Many of the basics of rock began with The Who: the emphatic clang of Pete Townshend’s guitar, the ardent histrionics of singer Roger Daltrey, the dexterity of John Entwistle’s bass playing, the exuberant pummelling of madcap drummer Keith Moon. Also as pioneers of longer-form musical ideas from 1966, The Who massively expanded the lexicon of the music.
While Tommy remains The Who’s archetypal concept album, their greatest achievement, Who’s Next, stems from Townshend’s failure to top that idea. He sketched out Lifehouse, a project so complex it made the fractured narrative of Tommy seem as straightforward as their song I Can’t Explain, but finishing Lifehouse proved beyond the limits of his confidence – and the band’s patience (it was eventually completed in its intended form in 1999). But at the time, The Who were left with a batch of extraordinary songs which they captured in a studio with unprecedented clarity and energy.
From the mid-70s onwards, a disenchanted Townshend suffered an unfortunate tendency to publicly disparage his abilities and achievements and also those of the group. The Who initially survived his sour attitude, and even the death of Keith Moon in 1978, replacing this singular drummer with the able yet clearly unsuitable Kenney Jones (ex-Small Faces/Faces), but they eventually disbanded in 1982.
Subsequently there was little activity (the odd bad-tempered reunion such as at Live Aid) until 1989, when they regrouped as an expanded touring unit and worked intermittently. But it wasn’t until the late 90s, when they reconstituted themselves as a compact five-piece with long-term keyboardist John ‘Rabbit’ Bundrick and Moon disciple Zak ‘Son Of Ringo’ Starkey on drums that they began to build the kind of momentum needed to overcome the mental hurdle of recording again.
Those aspirations suffered a massive setback with the death of John Entwistle in June 2002, immediately prior to The Who embarking on a major US tour.
New material eventually emerged on 2004’s Then And Now compilation in the form of two impressive new tracks that bode well for the planned release of a new album, which finally emerged in 2006 (Endless Wire). The was followed, at typical Who-speed, by the self-titled Who in 2019. Maybe there'll be another in 2032.