Quadrophenia

  

 

    I Think that Peter.T did his best work in this masterpiece of music... even better than "Tommy" for me. I didn´t see the movie, because I´m too young and in these days it´s difficult here to found this reliques like Tommy´s movie (this one I´ve seen) and other stuff relationated.... Umm... Whatever, it´s an excellent album and I hope I can see the movie quickly.

THe film was done on the cheap.There are a lot of errors in it.
ie When Jimmy and Steph(Lesley Ash) wake up to find themselves surrounded by Hell's Angel and one has the Motorhead logo on the back of his jacket.
When they are driving down Ladbroke Grove,there are models of car that didn't exist until at least another 10 years later.

Guillermo wrote: This week a TV channel in my city broadcasted the "Quadrophenia" film. I saw it for the first time in late 1980, so I wanted to see this film again. I was disappointed a bit. The film ends with the suicide of Jimmy, the main character of the story.Also, there is not a lot of music from "Quadrophenia", only some backing music, and only few complete songs. Also, the story is told in another way. I bought the album "Quadrophenia" (not the soundtrack of the film, the original 1973 album, but re-mixed and remastered in 1996). I listened again to this album today, and this album has very good music, and it is maybe the last great album released by The Who. For me, it wasn`t clear, after reading the explanation notes about the story in the booklet, if Jimmy took his life at the end of the story, or if he found at last mental peace to live his life in a better way. The story is sad, but the music is very good, IMO. What do you think of "Quadrophenia"?

Minor correction, if I may..

Jimmy doesn't kill himself. He - somehow - drives the scooter off the edge of the cliff.. BUT, at the beginning of the film you see Jimmy walking away from the egde of the same cliff, with the setting sun behind him. He is basically ditching the mod lifestyle, and turning his back on all the drugs, back stabbing and heart ache that got him into that awful state of mind. The whole fim is about Jimmys efforts to fit in with his mod friends, but ends with him realising that the whole scene is not worth the pain. It's quite a positive ending in that resepct.

As Blacksword already commented on the impression of the wrong or sad ending of the movie, I don't have to talk about that.
The album "Quadrophenia" is an absolute masterpiece and deserves to be listened to in times to come as an equal to "The Lamb Lies Down On Broadway" by Genesis (wouldn't that make one hell of a movie?) or "The Wall" by Pink Floyd (the movie wasn't too bad either).
As to the mistakes ManErg pointed to: Yes, there are mistakes, but a lot of movies have mistakes in them. Remember "Ben Hur"? There was somebody in it wearing a wristwatch!!

Tommy and Quadrophenia are two of the ten best rock albums of all time IMO.

But I don't think that Quadrophenia was their last good album. Who Are You (1978) is quite good.

 

Guillermo wrote: eddietrooper wrote: Tommy and Quadrophenia are two of the ten best rock albums of all time IMO. But I don't think that Quadrophenia was their last good album. Who Are You (1978) is quite good.   "Who Are You" is a very good album, but I prefer "Quadrophenia".

Who are you is somewhat weak when you consider it's from the guys who made Quadrophenia, but t still holds up really well.

The beginning of Quadrophenia is the end! When he crashes the scooter over the cliff the beginning of the film is him walking away from that! Anyway it is a brilliant film(ok minor mistakes)! I actually went up the alleyway where Jimmy was with Steph!

Blacksword wrote: daz2112 wrote: The beginning of Quadrophenia is the end! When he crashes the scooter over the cliff the beginning of the film is him walking away from that! Anyway it is a brilliant film(ok minor mistakes)! I actually went up the alleyway where Jimmy was with Steph! As I pointed out earlier in the thread.. I agree, it's an excellent film. I've always loved it. Was there any 'Mod' grafitti in the alleyway??

Thanks. Now I understand better the booklet notes in the CD and the story in the film. I have a book called "The Who:Teenage Wasteland" written by Chris Welch (Castle Communications, 1995). He wrote about the "Quadrophenia" album:(Jimmy) "ends up in Brighton throwing himself and his scooter into the sea". It seems that Welch also was confused about the end of the story in "Quadrophenia"!

I also found in this website http://www.thewho.net/linernotes/Quad.htm an explanation, song by song, by Pete Townshend, of the story in "Quadrophenia":

First song of the album, on Disc One:

I Am The Sea (2'08)  Pete Townshend: "Our story is set on a rock in the middle of a stormy sea..." And where did the cat come from?

Last tracks of the album, in Disc Two:

The Rock (6'37) 
Pete Townshend: "It's getting in a boat, going out to sea and sitting on a rock waiting for the waves to knock him off that makes him review himself. He ends up with the sum total of frustrated toughness, romanticism, religion, daredevil - desperation, but a starting point for anybody."

Love Reign O'er Me (Pete's Theme) (5'48) 
Pete Townshend: "'Love Reign O'er Me' is similar to 'Drowned' in meaning. This refers to Meher Baba's one time comment that rain was a blessing from God; that thunder was God's Voice. It's another plea to drown, only this time in the rain. Jimmy goes through a suicide crisis. He surrenders to the inevitable, and you know, you know, when it's over and he goes back to town he'll be going through the same sh*t, being in the same terrible family situation and so on, but he's moved up a level. He's weak still, but there's a strength in that weakness. He's in danger of maturing."

Edited by Guillermo

Simply amazing album, Love Reign O'er Me is what got me into The Who. I heard the song in the movie and was completely blone away when i went to buy the album.