Scott Baker Releases a Great New CD

                                                           

Scott Baker & The Universal Expressions

Northern Hospitality

…And Other Celestial Threads

Vol 1

Scott Baker is like a fine wine, just gets better in time. It seems that despite his prolific output he continues to build and perfect his craft. It helps that he has a kick-ass band with Eric Janetsky on guitar, Timmy Scott on drums and Matt Nyquist plays the bass guitar. There were several special guests that did some session work including Andy Reed, Eddie Garcia, Andy Rogers and the legendary B-3 player Dan ‘Swival’ Sliwinski. WHNN’s Blondie is the de-facto manager and spiritual guide for the band with Johnny B. peeking over her shoulder. Baker recorded it at his studio, Sour Mash Studio in Bay City. They mix and mastered the disc at Reed Recording in Bay City. They began the project in June 2012 and finished it up in February 2013. It was an eight month labor of love and its Baker’s best body of music so far.

The opener is an old time foot stompin’ blues entitled Radical Spiritual (Prepare Yourself). It’s an ancient field holler taken from the John Lee Hooker Playbook. It has the enlightened righteousness of Leadbelly singing the Bourgeoisie Blues.

Slow Morning is an ode to hearth and home, a hippie creed of peace, love and living off the land. It’s a mid-tempo rocker with prominent B-3 accents and splashes of tremolo guitar. The time signature shifts about and some sweet wah wah guitar drops into the mix. The echoed background vocals segue to a call and response hook and there is a tasty jam at the coda.  The lyrics are awash in warm sepia tones like an old photograph…

Morning coffee, rub my eyes

I’m wide awake

I’m gonna give back

A little of what I take

Tricked Out opens with a marching band drum roll. Baker matches the bass string riff in a layered attack. The guitar line is one octave above the bass – sweet harmonics. The lyrics are direct and simple

You’re a little tricked out

I’m a little flipped out

Baker’s solo on the bridge combines big fat notes with delicious harmonies. Several tempo changes chase the mood around the block and back again. The extended jam takes the listener on quite a ride with sweet tones of home and family and a bass line that evokes the purity of mother earth.

Magnificent has an Allman Brothers vive with a second guitar layering the riff a note higher than the lead, there’s an organ splash that fills out the sound. Baker rings the E-string and the music starts cookin’. The band’s harmonics are masterful. They don’t just fill space, they create an emotional landscape for the music to breathe. This is a song about deep end carnal desire – so hot and pure makes you stand up and pay attention.

Juke Joint Revival is a straight up 4/4 rocker. The bass guitar joins in with a Peter Gunn riff. This is a tribute to the old fashioned blues, boogie and barbecue with veiled references of getting’ you some…love that tasty sweet to the bone meat . Blues is the perfect vehicle for greasy sexual metaphors. There is a masterful interplay between Baker’s slide guitar and the piano riff and a pinch of harp. Gimme  some Johnny Bassett, Alberta Adams and John Lee Hooker any day - great tune – a throwback back to past musical migrations, better times; the worst of times. I loved the screams and applause at the end. It took me there.

Baker slows down the tempo on Frail as the music becomes a morality play. It has a thematic consistency about life and the mystery of death. The juxtaposition of Jesus and politicians with evangelists and salvation is compelling and thoughtful. Where will we go when our life ends…won’t know till you get there? Baker is near the zenith of his craft. He reveals his own doubts and fraility with just his voice and guitar. The rhythm section slides back-in, providing the soundscape for Baker’s extended solo.

Back Pockets is simply a great performance. It is an acoustic ballad that speaks to the pain of being one step down in love and in life. Baker’s vocal is assured yet conveys just a bit of vulnerability

Bemos is a heartfelt tribute to one of the greatest rock & roll hubs in mid-Michigan. Hail to Rob and Luann Ervin – the good guys. This is a mid-tempo rocker with a cool goodtime vibe. The background singers are exceptional they echo Baker’s lead vocal. He sings it with a smile in his voice. I love this song!

