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Dogs



If Mike Westbrook is right that greyhound racing is cruel to the animals in
question, something I`d like to have more info on before drawing final
conclusions, I certainly would not bemoan the passing of the sport, nor is
it one I`ve ever been involved with personally. My point was not to
romanticise the sport, but to draw attention to Pete Townshend`s artistry in
finding a kind of beauty (under the "starry skies") in aspects of the world
HE grew up in (as indeed he said was his life`s mission in the The Horse`s
Neck). Pete didn`t grow up in a mansion with approved masters hanging on the
walls, or manicured gardens hidden behind walls as high as Prudential. He
didn`t go to Oxbridge and study the socially approved music or literature:
he created his own authentic art in all these areas from the stuff of the
life around him. In Dogs he was taking a wry but affectionate look at
cultural activity which was human and interesting (although perhaps not
perfect), and which was being ignored by the avatars of official culture in
England at the time. He did the same thing in Quadrophenia and his earlier
youth-oriented singles. Only a few rockers are capable of creating this
ironic distance between themselves and their external world to show us human
truths in an original way, and here Pete occupies a select pantheon along
with Lennon and McCartney, Ray Davies, Bob Dylan, Bruce Springsteen, and not
too many others. I can fully understand being interested in the Who for
reasons unrelated to those I`ve highlighted here but some people are also
interested in Townshend`s non-musical (in the strict sense) artistic
aspirations. To put it another way, it would miss the point of say, Lola or
Pinball Wizard to focus on the seedy pleasure dens of 60`s Soho, London as
evil places needing to be cleaned up.  Thirty years later, Soho is as
innocuous a place to be as any Royal garden party, or almost. They`ll get to
the remaining dog tracks before long too, don`t worry........Gary M.