Hearing and the Who

["Gary M. Gillman" <garyg@inforamp.net>]

Well, I've learned a fair bit from Scott Totten, Litgo and other listers as
to the difficulties PT would face were he to attempt to play a
pre-1985-style Who show. But in the end I still think there's a lot of
unanswered questions. For example, in that 1989 interview Scott quoted,
which I was familiar with, Pete says wearing earplugs would compromise the
performance in his terms. The interviewer did not ask him to explain that
statement, however. Also, isn't the performance compromised to a degree when
one selects another guitarist to play one's lines - unless of course that's
the only feasible alternative in the circumstances, which may well have been
the case in 1989? I accept that Scott cannot wear earplugs and play Who
music effectively, but many hard rockers do wear them without difficulty.
Ted Nugent has worn an earplug in his one good ear since 1967 (he lost the
hearing in the other one due to playing too loud). Also I understand there
are special plugs available today that pipe in the sound from the board at
the volume selected by the wearer - I understand that the members of Rush
use them when playing live. So far, until we hear more from PT on this, I'm
most persuaded by a reason mentioned by both Scott and Jen: Pete's moved
beyond the old power chord rock for artistic reasons, and sees no reason to
revert to the old ways even if he could.....Gary M.