Original subtitles

welcome classic rock fans to another

ranking video our worst the best where

we look to evaluate the albums by the

the most iconic of artists

and today we're hoping to bring some

order to the chaos that is the who

before we start though i won't urge you

to click like subscribe and do all that

stuff and do check some of the links

below this video for ways you can

support the sterling work done here at

classic album if you become a patreon

why not there's a fine body work on

there now

anyway enough this flim flam let's get

straight into it shall we number 12 is

face dancers from 1981. this isn't a bad

album it's just somewhat mediocre for a

band that took us on that amazing

journey

uh from those early testosterone fueled

mod anthems

to

the more conceptually engaging pieces

that were played as the

the sun sean as did the music

resplendently over yazka's farm in 1969.

don't let go the code the ode to me baba

and you bet you bet are decent numbers

but musically all seems rather

rather pallid to me it uh there's no

roaring guitars heavy drums or that

swamp thick bass line that bludgeoned us

at the university of leeds in 1970

terms and songs on this album as ever

are graceful introspective but i have to

say that adultery seems rather

uninvested

perhaps sonically not really ever

recovering from the loss of keith moon

pete townsend told jonathan aitken in

1967

that a pop singer's life is well paid

murder

i think what we're witnessing on some of

these later albums is the slow

strangulated gasp of who-ness the who

has a band set out to express the joy in

the rage of a generation

but on this album it feels like their

fox has been if not shot

certainly stamped upon by the hobnailed

boots and nihilistic roar of the punk

insurgents

oh those flemmy upstarts

the sound was also interesting

historically because the first album to

feature

faces alumni kenny jones which caused

some rifts in the band roger daltrey

wasn't happy

with kenny jones drumming start he went

on to say that kenny jones is a a fine

fine drummer for the faces but wasn't

right for the who in fact if you may

quote from his

autobiography kenny watered down the

energy of the band he was pulling the

who back into a straight pace small

faces pub style performance

and i was finally impossible to phrase

the lyrics and i must admit i agree with

doltry on this the who sounds

disappointedly tame with kenny jones on

the drums

i miss all that shrapnel induced chaos

represented by

keith moon as he contributed to the

cacophony of this beautiful noise

townsend of course is a completely

different angle on it he states in his

autobiography that uh i like the novelty

of playing with kenny you kept the beep

without decorating it like me john was

finding more space than whose new sound

not less

anyway this album face dancers comes in

at number 12. number 11 is who it's hard

from 1982.

uh after the rather tame face dancers i

think it's album rocks a little harder

which is certainly welcomed and stamina

spawns a couple of singles athena and

eminence front

sonically sound as interesting as say

explore the new synth technology

available to them this album in some

ways reminds me of a 1978's who are you

an album where they toyed with moog and

organ sounds this incorporates uh again

synths and some interesting keyboard and

they kind of fall between two stalls on

the sound first is the need to

very much sound like the who

and the second is to sound very modern

and contemporary but the band by this

time are beginning to look like old

relics especially on a musical landscape

defined by the heroine chic of the 1980s

new romantics the who at their very best

embodied embraced that outrage and

impulse

of uh of their generation

uh often straddling that fine line

between uh

music and um sheer bloody noise but this

album overall doesn't feel quite right

pete townsend state said adultery

uh didn't feel

that the album was complete and insisted

that clint jones

allowed them to work on it further

and even glenn johns insisted that they

go with the first stake of eminence

front although uh pete townsend felt

that he could have sung it better

townsend does go on to say that dolce's

voice on one life's enough is one of his

best vocal performances

all adultery goes on to say in his

autobiography that this album doesn't in

any way stand up to the who's early

material

number 10 is endless wire from 2006.

