The Well Run Dry? (Was Re: FACE DANCES")

[Gary Sumpter <garys@spectranet.ca>]

Kevin Cotrupe <KC@screamingmedia.com> wrote:

>Think about it ...this guy writes Tommy, Who's Next, Quadrophenia, Who By
Numbers, >Empty Glass, Chinese Eyes etc... That's a lot of music to be
written by one's >self......No Lennon and McCartney...No Jagger and
Richards ...Just Pete. maybe the >well just ran dry.............maybe
that's why he might be hesitant to write new >material ...who knows...????

Try telling that to Bob Pollard of Guided by Voices.  It's been said (and I
don't remember the precise quote) that Pollard can write 5 or 6 songs while
sitting on the toilet -- and that a couple of them will be really good!
The fact that Pollard is a huge Who fan is just icing on the cake.  Get
hold of "Bee Thousand" or "Under the Bushes, Under the Stars" and listen to
them all the way through twice -- that's right, twice; once to familiarize
yourself with it, twice to let those hooks grab you -- and you're a goner.

As for Pete, I'm not so sure I believe it's a case of "the well running
dry".  It seems to me he's spent the bulk of the last 20 years trying to
convince everyone -- himself included -- that he's outgrown rock & roll,
that it's somehow beneath him.  He's always been pretentious (in the most
agreeable sort of way) without being pompous, but judging from the
discussion here, most people seem to think the qualitative decline in his
writing began around the time of "Who Are You", continued through "Face
Dances" and "It's Hard", and invaded his solo work as well -- with the
possible exception of "Empty Glass".  If this is true, how do we account
for it?  The decline actually pre-dates the usual excuses -- Moon's death
and the Cincinnati tragedy -- so, while those events surely would have
exacerbated the problem, they didn't create it.  Seems to me the period
1977-1978 was particularly rough on Pete, with the advent of punk, his
growing complacency with the Who, the onset of his hearing problems... and
maybe even a nervous breakdown (wasn't it around this time that he claimed
he used to wake up in the middle of the night "praying to be destroyed"?).

Still, Pete's had flashes of brilliance since the demise of the Who.  A
number of songs from "White City" were fantastic.  So too with
"PsychoDerelict" (and "English Boy" in particular).  He seems to have the
rock & roll itch again -- more now than at any point in the past 20 years
-- and he seems to have reconciled himself to the Who's continued
existence, so perhaps the time is right for a creative outburst with the
band... (and what a shame Guided by Voices isn't opening!)