THE WHO SELL OUT

This set the path for the well-known "Tommy" but it is equally as great, another wonderful concept album bringing you back to the sixties by taking on the role of a pop radio station of that era refected through the minds of The Who! It's clever, genuinely funny and some songs are also very moving, all interspersed with some weird and wonderful pirate radio jingles.. "Radio London Reminds you ... go to the Church of your choice". Noone could have produced such an album like The Who did at that time.

Most great British bands had an essential formula, - fantastic songwriting, great harmonies and melodies, high quality musicianship, storytelling, pathos, rhythm, syncopation, humour and whimsey. They were clearly good at the last two, especially this band. And this album is probably their most humourous. "Tattoo" is very funny and Roger does nice teenage angst vocals here. It's a beautifully crafted and lyrically sophisticated song, which adds to Pete's catalogue of investigating the meaning of gender. The Medac Song is very amusing too... "Henry laughed and cried "I got 'em" ... his face is like a baby's bottom". The hit from this release "I Can See For Miles" is really brilliant with its savage, stinging guitar and stampeding drums, a most wonderful anthem to paranoia of female treachery.

Pete Townsend's guitar playing was very different here. Listen to "Sunrise" for example, a most stunning love song which has a difficult and affecting jazz chord sequence. The great thing about a lot of the songs is that Pete Townshend sings them and he's at his yearning best. He gives The Who a much more sensitive sound than their later heavier recordings which suited Roger Daltrey's voice best. "Our love was", "Relax", "I Can't Reach You" and "Sunrise" (which I mentioned already above) are all of the wistful, blissful type for which The Who are not generally known. The bonus tracks are a truly great bonus with "Glittering Girl" and "Early morning cold taxi" standing out as tracks nearly good enough to go on the original. Excellent album in all. I strongly recommend revisiting this album!