Only You opens with some sweet slide and just a bit of tremolo. Baker’s full bodied e-string excursions are reminiscent of Henry Vestine’s work with Canned Heat in the seventies – Bob “The Bear” Hite was still singing the leads. I saw them perform at the Brewery in East Lansing in 1973 and Vestine’s riffs were pure magic. Baker’s riffs recall Vestine’s craft on Let’s Work Together  - it’s a shining moment.

Bring the Sun has a Bad Company sound. The bass string lead guitar has a circular pattern and the bsnap of then wrist drum pattern is right in the pocket. The rhythm section is the unsung heroes on this disc. The bass and drums form a tight coalition like Entwhistle and Moon Won’t Get Fooled Again. They are so good they can make it tight and right at the same time they give enough space for Baker’s exploratory leads.

Northern Hospitality speaks to the laid back vibe of our brethren from the UP. It has a slowed down walkabout time signature that conveys the summer means fun pace of life beyond mid-Michigan. It’s like another world, quaint yet sophisticated. It’s a part of the annual migration and it pays for aspiring rock & rollers to learn the lay of the land. The song has a cool groove and sets the tone to imagine cherry pies, clear lake water, bonfires and fish fries. Leave your troubles behind, at least for a moment

You Got Nerve is an old time blues with harp, screaming guitar and a             12 bar -turnaround. Baker’s baritone lends itself nicely to this tongue-in-cheek woe is me blues for the masses. The lyric is hilarious yet filled with pain. Baker et al must have had a ball putting this one together. Baker’s playing at the coda is simply stunning. He’s having the time of his life.

You said you want a diamond

But I gave you love instead

But now you won’t let me

Pass out in my own bed

 Heart & Soul is colored by a simple acoustic pattern and washed by lovely earth tones through a synth backdrop. The vocalist is singing through a synth – almost like a vocoder. His voice is echoed, soft and conversational as if he is sitting at the kitchen table. This is a beautifully crafted song by Eric Janetsky, one of the most wistful ballads I’ve heard in ages. Sample the lyrics, simple yet elegant.

As long as I’m living

This is my song to you

When I am gone from here

My words will still be true

If life were so simple

We’d have a simple plan

Wait for tomorrow

start over again

Hope floats to the surface

Sinks back down again

Oceans are endless

But rivers curve and bend

Life is a story where

Every page is read

Life is a postcard

I know I’ll never send

 

The perfect ending!!

 

Denny McClain - I Told You I Wasn't Perfect

                                                           

I Told You I Wasn’t Perfect

By DENNY McLAIN

with Eli Zaret

 

If you look into the abyss

The abyss will look into you

-Frederich Nietzsche

I was 16 years old when Denny McLain took the country by storm by winning 31 games. He also won the MVP and Cy Young Award – a perfect trifecta. In a peculiar twist of fate, McLain released two albums for Capitol Records and made extra money performing the Hammond organ in a three day whirlwind romance with the Riviera Hotel. It seemed like an odd coupling at the time but according to McLain this was only the beginning of a long descent into a self-made hell.

McLain describes life in his family of origin of violence and invalidation. His father would beat him; his mother rarely stepped in. The ghosts in the nursery exerted an undue influence on McLain and set the seeds for his later anti-social behavior. His father was a severe alcoholic who ruled by the strap and threats of the omnipresent leather strap. It was a brutal existence that few children could live through unscathed. As a traumatized kid, McLain was never able to clear out the trauma and accurately assess safety and risk. This would lead to his ultimate downfall – poor decisions resulting in years of imprisonment, divorce and the ongoing disdain of his former colleagues on the Detroit Tigers.

McClain was a natural athlete who was initially courted Notre Dame but when the Major League scouts  from the Yankees, White Sox to the Phillies offered an impressive amount of money. It was enough to turn the head of a working class lad. In 1962 McLain accepted a 17, 000 bonus from the White Sox. He was on his way. At this point in his career McLain could only throw a fastball (and it would forever be his “go to” pitch. McLain threw a no hitter in his rookie debut. It was a sign of things to come. He was “The Natural.”

