Who's Cool (long)

[Extremus@aol.com]

Cool is in the eye of the beholder.  And owner.

My vote for coolest item to date is Pete's guitar strap.  (And it's stored in
a box??  Aarrgh!  If you want it to have a proper home, let me know.  I'll
give the Shrine of Perpertual Adoration of St. Pete's Guitar Strap a lighted
display case, site security, and public availability for adoration by the
devoted, uh, dozens, anyhow.  This is a serious offer.)

The Rick earns the "Most Impressive" award, but I just can't give it cool.
(Sorry.) I seriously looked at one when they came out, but it just wasn't
cool enough for the money.  IMHO, understand.  Something about an endorsed
edition guitar -- anybody's --  falls in the same class as owning a Viper
just so it can sit garage to be shown off.  The strap, however, has that tang
of "this was Pete's and I grabbed it myself" authenticity that's megacool.

I'll probably never own anything that cool (unless the owner takes me up on
my VERY serious offer for displaying it) since I've never gotten that close
to the stage in the right circumstances and probably never will.  But I have
some interesting collectibles that are fairly cool.

I couldn't single out one item as the coolest in my collection, because
different items are cool to me for different reasons.  So, in categories:

Vinyl:  "Tommy" Live in Amsterdam, 3 lps on hot pink vinyl.  

CD:  None.  I've yet to meet a truly cool CD.

Poster:  The Who at Fillmore West 1968 with Cannonball Adderly (anyone even
heard of them?  Say yes and we'll all know how ancient you are!  [not boring,
though]) and The Vagrants (I won't even ask.)  Bright yellow with black print
and flying ears.  The bodies (think of butterflies with ear-shaped wings)
include a big nose (hummm); a torso, feet, a hand, legs, etc.  An original
handbill.
(honorable mention: 1972 "Fallout Shelter Tour" by Bill Graham for 11/20/72
show.  Original, black on yellow with radioactive symbol.  The more-commonly
recognized poster for the same show is the castle in the air with the owl
(most of us probably own one of those).

Coolest, completely unique Who item:  A ceramic pin of Pete's head
(caricature) my partner had made for me for my birthday several years ago.
 About 3" high, mostly nose, and rather unintentionally hilarious.  (He gave
the sculpter a group of photos, just so the guy would get it right and it
still came out a caricature.)

Coolest mini collection: a) Stickers from Empty Glass.  Brown on white,
interior cover pic.  b) McVicar stickers.  Black and red on white, fist with
handcuffs and running man.
c) If you can date and identify this, I'll give you one:  Red on white, 3"
diameter circle.  Drawing of a lion roaring, wearing a t-shirt that says "The
Who and friends roar in!"
d) Blue and red on white "target" design with The Who.  Outer edge of target
is male symbol.
e) The Magic Bus on Tour, multi-colored promo photo sticker 4"X4".

>From the sources, (and dates of acquistion) I know all the above are original
issue.

Coolest things I actually show off in public:  collection of pins.  Most are
from the 70's (TKAA film promos, Quad tour (using the radioactive symbol
again), a few 80's (like Face Dances promo), a really sarcastic one from '89,
with the three set into a U.S note (denomination unknown--do they make $25
million dollar notes?), a few molded plastic, or brass, Who-logo pins that
aren't dated but, again due to source, are probably 25+ years, a few
enamel-on-metal also 20+ years old.  Some, like the promo items, were free.
 I didn't pay more than $1 for any of them.  Proving price has nothing to do
with coolness.

Item other people think is the coolest (next to the hot pink vinyl--that
seems to win hands down my friends): Set of tickets (original) for the
Fillmore show with Cannonball Adderly (see poster note, above).  Thursday,
Friday, & Saturday ($3 a night) with the poster art in different colors for
each night.  To me, they're interesting, but not cool.

Coolest t-shirt:  Fallout Shelter, with "Warning - The Who" on front,
radioactive symbol on back.

As I said, cool is a matter of taste.

Mick Noland