this is the band's first studio album

since 1982's it's hard

and it opens with this

synth riff that strongly recalls uh

barbara riley the first half of this

record very much feels like an artifact

uh replete with uh in the words of the

guardian preachy creaky acoustic numbers

has to be said that the the absence of

moon and then we saw on this record is

absolutely palpable i personally don't

think that whoever really recovered from

the loss of n whistle and on the second

half we get pete tanzan's new rock opera

and it all sounds pretty damn good i

have to say

endless while often harkens back to

previous who albums

there's um the whole thing at times

feels like an exercise in nostalgia baba

o'reilly haunts fragments

and the triplets on the punk meets the

godfather um

very much infuses mike post theme

also the sort of stark acoustic

introspection which could be very much

reminiscent of

the who by numbers the album does close

with that mini rock opera wire and glass

which townsend has

gone on to say that this song is based

on the very first experiments by

lawrence ball

a composer i commissioned to create a

system and software that would recreate

method music

well clearly an accessible piece then

nevertheless you know the closing suite

does have a certain lineage to it which

recalls pete townsend's

1993 solo album

psycho derelict as well as the um as

well as the aborted life house project

according to roger daltrey and his

autobiography the song you stand by me

was pete's way of thanking him

for um

backing him up and standing by him

during all those dreadful child porn

allegations he goes on to say he handed

me the demo tape and said i wrote this

for you

anyway number 10 the endless wire from

2006. number nine is who are you from

1978.

uh this is the last album of keith moon

of course and uh but this album feels

depleted it lacks power it lacks

moonness is what it lacks

but then keith

had been suffering from dreadful ill

health i think at the time and his

drumming was definitely suffering there

was a

fatigue and world of weariness about the

band as a whole i think on this album

that led to the

collective vision of the group somewhat

waning and the material and this album

flip-flops between the the blustery

attempts at contemporary relevant songs

like sister disco new song music must

change

and that bittersweet insecurity that

we've come to expect from townsend

wonderful numbers i'd love is coming

down and the anthemic title track i

think it's safe to say that since who by

numbers has been a desire to drive the

band into producing

uh

shorter punchier songs and rockier

albums much in the vein of

who's next rather than the long

sprawling conceptual pieces the

arrangements on this uh heavily on

synths and um

strings

which makes the tracks seem rather busy

cluttered in fact some of the tracks on

this album like the title track and love

is coming down and explores the often

the contradictions in the in in the

life and presentation of aging rockers

which makes them rather interesting and

that's not forgetting the autumn of 78

keeps being passed away

and effectively odin on the medication

that was prescribed him to actually cure

his alcoholism

uh p townsend said after keith moon died

that

it made me lose all logic number eight

is the who from 2019.

this album has been described by rolling

stone as hard rock comfort food

there's certainly hearkening back to the

um a celebration if you like of the

who's back catalogue

the lyrics are

gorgeously cinecolons and you know they

snarl through them lines like

i don't care i know you're going to hate

this song and dalty sings surprisingly

well

on this with conviction and anger and

snarl

you know i think he thinks he's back in

1965. and i don't mind

on this album you know the opening line

is i don't mind other guys ripping off

my song

as townsend uh recalls

one of the most enthemic who numbers of

all the kids are all right this album

has been described as a sort of abbot

and costello appropriation of the who

brand

instead of the who sell out who's next

who are you and so on we just get the

who

and the cover is done by peter blake

that godfather of pop art uh who's most

renowned of course for um

uh sergeant pepper as well as the you

know the face dancers they'll be

responsible for that one as well

but what we get is this wonderful

uh almost post modern um

perhaps even cynical depiction of uh

popular culture from you know people

like things like the union jack on there

chuck berry

pete townsend smashing his guitar my god

they were the days weren't they batman

and robin

which uh you know is linked with the

history of the who

as well

but it it works effectively

in terms of anchoring this album of uh a

more glorious past shall we say i must

admit this sounds a lot better than i

expected it to be uh one of the songs i

don't want to get wise feels like a

distant cousin

a few times have moved perhaps to my

generation especially adultery sings it

rather than the arrogance of uh hope i

die before i get old townsend now it's

uh

his writing lyrics more appropriate to

somebody as nulled as he is lyrics like

life teachers as well but i don't want

to get wise so anyway i put the who 2019

at number eight

number seven is a quick one from 1966.

