THE WHO AT KILBURN: 1977

Angry and wasted, and still not to be missed!

The Kilburn gig was supposed to be filmed for inclusion in The Kids Are Alright film, but the band were so ashamed of the show that they threw it in the vault for decades. Being one of the last gigs to feature Keith, it was inevitable that the show would eventually resurface despite the whispers about it. Many claim this DVD is a complete disaster of only historical value, and that all but the most mouthfoaming Who fans should disregard. Should you avoid it? Not if you love The Who!

Some of the rumors are true. This is a sloppy show featuring an obviously out-of-practice band who possibly held their post-gig drinking party before the gig, as everyone but Roger appears to be half-in-the-bag. It's a show that finds Townshend in an extremely toxic mood, openly chastising the show as [&*!#], and seemingly contemptuous of the audience as well. At one point he challenges the "big-mouthed little gits" in the audience to step on stage and try to take his guitar from him. Thankfully no one dared because it would have been ugly. Keith tries his best to keep the show festive and win over his guitarist, but Townshend will have none of it. Reportedly the other three were not pleased with Keith's readiness in general and this may be the reason for the tension on stage.

If you're the kind of person for whom good music means disciplined and tight, with a businesslike professionalism ala many bands of today who actually take classes on how to be in a band (what a joke), then stay away. If you don't mind your rock and roll to have some drunken' vomit on the car door, by all means check this out. I really enjoyed the show despite the mistakes I heard, a few which were cringeworthy. I think when you're watching a band who is a little looped, the sloppy loss of inhibition has the bright side of yielding some interesting grooves and passages. Certainly true with Townshend who was overplaying almost everything, but sometimes the results were awesome, and to be fair other times they were not. If you want to hear The Who as you rarely do, with their hair down, sounding like they are playing their friend's wedding reception late in the evening, you have your chance. There will be some euphoric highs and some frightening lows, including the absolutely most devastatingly bad version of "Who Are You" you've ever heard. My sig-other was staring at the TV literally begging Pete to stop....please, let it die....she was saying as he dragged the body on and on through the streets of concert hell. Ouch.

As a great bonus (or perhaps an apology) the set gives you a 2nd disc with a show from 1969, showing the boys in far more muscular form. Shot at London's Coliseum in December of that year, this disc will soothe the shock of the Kilburn show. I personally think the two-disc set is a must for any Who fan, warts and all. I had a blast. As I read somewhere, even an off-night for The Who is more exciting than a great night for most other bands.

THE WHO in a bad night were far better than 90% of the bands in their best day

I honestly can't understand the critics to this video, that's what THE WHO was...A force of nature that couldn't be stopped, if you want to see a polished clean 1977 show, buy a CAPTAIN & TENILLE concert, but if you want to see a band giving 110% of them even if not in shape and amazing material, this video is a must have.

Luckily I waited until the deluxe edition was released in Blu-Ray, because apart from the regular 1969 at the London Coliseum version, you get an extra bonus, the first-ever live recording of the rock opera Tommy featuring: "A Quick One While He's Away", "Overture", "It's a Boy ", "1921", "Amazing Journey," "Christmas," "Acid Queen," "Pinball Wizard," "Do You Think It's Alright," "Fiddle About", "Tommy Can You Hear Me?", "There's a Doctor", "Go to the Mirror", "Smash the Mirror", "Miracle Cure", "Sally Simpson", "Tommy's Holiday Camp", "I'm Free", "We're Not Gonna Take It."

I agree with Finnforest's comments about weak songs in the Kilburn concert like the infamous version of "Who are You", but "Baba O'Riley" "Behind Blue Eyes" and "Pinball Wizard" are as exciting as usual, and of course the hilarious version of "Tommy's Holyday Camp" with Keith singing completely out of key. So yes it has lows, but the whole concert is a collector's item that no WHO fan should avoid.

The image has been digitally restored (A few minutes are lost because of the rewinding of the 16 mms camera), the sound is great (avoid the dull Dolby Digital 5.1 mix, because the DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 and PCM 2.0 with boosted vocals are both excellent), so it's a piece of musical history in very good condition that every fan must get.

Ah, almost forgot the rating.........4 solid stars.

I knew about this Kilburn concert (the first DVD in this package) because I read about it in a book about The Who written by journalist Chris Welch. This concert was done and filmed with the aim to include some footage from it in "The Kids Are Alright" documentary film which was also done during that period (1977-78) by Jeff Stein. But unfortunately, the members of the band were not very satisfied with their performances in that concert (particularly Peter Townshend, who even shows some dislike from the band`s playing during the concert). At the same time, maybe it was a good idea to not release this video until recently because the modern technology which is available now maybe helped a lot to improve the sound and image of this concert video which is very good. But, I think that at the same time the band had at that time some real reasons to not include footage from this concert (apart from two very brief scenes when the band was not playing) in "The Kids Are Alright" film: they sound like they didn`t rehearse enough. Particularly Keith Moon`s playing shows some "doubts" in some places, like he really was having a hard time remembering how to play some songs. Also, his playing began showing the effects of the excesses in his lifestyle and the lack of practicing. In fact, this was the bands`first concert since mid 1976, and Moon was living in the U.S. then until the band called him to return to England to record the "Who Are You" album in late 1977. Another reason to not release this concert video in the seventies maybe was that they were a bit drunk while playing (I can see it!). But the performances of most songs are good, sometimes noisy and chaotic. Anyway, this is a very good concert video which shows the band playing with a lot of energy. They even played a bit of the "Who Are You" album title song in a somewhat improvised form (as I mentioned above, they were recording the "Who Are You" album then until mid 1978). To replace the live footage from the Kilburn concert in the "The Kids Are Alright" film, they played and filmed another concert in May 1978 at a film studio inviting (like in the Kilburn concert) some fans. The "The Kids Are Alright" film is a good film but most of the songs included in the original film (including the songs which were filmed in May 1978) suffer from a bit of high speed in their appearance and sound, and also for this reason the release of this Kilburn footage is much better than that film mostly in the presentation of the live performances. The performance of "My Wife" was the only live recording from the Kilburn concert which the band released in the "The Kids Are Alright" album, but in a bit edited form and with a different sound mixing (but i wasn`t included in that film). Even with all the flaws the Kilburn concert was much better than some of the later concerts which the band played after Moon died (particularly during their "Farewell Tour" in 1982).

The second DVD from this package shows the band playing the "Tommy" rock opera live almost in its entirety in 1969. It seems that some songs were not played for some reason, and the band plays it very well but obviosuly lacking the keyboards and horns which were recorded in the original studio album. The quality of this footage is not very good, sometimes dark, and it lacks in some places the images of the band filmed live and instead they show some still photos from the concert to replace the missing footage. Not as good as the Kilburn concert, but it was a good idea to include this footage in this DVD package as "Bonus Material".