The Who Songs Quadrophenia

[Fidelia Boldul]

Being a double album (quite possibly the best one, and that is opined knowing that Electric Ladyland, Physical Graffiti and London Calling are also on the dance card), the combination of sheer quality and precision still manages to astonish, all these years later. Unlike most double albums that tend to drag a bit toward the end, this one gets better as it goes along, and none of the songs feel forced.

I've been hesitant to post this album. I usually have a rule not to post something that has been officially released and still in print, when I haven't made any changes to it. But this is an exception. I figure I've been posting a whole series of Townshend's demos for the Who, and it would be odd to have a giant hole where the Quadrophenia sounds would be. In 2011, a super deluxe edition of the album was released, called "The Director's Cut." This is just two discs from that, combined, in the exact same song order.

The songs order generally follows the released 1973 version of the album. However, there are some exceptions, especially songs that didn't make the album, like "We Close Tonight," "You Came Back," "Joker James," "Wizardry (Electronic Wizardry)," and more. The Who eventually would release their versions of some of these in 1979, in conjunction with the release of a movie about the album.

One classic song from the album, "5:15," is not included here. That's because Townshend never made a demo for it. Instead, it was the only song on the album that was created spontaneously while the Who was jamming in the studio.

Note that Volume 5 in this series actually envelops this album chronologically, with demos from 1970 all the way to 1975. That includes some songs from the next Who album, "Who by Numbers," which was released in 1975. Most of the songs here were recorded in 1972 or 1973. Because it was a double album, it took a while for it to come together. Apparently, the "Drowned" demo dates all the way back to 1970, before Townshend even came up for the concept of the album.

The album tells the story of a disillusioned, working-class mod named Jimmy while plumbing Townshend's tortured psychology. The protagonist is emblematic of the youth culture that spawned the Who themselves. He "rides a GS scooter with his hair cut neat," pops amphetamines and spoils for fights.

And after the deaths of Entwistle and Moon, despite the Who's successes in their wake, the Who are quite literally half a band. The essentiality of this quartet is demonstrated by the album title, which represents the four personalities of the Who, as well as the four sides of the album.

While it would be a stretch to call Quadrophenia an album of hits, highlights are lurking around each corner. Sure, there are instrumentals, like "Quadrophenia" and "The Rock," but they only help the story along to its crescendo.

Quadrophenia begins and ends out at sea; opener "I Am the Sea" is a foreshadowing agent, as vocal snippets of ensuing songs seep through mightily stormy sound effects. And, of course, "Love Reign O'er Me" is a hand outstretched in the darkness, for salvation from the briny deep.

The whirling synths in "Quadrophenia" effectively illustrate a mind divided; the rough, street-ready sonics of "The Punk and the Godfather" are all pomade and motor oil; Townshend and Daltrey's piano-pounding rant "Helpless Dancer" sounds like they're twin Phantoms of the Opera.

Granted, it's not like any of us listen to Sgt. Pepper's or Ziggy Stardust or The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway for the story rather than the songs. In fact, without ancillary materials, most concept albums are, if not hazy, totally opaque.

But while the story of Quadrophenia is a bit of a blur, it has a consistent narrative rush, a graspable Campbellian arc. The arc of Jimmy the mod is much more linear and legible than that of Tommy; in fact, one critic thought a Townshend Rolling Stone interview told the Tommy story lightyears better than the music did.

Perhaps due to its concision, focus and memorable-song quotient, Quadrophenia still has meat on its bones; after a one-off performance of Quadrophenia at the Royal Albert Hall in 2010, the Who took it on the road for a fiery U.S. tour, billed Quadrophenia and More. And its onstage afterlife has stretched on from there.

Ongoing advancements in music-making tech expanded the sound of popular and underground music. New multi-track technology was now standard in recording studios from Los Angeles to London. Artists from a variety of genres experimented with new synthesizers, gadgets like the Mu-Tron III pedal and the Heil Talk Box, and techniques like the use of found sounds.

1973 was also a year of new notables, where now-household names made their debuts. Among these auspicious entries: a blue-collar songwriter from the Jersey Shore, hard-working southern rockers from Jacksonville, Fla. and a sister group from California oozing soul.

Politics aside, the third year of the '70s had it all: from classic- and southern-rock to reggae; punk to jazz; soul and R&B to country. Read on for 20 masterful albums with something to say that celebrate their 50th anniversary in 2023.

