Roger interview (repost BTW)

["L. Bird" <pkeets@hotmail.com>]

>from Gary Herman, The Who

Roger is the main text, the interviewer is in the *'s. What I find 
interesting about this is that Rog is talking about the actual process of 
music-making - it's obvious that he doesn't just walk into the studio, sing 
and walk out again, but he was actively concerned about The Who's sound, 
more than I had thought.

~~~~~~~~~

Interview with Roger Daltrey late January 1971 at his Tudor cottage in
Buckinghamshire: *When we arrived he had just finished digging a trench in 
preparation for building a wall*

I always knew I'd make it, after starting The Detours. We never started for 
any reason, just that we liked playing together. No ambition or anything. 
Every week we used to get that much better.

*That was in 61 or 62. What kind of music were you playing then and later 
with the High Numbers?*

When the Detours were out, we were just learning to play anything. Duane 
Eddy stuff, Shadows, Hank Marvin was king. Really, that's about it. Cliff 
Richard stuff, you know.

*You sang then?*

No, I was lead guitarist. Didn't sing at all.

*Why not?*

I never bothered. I didn't want to, just wanted to play guitar.

*What sort of things were you doing before you started the group on a
full-time basis? Were you still at school?*

We were at school, yeah. And I got kicked out of school. After the group had 
been together for about three months, for smoking behind the bogs 
[bathrooms] or something stupid. That was even before Pete had joined the 
group. That was just me and John out of the original group. Pete joined 
about nine months after that. He was just learning guitar. Played it more 
like a banjo at that point.

*What happened then?*

Jesus Christ! Went through about four lead singers and various people coming 
in with strange instruments and then decided to sling everything out. There 
was another drummer at that time, so it was John, Pete, and myself and this 
other drummer. We'd been through playing all *pop* music, it was just after 
the Beatles made it. We played Beatle songs for about six months and then we 
completely forgot that and went on a really heavy blues trip. That gave us 
our freedom, that's when we really started putting out any sort of new 
music.

*That wasn't R&B like on the first album?*

No! that was after playing blues for two years that that came out. And it 
was very scrappily done, that first album, anyway. It wasn't like we were on 
stage. I mean, we were playing like Jimmy Reed stuff, John Lee Hooker. That 
album was recorded very quickly and very cheaply and it wasn't really what 
we were all about then but it came out in the period when we were getting 
into Pete Townshend more, you know. And forgetting about the blues.

*By this time he could play guitar.*

Yeah! We went through this Johnny Kidd and the Pirates scene, copied
everybody, you know, literally. That was the Detours, then we became The Who
when we started playing blues and then after about another six months we
kicked the drummer out and Moon came along. W e got in touch with Peter
Meaden and he decided to call us The High Numbers. Meaden got us on to the
Tamla Motown sort of thing. But blues taught us to use musical freedom, you 
know. Playing pop before, you just copied a record and that was it. If we 
got near to the record we were happy. But blues was a completely different 
thing altogether. There was so little in a blues song that you had to do 
something different, improvise. We'd play one verse for 20 minutes, and like 
make up half the lyrics and improvise on the music.

*There is on I'm a Man, which comes a bit later than all this, what seemed 
to be at the time rather sophisticated electronics.*

Well, Townshend was the starter of it all, I don't care what anyone says. 
Well… I think Beck as well, [this would be Jeff Beck, rather than Beck 
Hanson, which would be funny…] about the same time, it's a bit dodgy between 
the two. But Pete went much further than Beck ever did. Pete wasn't 
interested in the technique of the guitar, he'd use a guitar in a completely 
different way from Beck. Beck would use electronics with technique and work 
it into one, whereas Townshend just *banged* the guitar and used the 
electronics, and I mean, no technique at all. Pete was the original feedback 
merchant. I'm A Man was only feedback using switches - boi-oi-oing. I mean, 
an electric guitar, really all it is is a guitar with a microphone. Pete 
used the microphone part of it instead of the fretboard, that's what I'm
saying.

*Most of the electronic effects, apart from mixing procedures, that you use 
can be reproduced on stage, which distinguishes you from groups like The 
Byrds who emphasise studio electronics and also because you don't use 
elaborate equipment, from The Floyd and similar groups.*

Oh, sure, Pete could go up on stage with two strings stuck over a piece of 
wood with a microphone under it and make it work. He didn't need a guitar to 
do it. Which is the difference between him and Hendrix who used the same 
sort of feedback, but he uses it with technical things which completely 
changes it. But basically it's the same.

*H used the feedback to build on the note*

Yeah, right. Townshend would just bang his guitar and leave all the strings 
open and then just twiddle about with the knobs to get the different tones, 
so he really wasn't playing guitar at all.

*Was he serious about it?*

Sure he was serious. He was after that incredible sound. It was incredible, 
you know. I still think it was some of the best sound we ever got. 
Everything was so bloody loud, and at that time them sort of sounds were 
unheard of. If you could find a sound like that today, to make people really 
go like that, you'd be a big man. At that time we had the sound that made 
'em go like that.

*There's the incredible middle break in Anyway Anyhow Anywhere with the 
guitar that sounds like a morse tapper*

That's just using a switch between the two pickups.

*At that time, when The Who were recording that sort of thing with Townshend 
making his guitar sound like an aeroplane or a morse tapper or a machine 
gun, there was a great reaction against this sort of electronic innovation 
and greater musical freedom, which is strange considering that there were 
similar developments in classical music at the same time. It seems that the 
