RE: Beatles/Who looked at objectively

["Nigel Morton" <nigel@adastey.demon.co.uk>]

An interesting arguement that could run and run.  While being fanatical over
the Who, and have been since first seeing them in '67, I would argue that
there were then a number of groups that were well capable of giving them a
major run for their money.  Admittedly the Beatles, with one or two rare
exceptions were not one of them.  Yep, the Who were harder than most but to
say they claim, easily, the title of the first "hard" rock band isn't easy.
Especially when you consider acts like The Yardbirds, The Animals, Cream who
were all banging around the same time.  However I believe it is possible to
claim that The Who were the first "hard rock" band in the sense that they
distilled many things down to a particular crunching sound but only after a
great period of "pure" pop i.e I'm A Boy, Picture Of Lily, I Can See For
Miles etc, etc.

Yep, The 'Oo were very much "in your face" when most of the competition was
standing to one side but they should also be remembered as a band that had a
clutch of very commercial and poppy tracks in the early part of their
career.

-----Original Message-----
From: owner-thewho@igtc.com [mailto:owner-thewho@igtc.com]On Behalf Of
Mark R. Leaman
Sent: 04 September 2001 14:24
To: TheWho@igtc.com
Subject: Beatles/Who looked at objectively


> I'm not sure I would say that The Who were the first "Hard Rock" band
either.

Deni:

You might not say it, but it's still true. I Want To Hold Your Hand &
Standing There were no harder than any Chuck Berry song, whereas My
Generation was pure Rock. No one had come close at that point.
Please note IWTHYH has that cute little riff (the one after "...say to
me...") while MG is in your face and there's nothing cute or sweet about it.
Standing There has the Poppy "Oooohhh!."
Early Who music was unrelenting, pure, and ugly. "You're gonna know me
woman/And I'm gonna know you..." "Our love was hard and fast..." John & Paul
would never have written such a blunt lyrics.
Looking at it with complete objectivity, Beatles music isn't very different
than Elvis, Holly, and Little Richard...and a LOT like The Beach Boys, who
were the ones who first came up with the sound The Beatles rode to glory.
They were a great band, but they just weren't in the same league as The Who.
Nor were The Stones. The Kinks, yes (for a while), Dylan, of course, XTC,
I'd argue that case. And NONE of them had the performance level of The Who,
so that pretty much gives them the edge.


"It's so much easier to quit on somebody than to remediate."
          George "my IQ is 91" Bush


               Cheers                 ML