I found the early chapters of the book to be exhilarating. McLain learned to throw curves, sliders and change ups from the legendary Johnny Sain. He could throw over 90 miles per hour and could over power even the best hitters. He had the killer instinct. But in 1965, McLain hurt his arm and was sent to Henry Ford Hospital to start a series of treatments. This is when cortisone came in his life. It would salvage his career in the moment but the injury would ultimately lead to a shortened career (10 years). McLain mentions his feud with Mickey Lolich – no loved lost on either side of that coin. It was interesting to me that McLain was critical of Al Kaline and intimated that he was not well liked by his teammates; According to McLain the guys on the team resented Kaline for turning down a $100,000 salary. The media played him up to be a hero (I did too) but the players knew it cost them thousands of dollars as the financial threshold was kept artificially low. The door for increasing the players’ salaries was slammed shut – for the time being. A few years later collective bargaining would provide professional baseball players a legal right to negotiate for salary increases, free agency would follow establishing multi-million dollar athletes and an ongoing debate about the astronomical salaries enjoyed by modern athletes in all major sport. They are the modern descendants of ancient Rome  -  gladiators  giving the masses bread and circuses.

There are 398 pages in 37 chapters and at times McLain’s writing is a bit tedious. I was less involved in his dramatic decline and connection to organized crime. I wondered why he could be so callous and hurt so many people especially his family. His long suffering wife divorced McLain while he was in prison only to re-marry following his six years of confinement.  

McLain devoted the first chapter to the death of Kristin, his oldest daughter. It was a tragic accident caused by a drunk driver on M-59. There was a fire and she was trapped inside her car. It became a sentinel event in Denny McLain’s downward spiral into mob affiliations, prison terms and the controversial purchase of Peet Packing in Chapter 27. McLain insists to this day that he had no knowledge of his partner’s raid on the pension fund of the workers who toiled for Peet Packing. He may have been disingenuous about his role in accepting a 2.5 million bank loan during his brief tenure at Peet - only to later discover that it was the workers’ pension money. He savaged the retirement income of the long suffering Peet workers. To this day he’s universally despised in Chesaning Michigan

In the nineties (pre-Peet expose) McLain was the featured speaker at the AHHS Letterman’s banquet. I was excited to see him and he did not fail to impress. He was articulate and funny in a self-deprecating way. He seemed to give an honest account of his life including his connection to organized crime. He was entertaining and accepted questions from the audience. I left feeling as if I knew him a little bit better. The person behind the myth – but then again I’m a sucker for a good story. McLain is out of prison and yet, to this day, he’s still getting into trouble. On September 22^nd, 2011 McLain was arrested in Port Huron after officials discovered an outstanding warrant against him from St. Charles Parish, Louisiana. He now weighs over 300lbs and is barely recognizable as the young steed who took the baseball world by storm in 1968. He’s paid a heavy price in a type of self-immolation that haunts his every step. Today he can only make a living playing Denny McLain, signing baseballs, rookie cards and telling stories.

 

I recommend this book to anyone who is interested in sixties baseball and character studies. There’s a little bit of Denny McLain in all of us. It can be purchased at Barnes & Noble or Amazon.com

The Banana Convention on the Road with Some Points Inbetween

                                                           

TBC

*Some Points In between

 CD and DVD Media Collection

The Banana Convention has expanded their vision with this enormous multimedia project. The music is superb and the lyrical themes have a coming of age relevance that speaks of diverse themes such as adult love relationships political awareness, class warfare and life as a traveling musician. The band is hitting on all its cylinders. Shar Molina is stands front and center as the focal point of the band. She has emerged as uniquely soulful vocalist and has found her voice. She is emboldened by her road worn maturity and through her liberation she has gained a growing sense of identity. She is discovering who she is. Each one of the supporting musicians is critical in the scaffolding of Shar Molina’s growing craft. Sean Drysdale is a monster musician and is the conscious of the band. Monte Nothelfer is the visionary, the leader. Chris Howard has become the earthen warrior pounding out the beats as a message to his comrades – the great communicator.  The guitarist Jake Voisine just may be the heart of the band with his fluid lines are more than just notes. They are the color of BC’s musical landscape.