pop-rock world was more reactionary than the classical world.*

Yeah. It's changing now though, thank God. But there again, I think because 
it's changing it's making pop a bit washy. I wish people would start saying 
pop's shit again, I really do. At least it makes the people in pop more 
aggressive. If all the old straights came out again and said 'what a load of 
rubbish' all the groups would get out and produce something really good 
again. 'Cause that's what starts it, man, that's what started us - complete 
aggravation with the people saying what a load of rubbish you're doing. We 
had to go out with a bigger load of rubbish to annoy them. So we tried to 
apply all the things we were doing to our record, to make an original sound.
That was Can't Explain.

*But CE isn't that original, not more than AAA, for example*

Yeah, AAA was much more original, CE was a pinch from The Kinks anyway. All 
we wanted to do was to get a hit record just to get recognition. So that 
when we went up North everyone would go 'The Who, who? Who?' do you know 
what I mean? You know, at that time the mod thing was dying out in London, 
but the rest of the country was just waking up to it, that's what kept us 
afloat. It's like the skinhead thing, that's dead in London, but go up to 
Manchester and there's thousands of them. At that time we never played out 
of bloody London. Derby or Coventry seemed like the other end of the earth.
[Coventry's about 2 hours away by train…] I mean we used to go up there, we 
used to pack bloody supplies. It was like a bleedin' safari. That's why CE 
was so good. It got people listening, all over the country, it was different 
- not completely original - it was a different sound. And it gave us the 
chance to get our ugly mugs on the box. Once we were there, mate, we could 
get in with some of the sounds we'd been doing. That's all you need, it's a 
lever. So Kit got on to a guy called Shel Talmy, who'd done the Kinks. T 
came down and heard this number CE and said that's the one. That was all it 
was to us. We did other numbers but that was the only original we had and he
wanted something original.

*How did you decide on releases later on in your career, when you no longer 
had the guidance of an experienced producer like Talmy?*

Well, we know. I mean you *know*. Like The Seeker we knew wouldn't be that 
big. But we released it - it done its job, you know, the people who were 
interested in The Who bought it. When we had Pinball Wizard, we *knew* as 
soon as we heard Pete's demo, and that's just how it goes, and we all just 
say that's the one. It isn't down to any one bloke.

*The Seeker, for example, seems to be Pete Townshend's trip. How did you 
feel about releasing a number like that, in which it seems that Townshend is 
in a way using you and the others to put over his own philosophy?*

No, not really, 'cause I think we're all seekers, you know, I mean, I know 
what you're trying to say, but it isn't so. I don't agree with you to say it 
was just Pete doing his thing at all. There was a time when we all went 
through ego trips, fighting all the time, but if one of the group went down 
we were always the first to help him 'cause really we're the best of friends 
and we've all gone through the trips that Townshend talks about in The 
Seeker. I think it was America that really brought us together. It was like 
the four of us, and a couple of road managers, on a desert island, so we 
just had to come together 'cause there was nobody else. There's nothing 
material about us, we don't go about together after a show. I know it sounds 
a bit enh…, but it's a very spiritual thing. The Who, us four people. It's a 
very very strange thing. Pete just happens to put what we feel in a song.

*Does he come along with a lot of songs and do you all agree to record one 
of them or does he say this is the song we're going to record?*

No, he comes along with a lot of songs. Maybe then, and out of them we might 
do three. He's literally written thousands of songs.

*Even though Townshend writes most of your songs, the actual end product is 
a product of The Who as a whole?*

Definitely. I mean, we all know each other so well now that Pete can go and 
make a demo and he'll play bass just like John and he'll sing just like I 
sing. So it's got to the stage where he knows exactly what it's going to 
sound like when we first play it. But even then it still changes a hell of a 
lot in the studio, the arrangement and things, it's a group thing. When we 
did Tommy Pete used to come in some days with just half a demo. We used to 
talk for hours, literally. We probably did as much talking as we did 
recording. Sorting out arrangements and things.

*What about lyrics?*

He always comes up with the lyrics, that's the one thing he's always done. 
We obviously have to make changes, but basically I don't want to interfere 
with them because he's miles better at it than I'll ever be.

*It doesn't worry you that Townshend seems to get all the limelight, and all 
the glory in the pop and rock press?*

That's all right. That's 'cause his part of the group is the part that the 
press pick out. But there again Pete can't put on and arrange a good stage 
act. Only I can do that. Cause Keith and John ain't got any idea, nor's 
Pete. They can't go on and say we'll play this set of numbers and it'll add 
up to this. That's my gift, it don't get publicised, I don't give a shit. 
All that matters to me is The Who. We did nearly split up at the time of MG, 
it was a big thing, arguments between me and Moon, and I was gonna leave the 
group and form one with Pete. I didn't want to because I knew we could be a 
bloody sight bigger, we were like the perfect painting, we were just right.
And I couldn't sing with any other group, not now, and I wouldn't want to. 
The kind of ego trips that other groups go through we went through right at 
the beginning. Now Pete's got the biggest ego and we all feed his ego and 
none of us care about his ego. He needs it and because he's got the biggest 
ego he writes the best material, perhaps, of any pop writer at the moment. 
If we can feed that, I don't mind being the food. In fact I rather enjoy it. 
But Pete doesn't do it all so Townshend gets the publicity, he does it for 
the Who and that's what holds it all together.


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