Addicted to noise Fillmore review (long)

[Litgo@aol.com]

I don't think this has been posted yet. From addicted to noise.

Litgo

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Addicted To Noise contributing editor Steve McConnell reports:

Pete Townshend came on-stage at San Francisco's Fillmore
Auditorium at 9:00 PM Tuesday (April 30) night and played, talked and joked
with the sold out crowd (which included R.E.M's Peter Buck) for over two
hours.
Sporting a dark blazer with a bright red kerchief sticking out of the breast
pocket, and a faded jeans jacket underneath, he still had the gall to make a
comment about the air conditioning being installed in a few
weeks.

Townshend opened with a nice version of "Let My Love Open the Door,"
with John Carin on back-up keyboards and vocals. Other highlights of the show
(which varied significantly from the concerts in L.A.) were an acoustic
"Drowned" from Quadrophenia, "Legal Matter," a slow, cocktail piano
version of "I Put a Spell On You," a country blues version of "EyeSight to
the
Blind," and a sing-along "Magic Bus" encore.

Townshend completely skipped
over his best known material from Tommy and Who's Next,
concentrating instead on material from his solo albums (including the songs
"Shout" and "English Boy"). He also did a lovely duet rendition of "Heart to
Hang On To" dedicated to Ronnie Laine with whom he had recorded the piece on
the excellent mid-70's album Rough Mix. He encouraged everyone to buy
that album to help out Ronnie, who is battling MS and has been wheelchair
bound
for a few years. He also remarked that he has plans to play a benefit for
Ronnie with members of the Faces (Laine's former band) sometime in the
future,
and also mentioned that for all his short comings, Rod Stewart is paying
Ronnie's medical bills.

Townshend seemed genuinely moved to be back at the
Fillmore. "This is the first place we played a real rock concert in the
States,
and it was right before we went down to Monterey to play at the festival (
Monterey Pop Festival in 1967)," he said. He also reminisced about listening
to
radio station KSAN in its pioneering free form radio days, and being
interviewed by its founder, underground radio pioneer Tom Donahue. Throughout
the show, lots of people shouted out requests for tunes, from well known to
obscure. "When I hear the things you people are requesting, I think to myself
'they've got all the albums, what am I doing here? What am I plugging?' It
must
be because I like doing it."

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