Some Points In Between and all of the live tracks were mixed and mastered at the   Reed Recording Company. 

Live audio engineers: Matt Harvey, Matt Hulcul and Monte Nothelfer. All the live tracks were recorded at the Bay City Mason’s Lodge except:

Head: Recorded in Austin; Entertainer: recorded in LA; Taking Back The Fun: recorded in Denver; Fine, Dammit: recorded in Dallas: Jessica Fletcher; recorded in Chicago

Website: http://www.FunTBC.com/SOMEPOINTS

The CD review follows…

So, strap on your seatbelt and secure the safety bar, you are about to enter BC’s  high speed chase for the holy grail through a filmed tour of shocking unspeakable musical statements that turn you upside down and rival the Aerosmith ride @ Disney. Let’s go…

Grand Illusion is neither soul nor rock though there are elements of both in this energetic workout. Drysdale’s bass line is solid and the rhythm guitar is funky while the tough drum pattern has just enough restraint to give the song some space. This has Indie all over it and its better than most everything you hear on Top Forty Radio. Its theme speaks volumes to any touring musician. Welcome to life on the stage

Head gets your attention right away – it forces you to listen to it and in the bridge you can dance your ass off. Jake Voisine’s fluid guitar strokes drive the rhythm section to dizzying heights of reptilian passion, rock hard and ready to go. Iggy Pop meets the Raspberries. Everyone needs a little Head (room).

There is a musical interlude that segues to The Entertainer.  It’s an unassuming, funky little rocker that gallops through the song at a frantic pace. It’s about the truth behind the lie - the dark side of being in a hardworking touring band. This is a tribute to all the musicians and bands who work their ass off for nickels and dimes and it’s just enough scratch to pay the bills – sometimes. But onstage the singer sings her song and makes you smile.  It’s alright…in the moment

 

Two Houses is built around an insistent minor chord pattern that evokes the backdrop for this breakup song. Molina’s vocals are mature and nuanced. She gets a lot of mileage from every syllable. She doesn’t just spit the lyrics out she embraces them like a sensitive and giving lover. Molina sings about loss and love from a worldly perspective. She stands outside of the pain and is triumphant as she sings about “a sad little thing that no one knows.”

Saddled (with no tears) is a mid-tempo rocker with a prominent in yer face John Bonham nuclear drum lesson. Howard drives the tempo with an ancient tribal beat that that signals an attack. Shar’s vocal presence is incredible from straight up and in your face or coy and tart with a few gymnastic vocal asides. The great irony of this song is that love is broken up and battered and yet the singer’s tears are dried up. There is nothing more to grieve. It is done.

The New Guy is Monte Nothelfer’s tour-de-force, a tongue-in-cheek brilliant song. It has a boy likes girl – girl ain’t having any scenario. You see… there’s a new guy in town and he’s hot - much hotter than Monte. I’ll let Monte fill you in:

The new guy is hotter than me – damn

He has perfect skin and a real cool tattoo

He’s been around, even to Madrid

Compared to him, I’m kind of a dick

-         courtesy of the wicked demented mind of Monte Nothelfer

LOVE IT!

