Riverfront Coliseum in Cincinnati during a crowd crush, rounding off an unbearably harsh two years for Daltrey, Townshend and John Entwistle.
Soon after, the band released two of their least favourite albums, Face Dances and It’s Har,d which Daltrey described as records “made by a band who were very unsure about whether or not they wanted to be making a record, and I think that’s a terrible doubt.”
While circumstance and tragedy expedited the deceleration of The Who’s relentless rock machine, the reality was they were one of many iconic 1970s bands staring down the barrel of change come the 1980s. While glam-rock had its moments, there was no accounting for the amount of hairspray that was soon to arrive, while the open-collar shirts were replaced with oversized prints. As such, a more futuristic and polished sound accompanied the change for a decade that was hellbent on defying against its predecessors.
While most bastions of the 1970s had little good to say about the changes, Townshend felt differently, despite his reservations about the aesthetics. During an interview on Jonesy’s Jukebox, he conclusively declared, “OK, he was wearing a plaid wrap, and he looked like a prat, but the band are pretty good. That’s true of quite a few of them, like Echo and The Bunnymen, and some of Spandau and Simple Minds, you know some of the bands from the ‘80s were great.”