this is a wonderful conflation of pop

and chaos uh it lacks that sense of

adrenaline and youthful rebellion we've

got with my generation and overall the

album feels a little bit more muddled

nevertheless they had set their sights

on more ambitious horizons shall we say

with you know interesting compositions

complex melodies and lyrical themes not

to mention the genre defining a quick

one while he's away the mini opera

townsend in his biography says about

this time he was struck by purcell's use

of unique luxurious use of suspensions

it's a staple part of that baroque

decoration

he goes on to say that the first time i

use suspension successfully is in the

kids are all right mostly to suggest a

baroque mood and keith moon lays down a

solid mark with cobwebs and strange

while

townsend continues to write songs very

much in the r b

vein you know songs like uh

run run run and so sad about us well

john ambrose also contributes to a

couple of numbers on this as well

whiskey man and boris the spider boris

spider would

have very much been the who set this

right up to the uh up to the point where

he died a quick one is a mixed bag of

experimental musings and clutter perhaps

that doesn't quite work for me but

nevertheless

it's the sound of the band's future

being forged i believe especially in the

certain aforementioned mini opera

i find the i find batman quite

intriguing on this there seems to be a

motif of a lot of groups

appropriating the batman theme

or batman as a theme for songs around

about 1966 which was about the year that

the tv show came out i believe i'm not

mistaken i mean for example there was uh

the ballad of batman by the camps uh the

spotlights did batman and robin

dickey goodman batman and his

grandmother which was bloody awful

um the finest one of course is the uh

batarang by the avengers band that

actually hails from memphis is

beautifully swirly and psychedelic there

are even those that uh suggest that uh

taxman by the beatles was

partly informed by the batman theme

and the band at this time release

substitute a song that takes its musical

refrain from the contemporary british

single where is my girl by rob storm and

the whispers townsend describes uh

substitute as a homage to smokey

robinson in the miracles via a 19th

nervous breakdown by the rolling stones

anyway number seven is a quick one from

1966.

number six is the who by numbers from

1975.

this is an astonishing album described

by enemy as townsend's suicide note this

is daltry's favorite album

understandably so because his vocal

performance on this record is absolutely

wonderful of rage

power and pathos

townsend said her trademark daltrey

bella can communicate so much emotion

from

uh withering sadness self-pity

loneliness to the more obvious rage

frustration joy and triumph this album

often gets a bad rap for not being

quadriphenia the songs are shorter and

punchier it seems people didn't want

more concise and rockier numbers drawn

from the mist of

townsend's drug and alcohol abuse

and understandably therefore it is a

quite a raw

and uh expo emotionally exposed album

daltrey has said of this one

uh how many friends and however much i

booze expose our vulnerabilities and the

album is wonderful for that it's about

our inability in the bigger sense one of

my favorite songs on the sound is how

many friends have i really got to just

eggs with a sense of loneliness and pain

uh very much about the idea of being

marooned by

fame in some respects doltrey has

actually resurrected this number for his

current live solo tour

townsend's lyrics on her very poignant

very personal to making sound a deeply

confessional affair

you know tracks like slip kids success

story blue red and grey however much i

booze imagine a man making it a

truly exceptional release i think number

five is my generation from 1965.