Taking Back The Fun – recorded live in Colorado with Nothelfer trading off lead vocals with Shar Molina. Is a high energy rocker with a hard rockin’ backbeat and some sweet e-string leads by Jake Voisine. Somehow TBC is able to end the song with an almost defiant exclamation Super Freak

Call To Arms opens with Shar Molina doing a cool-ass rap with a message of universal love and diversity…a call out to human rights and involvement in the democratic process. She addresses us as Sisters and Brothers insists that we leave negativity at the door. It’s as political as it gets and it speaks to the entrenched class warfare in America. This needs to be said. It must be spoken

Go Fly a Kite has a heavy backbeat up front in the mix and pushes the band to catch up or die. Voisine is on fire doing heavy metal Chuck Berry riffs like he’s ringing a church bell. This is one of the best songs I’ve heard in recent years

Folded. The drummer creates an intricate jazzy percussive pattern. Molina’s voice emerges and comes to the forefront. Howard picks up the pace and the frantic breathless tempo rages forward at breakneck speed. Molina screams above the wall of sound, “Subtract and Multiply. We’ve folded.” This is one of the most pertinent political statements by any artist since CSN recorded Ohio seventeen days after the shootings at Kent State.

Fine, Dammit! is a high energy rocker that has some righteous Alanis Morrisette anger folded into the lyrics. “Send me a self-addressed letter and I might write you back someday”…hmm. The bluesy middle eight makes it all real – for a minute. But when Voisine goes ape shit on a Townshend-esque rapid speed strumming tutorial it becomes a free for all.  Everything ends well, it’s ok. How could it be otherwise.

Jessica Fletcher is a TBC oldie and it has practice what you preach message that isn’t quite delivered. It is more like a modern Sermon on the Mount that rails against deceit, cruelty and lies. But there are too many years of false promises –t just another set of tales from the crypt. It’s not just corruption in government and Wall Street; it’s about you and me and the small ways we betray each other. It is signaled by the lack of everyday courtesies - a simple hello or opening a door for someone. It’s No Country for Old Men.

The mood shifts and Molina begins Safe and Sound, a soulful journey through love’s depths. She sings “I’m there for you” despite the hidden pain, the ambivalence within all love relationships. She’s hip to the double-edged coin of love and hate in the lovers’ bed. It is a grave disappointment when you discover love’s perfect imperfection.

A perfect end to a disc filled with truth and no small measure of ambivalence about love, music and the state of the world. This is a credible leap to relevance  by a maturing band.

The DVD is an incredible document, flaws and all. The band members act as if the cameras are running. They don’t seem to require makeup for blemishes or towels to wipe off the sweat. They don’t pose or play rock star. They don’t do a rock star primp and strut. It was shot by three separate cameras that give it a documentary feel. In word and deed it is a documentary of one of Michigan’s most evolved bands.

The DVD disc opens with Shar Molina’s wordless double tracked vocals and a cascading soundscape of heavenly harmonies. It evokes a sense of transcendence that is painted in day-glow colors and reflected within a prism of other-worldly love…

If you want to see and hear the real truth about Some Points In Between you can buy the package for only $10 @ www.FunTBC.com website

 

Peace

Bo white

 

 

Neil Young - Waging Heavy Peace

                                                            

NEIL YOUNG

WAGING HEAVY PEACE

A Life In Review

It seems that the ever aging-out baby boomers have risen up from their  affair with modern country schlock to find some kind of meaning to their lost promise and dreary lives. We were confident that we would top our parents in some way. After all we were children in the Age of Aquarius…but somehow we lost our way.  It happened incrementally without us even noticing. We have class reunions that few bother to attend - so & so’s mother passed away and our entire class mourns but doesn’t even remember the classmate let alone the parent. We have 401 K’s instead of pensions. We worker longer and earn less than our parents. Our music will never die but it doesn’t chart. It’s this dark cloud on the horizon signaling the end of our youth and our shrinking relevancy to the stage of public opinion. Lately it has been decreed (by no one in particular) that 2012/2013 is now The Golden Age of Rock & Roll Biographies - seems like our old heroes have something to say even if they can’t secure financing for their next big project. This is how you do it; imagine a three-pronged media blitz consisting of a book signing @ Barnes & Noble, a record release and a massive coast-to-coast tour with 12 dates scheduled in Europe. Only nobody comes to the book stores because they don’t carry books, only NOOKs; the tour is expensive and folds after a few dates in the artist’s home state and there isn’t enough cash to pay for studio time – even if it’s free. Sound familiar?

