.

What do you expect from a guy who can only play 3 notes on the guitar? All those decibels have probably knocked what little sense he had right out of his head.

Hmmmmm. As a guitar player myself I can confirm that Pete Townshend has been one of the most talented and innovative guitarists that rock has ever produced. Decibels yes...God, when I first heard the Who I thought I would never recover my hearing!

His music is incredible in my own opinion, and while some of his early material was lyrically rather silly, songs like "My Generation" and everything on "Tommy" brilliantly caught something that Townshend has been trying to convey throughout his career: the feelings that youth have that they are lost, alienated and unimportant in an adult world. A lot of that came through in his "Life House" project, parts of which were released as the classical rock album "Who's Next". More of the same in "Quadrophenia".

It was already clear to me as a teenager that Townshend is a survivor himself; in some of his songs it could hardly be more obvious. I could identify with the way he found to cope with this burden: alcohol and drugs. For a long time he was an impossible drunk and he and Keith Moon were the ones responsible for the Who's reputation for demolishing hotel rooms. He also had really bad drug problems and would show up for a gig so drunk that the only way he could perform was for Moon to fix him before the show. A lot of the incredible performance the Who put into their shows was really all about Townshend's need to let loose with pure unadulterated emotion.

Though a wild man himself, he is also a very reflective and intelligent guy and was largely responsible for the fact that Eric Clapton is alive today. Townshend got him into rehab to get him off heroin and alcohol (a bottle of brandy per day).

Like many rock icons, Townshend grew up with the idea that the rules just didn't apply to him. He spent much of his life as a loose cannon on the deck in all sorts of ways, and he has paid a heavy price for that. He has shot himself in the foot many times, but personally (and this is just my opinion) I don't think for a minute that he's a pedophile.

I hope he gets his autobiography out, and I hope this gives him some peace concerning his past. He surely needs it.

Much love,
Larry

I don't know the guy, so all I have to go on is the media reports, which I admit are not the greatest source of truth. However, he seems to keep doing this, from using his credit card to buy pictures of little girls getting raped to writing kiddy porn. I say actions speak louder than words. He's a creep.

You'd think he learned how much the rules do apply to him the last time they caught him at this stuff.

Nobby,

I agree with you and I don't mean to be defending this behavior, but in fact many of these people really don't get it at all. Here's an example. When I was in San Francisco in the late sixties a friend of mine, a guitar player in a band famous all over the country, decided he had to get clean off heroin. Great idea, so what does he do? He goes on a canoeing/rafting trip in the mountains with his wife and three yo son, but he takes along lots of drinks and of course his works for shooting up. One night he and his wife are totally drunk and he fixes her; she ODs and dies right there in front of her toddler son. After this catastrophe does he "get it"? Nope. He continued as before and hadn't learned a thing.

It's a mentality I could never understand, but of course we see it all the time.

Much love,
Larry

Hmmm,

When I saw what this one was about, I figured there'd be some comments....

Love you guys,

John

I do feel sorry that he has been hounded by the media, but it is sad that he had to write stuff like that, he is treading muddy waters for himself and his family.

I used to really like him, but he should have more sense than to try and hang himself,

ste

Ste,

You are so right. People like this surely know already that the harsh media spotlight on them is going to draw the wolves at any provocation.

Townshend was pushing the envelope when he wrote and sang about "Uncle Earnie" and his "fiddling about" with Tommy in 1970, TWO FULL DECADES before the abuse of boys was taken seriously in our society. But what these iconic figures often don't understand is that these achievements - whether musical, social, political, or whatever - don't give them a pass for whatever they want to say or do in the future.

For the record, and although I didn't see the piece PT wrote about the two sixteen year old, I would be willing to bet that it's autobiographical.

Much love,
Larry

Having worked in the UK music industry of the early to mid seventies and two of my abusers being executives in the same industry you would be right in thinking I am a a music nut. That said I have followed The Who since the mid sixties and have seen them live more times than I care to remember, but one thing I did hear with regard Mr. Townshend was he went through a spell of that old chestnut the all prevaling "Sexual Identity Crisis".

I always identified with his lyrics especially so with the release of "Quadrophenia":

The Real Me:

I went back to the doctor
To get another shrink.
I sit and tell him about my weekend,
But he never betrays what he thinks.

Can you see the real me, doctor?

I went back to my mother
I said, "I'm crazy ma, help me."
She said, "I know how it feels son,
'Cause it runs in the family."

Can you see the real me, mother?

The cracks between the paving stones
Look like rivers of flowing veins.
Strange people who know me
Peeping from behind every window pane.
The girl I used to love
Lives in this yellow house.
Yesterday she passed me by,
She doesn't want to know me now.

Can you see the real me, can you?

I ended up with the preacher,
Full of lies and hate,
I seemed to scare him a little
So he showed me to the golden gate.

Can you see the real me preacher?
Can you see the real me doctor?
Can you see the real me mother?
Can you see the real me?

And this one especially. I really thought at one time it was about me and I still regard it as my song.

Dr. Jimmy:

Laugh and say I'm green
I've seen things you'll never see.
Talk behind my back
But I'm off the beaten track.
I'll take on anyone
Ain't scared of a bloody nose,
Drink till I drop down
With one eye on my clothes.

What is it? I'll take it.
Who is she? I'll rape it.
Got a bet there? I'll meet it.
Getting High? You can't beat it.

Doctor Jimmy and mister Jim
When I'm pilled you don't notice him,
He only comes out when I drink my gin.

You say she's a virgin.
I'm gonna be the first in.
Her fellah's gonna kill me?
Oh fucking will he.
I'm seeing double
But don't miss me if you can.
There's gonna be trouble
When she choses her man.

What is it? [etc.]

Doctor Jimmy and mister Jim etc.
Is it me? For a moment
The stars are falling.
The heat is rising
The past is calling.

I'm going back soon
Home to get the baboon.
Who cut up my eye,
Messed up my Levis.
I'm feeling restless
Bring another score around
Maybe something stronger
Could really hold me down.

Townshend to me is one of the chief commenators of the 20th Century, but how can a man with his intelligence go into a CP site and pay for images for research? ...... That act was/is beyond my comphrehension, I know what CP is like it happened to me and I dont need reminding by way of looking at stuff like that, I would have thought he had a good enough imagination to figure it out without entering one of those sites he certainly had an insight when he wrote "Uncle Ernie" from Tommy.

However it is now well known that Townshend was abused by his grandmother and that he has only just recently disclosed but he was getting close to that point with the publication of this essay:

A Different Bomb.

It is a pdf document and it can be read here at:

http://www.petetownshend.co.uk/media/020120adifferentbomb.pdf

As to his recent writings on teenage sex I have no desire to read it and wonder why he did publish it on the net is he going through some sort of perverse way of purging himself?

Like Roadrunner I dont think Townshend is a paedophile either as I know he has been supportive of survivor groups in the past.

Kirk
"Lets grab this bull by the horns and swing it about a bit"

Kirk,

I don't know if Pete has ever commented on it himself, but when he and the Who were just getting started and were still pretty innocent to the "ways of the world", Kit Lambert had him and Keith Moon staying in his flat with him on various occasions. I often wondered what that was all about, but perhaps it was just Lambert being supportive. Back then the Who were more or less penniless and hardly getting by.

Larry