the who cut their teeth essentially

playing r b numbers

either as the detours or the high

numbers

and daltry gave such uh such songs a

real urban street swagger and the mods

loved things like tamina motown simply

for that reason that it was an urban

a manifestation an urban expression

a zoot suit was recorded by the high

numbers at this point it was actually

written by their their manager peter

meadon

but it was essentially a rip-off or copy

of the song misery by the dynamics

there are a few seismic moments that uh

very much affect the evolution of the

who and one of those seismic moments was

a support slot with johnny kitten

pirates

now johnny kidd and the pirates were a

real powerhouse um drums uh

bass league guitar

and pete townsend wanted to emulate that

uh effectively uh roger dobry hangs up

his acoustic guitar just focuses on the

microphone and that voice leaving the

other band members to create their own

brand of mayhem behind him and another

seismic event was them supporting the

rolling stones in 1963

where pete townsend says he stole

the windmilling arm from keith richards

june 1964 marked the debut of the who

when that when they played their first

show at the railroad hotel in harrow

west london

it was about this time as well that p

tanzan was coming um

increasingly

interested in the work of gustav metzger

and his ideas of auto destructive art of

course that would

affect or

influence that

cacophonous melee that often ended the

uh the who shows now when jeff beck

smashes his guitar and blow up

it's because of his frustration at the

the fact that the instrument is

malfunctioning

when townsend smashes his guitars to

create a specific and very special kind

of noise can't explain comes out about

this time can't explain according to

tanzanite he wanted to be as much like

the kinks as possible however adultery

dismisses a bit of pop ephemeria and he

said he didn't want to sing anything to

anodyne ever again however anyway anyhow

anywhere was considered a complete

genius by adultery in fact the feedback

on that song

was uh quite revolutionary many respects

decker sent the first pressings back

feeling there was a fault with the with

the pressing

but as dolce said it was actually uh

that effectively captured the band's

live sound on vinyl

johnny hooker's stuttering blues was

also an influence and roger daltrey had

been experimenting with his voice and

stuttering in particular

ever since he'd been joined on stage by

sunny boy williamson

sunny boy williamson used to use a

stutter rhythmically when he sang i

think adultery was taken at the the kind

of oral dissonance that this created

it became a

stuttered articulation of youthful

dissatisfaction

and one of the things that marks this

album is that iconic uh cover photograph

the cover photograph was appropriately

urban as one can imagine

the photograph was taken at surrey dock

south east london november 1965 it was

done by the decca in-house photographer

at that time was david

my generation is an explosive debut with

powerful uh

guitars and drums exhilarating chord

crunches and

distortions which very much contribute

to the overall sound of this album of

this band

townsend's original numbers on here

focus on melodic hooks and some real mod

swagger tracks like uh

now the good's gone much too much and of

course the kids are all writing some

quality tunage

my generation has been seen as an

ultimate rebellious anthem in fact i

think townsend told rolling stone

magazine in 1985 that it's essentially a

song about trying to find one's place in

society

it was actually recorded for the ready

steady who ep in 1966 where they

incorporated the end of it elga's land

of hope and glory

of course there had to be a writing

credit

on that to townsend and elga and it's

also worth mentioning one can't deny the

uh influence of most alison's young

man's blues

uh as an inspiration i think for this

one this song demonstrates the clear

influence of american r b with that call

and response then going on and the

lyrics have been described by one critic

as one of the most distilled

statements of youthful rebellion in rock

history

number four is the who sell out from

1967. this album sees a wonderful

appropriation of pop art motifs in the

carnivalesque

1966 was a fine year for music with uh

blonde on blonde frank zappa's first

album with the mothers

pet sounds of course beatles revolver

p townsend said sergeant pepper and pet

sounds went on to redefine popular music

in the 20th century atmosphere essence

shadow and romance were combined in ways

that could be discovered again and again

and let's not forget uh quite

interestingly that uh keith moon

believed that being for the benefit of

mr kite was written about him the who

with this album produces a wonderful

polemic

on the the very nature of the

relationship between money

commerce and art in fact one critic has

written that uh townsend and the who had

come realistically to reckon with the

powers of commercial machinery to

outflank their best efforts at creative

independence yet found a way to figure

that state of ambivalence and

contradiction within a vividly

convincing musical and visual statement

the original idea or central conceit was

the whole thing was going to be

presented as like a pirate radio show

and they would sell space on the album

for advertising uh have these

advertising jingles

eventually they abandoned the idea of

actually selling that to legitimate

companies to actually creating their own

advertising jingles what we get

ironically is a piece of very consumable

psychedelic uh pop confection that is

incredibly dark in places a lot of these

half concepts at the time just tend to

break down halfway through

the beetle sargent pepper being another

example perhaps

pet sounds as an argument for pet sounds

being a concept album

however i feel that the the fly in the

ointment of the concept argument tends

to be sloop john b this almost spawns uh

arguably whose greatest uh ever single

and that was uh i can see for mars i

love all that

dark acid acid-drenched stuff also

there's wonderful songs in the sound

like armenia city in the sky

relax i can reach you

also finds townsend's writing

reaching from his quasi-spiritual

territory which would see him develop

that idea for tommy rael is another

fascinating number on this album another

mini opera

some of the sonic motifs used in rael

would be repeated

for their next album this sound was a

wonderful symbiosis a kind of melding of

where the band have been and definitely

where they're going a fusing of melodic

mod pop powerful instrumentation

number three is tommy from 1969 this

full-blown rock opera about a deaf dumb

and blind boy who ultimately becomes

analogous or a metaphor if you like for

the

the spiritual blinkeredness and

blindness of a whole population this is

the average launch suspended

superstardom unarguably the plot is

certainly a bit sketchy

uh but nevertheless you can't um you

can't argue in terms of his power and

conviction pete townsend introduces this

album to the assembled press at ronnie

scott's in 1969 as a story about a boy

who witnesses a murder and becomes deaf

dumb and blind and he's then later raped

by his uncle and gets turned on to lsd i

know i'm not going to say too much about

this album so i've already done a

quite an extensive and detailed review

on it you'll find the card for this

review just up there

number two is quadrophenia from 1973.