Well, that isn’t what Neil Young’s book is about. It is a thoughtful stream of consciousness tome poem about friends, lovers and compatriots who have touched the life spirit of Mr. Neil Young.  There are 68 chapters though several run only a few pages. Young is an uninhibited writer who effortlessly mixes fantasy or dreamlike passages when writing about his father or dear friends who have passed on with nuts and bolts details of his Lincvolt electric car or his fascination with Lionel Trains (which he purchased).  His style and approach to writing a book appears to be similar to his approach to making music – following his muse and trusting his impulse to free associate. He is one of the original free spirits – a hippie who altered his consciousness through dope, booze, love, sobriety and self-reflection. He is a musical genius and a renaissance man who can shape a cracked broken down rock with hammer and anvil to create the perfect alchemy, turning lead into gold.

The initial chapters rest comfortably amongst the memories and other artifacts of Young’s keen mind. Each story links to emotional connections with people with whom he collaborated or loved. Lionel Trains was a lifelong pursuit and it was more than just a hobby. The time and creativity that Young devoted to his trains was inextricably linked to his mostly successful attempts to find ways of communicating with his son Ben Young, who was born quadriplegic. Ben’s birth was a sentinel event for the family and Neil made every effort to help his son communicate and enjoy his life despite the physical obstacles. Though Ben was non-verbal, Neil made every effort to communicate with his son meaningfully. He even recorded an album entitled TRANS in which he sang through a machine. Most people couldn’t understand what he was saying – that was the point! Young was trying to communicate across barriers from one world (verbal) to another world (non-verbal)–TRANS was the bridge

Young praised Buffalo Springfield especially the singing of Steven Stills and Ritchie Furay. He maintains that if drummer extraordinaire Bruce Palmer would have not been deported the Springfield would not have imploded so early in their career. He recalled opening for the Byrds (one of his favorite bands) and blowing them off the stage. Buffalo Springfield were that good and yes, the Byrds were that bad! An early influence was Randy Bachman, the founder and leader of the Guess Who. Bachman was the premier guitarist in Canada at the time was nice enough to give Young some tips about fingering positions on his guitar and equal levels of encouragement.

Despite all the high-profile acrimony between CSN&Y Young only praises his former partners – especially Steven Stills. Young refers to him as a genius with one of the most naturally soulful voices he’s ever heard. Young writes about how incensed he was with then Kent State massacres and his immediate visceral response of “disbelief and sadness” that led him to compose Ohio. He recorded it the next day in an LA studio. It was on the radio within a week (this was before the Internet and You Tube). Young felt that CSN& Y were speaking for a generation (they were – their influence cannot be overestimated). Young writes that the U.S. government has still not apologized to the families of the four fallen students. Shame.

Crazy Horse has always been Young’s favorite band and he’s done some of his best work with them including Cinnamon Girl (their first song), Down By the River, Cowgirl in the Sand, Keep on Rockin’( in the Free World), My My, Hey Hey. Young says it’s simple down-to earth rock & roll. In introducing Cinnamon Girl to the band, he described the modal instrumental theme as “Egyptians rolling giant stones up to a pyramid on logs. It’s huge and it’s moving. Unstoppable” YES! He describes his deep long term mourning for the loss of the Danny Whitten, a great spirit in the sky who sang and played great rock & roll.

One of the most poignant moments in the book was Young’s collaboration with filmmaker Jonathon Demme. The film Neil Young: Heart of Gold was a sensitive yet powerful performance that captured Young in a triumphant performance of his critically acclaimed album Prairie Wind and classic hits like Heart of Gold, Harvest Moon and the Pianter. He had a great group of players and singers including his wife Pegi Young, Emmylou Harris, Ben Keith, Spooner Oldham and Rick Rosa. Buy this DVD it is the musical companion of Waging Heavy Peace. Read and listen!