Band on the Run won a pair of GRAMMYS the following year: Best Vocal Performance by a Duo, Group or Chorus and Best Engineered Recording, Non-Classical. McCartney added a third golden gramophone for this record at the 54th awards celebration when it won Best Historical Album for the 2010 reissue. In 2013, Band on the Run was inducted into the GRAMMY Hall of Fame.

The album represented a commercial and artistic breakthrough for Hancock, going gold within months of its release. "Watermelon Man" and "Chameleon," which was nominated for a Best Instrumental GRAMMY Award in 1974, were later both frequently sampled by hip-hop artists in the 1990s.

Critics perennially place this Pink Floyd album, the band's eighth studio record, as one of the greatest of all-time. The Dark Side of the Moon hit No.1 and stayed on the Billboard charts for 63 weeks.

This David Bowie record followed the commercial success of The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust & The Spiders from Mars. Many critics unfairly compare the two. A career chameleon, with Aladdin Sane, Bowie shed the Ziggy persona and adopted another alter-ego. The title is a pun that means: "A Lad Insane." For the songwriter, this record represented an attempt to break free from the crazed fandom Ziggy Stardust had created.

Great art is often born from grief, and Brothers & Sisters is exemplary in this way. Founding member Duanne Allman died in 1971 and bassist Berry Oakley followed his bandmate to the grave a year later; he was killed in a motorcycle accident in November 1972. Following this pair of tragedies, the band carried on the only way they knew how: by making music.

While this may seem like a recipe for hating your own creation, the 66-year-old kept Jump for Joy at something of a distance, not overthinking or smothering it. As a result, Louris is elated to put out a record that feels refreshingly weird and untouched yet with his fingerprints all over it. "In this case, it's worked because of COVID and I'm excited to have something I like coming out," he adds. "And I've also made the decision that I'm not going to wait for the record company anymore."

Jump for Joy, which arrived June 4 on Sham/Thirty Tigers, is Louris' first solo album in 13 years. (He last released Vagabonds in 2008.) But while enjoying the intimate, homespun pop songs within, like "New Normal," "Mr. Updike" and "Follow," know that you're not going to have to wait two-and-a-half presidential terms for the next one. A newlywed hitting a new seam of creativity, Louris plans to keep self-producing songs and putting out the results on his website and Bandcamp.

The new album isn't the only thing on Louris' docket: He's been covering the Beatles' White Album in full on his Patreon page; goofing off with his son, Henry, on his music-filled YouTube show, "The S**t Show"; and jamming wild prog records like Yes' Tales from Topographic Oceans. The interior feeling of Jump for Joy sums him up right now: Touring and hitting the studio may not be big priorities, but he's got a wellspring of ideas percolating inside.

While listening to this album, I didn't have a single thought of, "That song sounds like Hollywood Town Hall" or "That part sounds like Tomorrow the Green Grass." I just thought, "That sounds like the Kinks. That sounds like Yes." Is there a faction of your fan base that just wants you to make those two records over and over?

There's definitely a schism we created when we did Smile, even Sound of Lies a little bit. Some people abandoned ship. They didn't like it. Bob Ezrin produced Smile, and I remember that he kept telling me, "Gary, you don't have to be reverential to your audience. Lead, don't follow them."

I grew up listening to pop music and prog rock. Everything English was what I listened to. I didn't grow up in South Carolina listening to Appalachian music. I didn't have brothers or parents who played Crosby, Stills and Nash records. I fell in love with British music. I wanted to be British. I wanted to be in the Who or the Kinks or the Beatles. And then prog rock, hard rock, English punk rock, everything.

While watching your cover songs on "The S**t Show" and checking out your White Album project, I was thinking that you have a versatile voice, one that can handle all those different songbooks and canons. Where do you want to go with the canon in the future?

Originally, I thought, "I want to do something where [it's not] my own music." So I picked the White Album because it's one of my favorites. I recently thought, "Why didn't I do something like Yes' Tales from Topographic Oceans or something really bizarre?" I'll tell you why: Because people would think it's a pompous and difficult prog-rock album to play. But I love that kind of stuff.

My focus is always on writing my own music. However, during the pandemic, I just kind of embraced learning cover songs, which I never really did that much. It teaches you something. It inspires you. And if you're asking what I want to explore as far as covering?

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