early who thrived on that flash and

outrage which was faithfully represented

in their stay show but eventually of

course they developed an interest in

exploring more conceptual and complex

pieces quadrophenia isn't a straight

narrative but rather a distorted dream

view

town zendesk said that quadrophenia was

going to be a complicated audacious

project i plan to emulate walter

carlos's sonic seasonings album with

extraordinary soundscapes between tracks

i wanted to capture the raging sea

in quadraphonic sound the sound was

built around the story of a young mod

struggle coming of age story many have

said that it's more ambitious and tommy

is certainly less muddled and doesn't

wallow in fantasy and sort of foe

spiritual quest

but instead

draws upon the band's own early

experiences growing up as well as the

birth of mod culture tanzan wanted to

portray the

story of jimmy the befuddled mod

uh having a kind of a four-way split

personality which many see as analogous

to the four personalities in the in the

band but ultimately yielded some

fabulous fabulous musical great songs

from the real me of course which was

covered by blackie lawless and his crew

back in the 80s as well as songs like uh

the punk meets the godfather i'm one and

the absolutely sublime

reign love rain on me

tamzin's writing on this is a resting

and heartfelt and the production is

absolutely fabulous

number one is who's next from 1971.

apart from live at leeds this band has

never sounded so loud and so unhinged as

they do on this record

wonderful juxtapositions uh we get

ballads like the song is over and of

course the tortured

behind blue eyes

we also get numbers of bargain my

personal favorite and won't get fooled

again which

positively expressed the rage anger and

frustration and pain and passion of a

generation a beautiful anarchy

buried in noise towson develops their

keen interests and synthesizers in this

album which further broadens

the who palette and are used moderately

and effectively

one commentator has said of this album

that it represents the death of the

1960s or or the death of the 1960s ideal

where townsend uh

declares the song is over scorns the

teenage wasteland and bitterly declares

that we won't get fooled again in the

documentary about the monterey pop

festival

townsend dismisses the counter culture

as nothing more than

an expression of youthful idealism and

drug-filled hope and i wonder if some of

that anger is channeled into this album

keith moon is completely unleashed on

this record and has never sounded so

unhinged adultery sounds fantastic

and john edwards baselines are just

absolutely manic we might argue that

tommy quadrafina in the aborted

lifehouse project are art whereas this

is nothing more than sheer unadulterated

rock and roll

the who's next read the who's finest of

course this comes about from the

aforementioned aborted lifehouse project

this was going to be the next big

townsend opus it was based on this

dystopian landscape where the earth's

ecosystem has collapsed and we all have

to live in these little pods and have a

virtual experience of the of the world

pumped in we'd all be subjected to a

kind of a police station have to endure

long periods of hibernation

very much like the matrix i guess

those that controlled the grid and

controlled what experiences we had

would ultimately go on to ban rock and

roll as something that was dangerous and

subversive a theme that's been well

furrowed and explored since then but

ultimately a group of renegades would

hack into the grid and uh

people would be drawn into the life

house where each person would sing their

own unique song to produce the music of

the spheres a sublime harmony that would

become what pete hansen has called

the one perfect note for disappearing to

a musical nirvana a mysticism of sound

the conclusion of the story was partly

based on a book by uh

inyet khan a musician who became a

spiritual teacher

gosh i have no idea why this uh this

just didn't take off

tanzan said in his autobiography that he

ditched it because people had trouble

coming to terms with the one perfect

note idea of the concept and it was

ditched in favor of a collection of

unrelated numbers turning what george

mele would call a revolt into style

anyway that's my ranking of the who

albums uh let me know what you think and

how you would rank these albums in the

boxes below

anyway if you've watched to this point i

want to thank you for doing just that

and uh maybe take some time to check

some of the links below this video for

ways you can support the fantastic work

done at this channel

i'll leave it there and hope that you're

well staying safe coverage free but more

importantly that you keep listening

you