Loss is a pervasive theme in Young’s book. At this stage in his life he’s lost his parents, family members and many friends. He mourns the loss of Kurt Cobain as he felt they shared a special connection. Cobain left a suicide note quoting one of his songs, “It’s better to burn out than to fade away.” Before Cobain’s death, Young attempted to reach him and take him under his wing – it struck a deep chord in Young that resonates to this day.  Young also talks about the death of his longtime collaborator Ben “long Grain” Keith. Ben Keith played pedal steel and can be heard on countless Neil Young sessions including the entire Harvest LP. Old Man and Heart of Gold are just two examples of Ben Keith’s signature sound. When Young first heard of Keith’s death he let out a primal screen thinking it was his son. Then someone told him it was Ben Keith and a different sadness took over and settled in.

The last few pages of Young’s autobiography  are a fantasy piece in which Young is riding in his Continental his mind wanders and he thinks of all the women he has met and loved and he comes up to Pegi, his wife and he feels really good. Family business is on the agenda. It is a time of reckoning – all the houses and properties, maybe too much to handle. Suddenly the traffic slows to a crawl. The radio plays Da Doo Ron Ron. Somehow he’s connected to a vintage radio show, He decides to get off the Interstate and take a two-lane road. It’s very quiet and Neil pulls over near a creek. He enjoys the taste of the fresh clear water. He gets back on the two lane and continues down the road to an old café. Two of his old friends David Briggs (Record producer; died in 1995) and Larry Johnson (the filmmaker- Journey Through The Past; died 2010) are there drinking coffee. Young walks over and sits down. They don’t talk much. David says something about an old friend and Larry Gets up to make a call. He wants some more coffee. Briggs looks at Young and asks, “What have you been doing?”

I Love this book and recommend it to anyone who is interested in sixties Rock & Roll, Folk Music and The Summer of Love. You can purchase Waging Heavy Peace @ Barnes & Noble

Peace

Bo White

Book Review -Pete Townshend Who I Am

 

 

 

 

 

Who I Am

Pete Townshend

 

Before I excavate all the lies, half-truths, and braggadocio that color this overly ambitious tome to extended adolescence, I must admit I hero-worshiped the Who like I hero worshipped the Beatles or the Stones and countless other great bands from the golden age of R-O-C-K.  Let me warn you now. This auto-erotic wannabe tell-all gets boring real fast and by the mid-mark I was falling asleep, getting migraines and feeling constipated. I could make other excuses but Pete Townshend is not a sympathetic character. He’s self-absorbed and shallow despite his intellectual and spiritual longings. He seems to wear his altruism like a cloak that can be taken off and discarded without a passing thought. Townshend is part of that upper echelon rock star mythos that  perpetuates the almost cultish devotion to narcisstic rock gods who are hopelessly infantilized by their hero-worshipping dip shit fans...like me. Now let’s take a peek inside the cover and read between the lines.

Townshend carves out three “ACTS” in this 500 page monster. I’ll comment on the chronological progression represented in each of the acts from the earliest days of the Who to their ascendance into the highest nether-regions of the rock god worship to their ultimate decline as a creative force.

ACT ONE: War Music

The opening sequence involves the Who’s first show in June 1964. The music is as raw as the musicians and Townshend accidently punched a hole in the ceiling with his guitar, stumbling upon the formula of destruction as a gimmick or as a statement. The next few pages jumps back in time to the end of the war in 1945. Townshend’s father was a musician and performed swing. It was the center of the post-war universe and helped pave the way for early rockets like Bill Haley, Little Richard and Elvis. Townshend lets us into a secret. He stole his famous windmill style of playing rhythm guitar was stolen from none other than Keith Richards. Townshend observes that the guitar became a primary instrument in rock & roll like a saxophone was in jazz and swing. This chapter covers a lot of ground from the creative tension between mods and rockers (the Who were mods) to the Who’s first great single I Can’t Explain and the baroque undercurrent in My Generation and the Kids Are Alright that also spoke to class hostility. This is Townshend’s most realized part of the book with a keen emphasis on the considerable craft of Townshend’s glorious pop singles such as Pictures of Lily (an ode to the joy of masturbation), Happy Jack (McCartney inspired) , I Can See For Miles, and Substitute (an homage to Smoky Robinson via The Stone’s 19^th Nervous Breakdown).  Shel Talmy was the producer of many of these gems up until Substitute. His ouster led to a nasty law suit that the management team of Chris Stamp and Kit Lambert were powerless to prevent. At one point Townshend considered making a pact with the devil in the personage of Allen Klein, one of the most notorious exploiters of rock and roll stars.

