Tommy - Live At The Royal Albert Hall

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Though the rock songs on 1967’s <i>The Who Sell Out</i> had done well, Pete Townshend was increasingly bored by the idea of being a singles band—by making records just meant to earn radio play. Before that record’s release, he’d started to absorb the teachings of Indian spiritual leader Meher Baba, whose classic <i>God Speaks</i> Townshend read after a friend told him that many of Baba’s teachings foreshadowed several of the songwriter’s own idea. “Each theory that I had expounded, many to do with reincarnation and its inevitability when considered in the light of law of average, were summed up in one sentence,” Townshend eventually wrote in <i>Rolling Stone</i>. “What was so sneaky about the whole affair was the way Baba crept into my life.” And, of course, his art. Townshend soon began devising a story of spiritual evolution, about a kid coming out of tough domestic circumstances in post-war Britain, only to become something of a spiritual superstar. That story would be told in 1969’s <i>Tommy</i>, one of rock ’n’ roll’s most accomplished early concept albums—apologies to <i>Sgt. Pepper’s</i>—and a fascinating, if fractured, mirror of Townshend’s own life and those of many of his rock peer. This wa, as the band members admitted, Townshend’s trip—but they became fascinated by his idea, and essentially cheered him along. <i>Tommy</i> sprawls across four full side, its 74 minutes and 24 overdub-heavy tracks moving from acoustic beauty to heavy soul, from Merseybeat charm to menacing proto-punk. Despite some cynical review, the album immediately expanded the rock lexicon and established The Who as its most audacious and eccentric big band. .

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