Their incredible performances at the Grande Ballroom and Woodstock in 1969 are sketched out nicely as well as an extended examination of Townshend’s first (and perhaps only) masterpiece Tommy which was released on May 17^th 1969. Townshend was only 24 years old. It was a busy and creative time for the Who including the release of Live at Leeds that revealed an incredible growth in their craft that was tantamount to a leap across the Grand Canyon. This ushered in a new phase for the Who, the quirky pop songs were replaced by thunderous high energy rock. A perfect coda to the first act.

 The First Act was well written and paced nicely so as you don’t lose interest. The rest of the book is a bit spotty like a teenager covering his zits with Clearasil not realizing that everybody can see that dried up goo all over his pimply mug.

 

ACT TWO: A Really Desperate Man

This begins the decline of the Who even when the are at the peak of their powers. Townshend seems to get hung up on rock operas and follows Tommy with Lifehouse, an incredible concept that produced such great songs as Pure & Easy, Won’t Get Fooled Again and Behind Blue Eyes. Eventually Lifehouse became Who’s Next, a masterful album that helped the Who ascend to the top of the heap. The seventies ushered in a decade of substance abuse, mental health problems and unencumbered infidelity and promiscuity. There were a few sentinel events in ACT II had crushing effect on the future of the Who. In September 1978 Roger Daltry called Townshend and said, “He’s done it.” Keith Moon had died. On December 3^rd, 1979 the Who was at the Riverfront Coliseum in Cincinnati. They performed their usual high energy performance. It went over well but after the show their new manager Bill Curbishley assembled the band and crew to tell them that eleven kids had died. There was a problem at the entrances and kids were trampled.

ACT THREE: Playing to the Gods

This final act describes the Who’s descent into irrelevance. They lost touch with their fan base in the late seventies during the rise of punk. The addictions piled up, mostly booze though cocaine and heroin took their toll on Townshend and John Entwhistle (one of rock & rolls greatest musicians). There was a farewell Tour and several reunions that were motivated more by potential earnings as opposed to craft. Townshend became an editor and writer for Faber’s magazine with a focus on popular arts (mostly music, books/novels and poetry. He began to expand his circle of acquaintances to include writers, models, and movies stars. He was particularly fond of William Golding a generous man with a keen mind. He wrote the iconoclastic Lord of the Flies.

Townshend was friendly with Paul and Linda McCartney and when she died Paul asked Pete to do the eulogy.

By 1999 John Entwhistle was broke and in debt. Townshend dropped his current projects in order to reform the Who and embark on an extended tour to help his old friend. On June 27^th, 2002, Entwhistle died of chronic health problems exacerbated by the use of cocaine.

This final act also addresses Townshend’s arrest and trial for possessing child pornography. On January 11^th, 2003 he was accused and the tabloids had a field day. Ultimately, Townshend agreed to accepts a caution and a low-profile listing for a limited time as a sex-offender. A few years later Townshend was vindicated when an investigative journalist Duncan Campbell did a forensic examination of the Landslide (porn) website and found no evidence that Townshend had ever accessed the site.

The book ends on a positive note as Townshend and his old bandmate Roger Daltrey made amends and became close friends.

Never mind my grousing Who I Am is an incredible journey to a magic kingdom of princes and pawns, kings and paupers, everyday people.

Peace

Bo