Pete Townshend has hailed his late bandmates Keith Moon and John Entwistle as a "formidable" rhythm section.
"I think one of the things that all guitarists of today are intimidated by is these young guys on Instagram that shred to hell and back, or to heaven and back, I should say, who started when they were six. But we are just our fingers."
"So they were a very formidable rhythm section.
"And I knew I could play anything and they would follow.
John Entwistle would know the notes that I was playing sometimes before I did!
So the importance of listening is vital."
The 'Baba O'Riley says a lot of Instagram guitarists he follows, as good as they are at playing, they need to work with other people to learn the art of listening.
Speaking about the late music icon Prince's "flashy" shredding, he said: "Well, Prince could shred and he often would play a really soulful blues track, and then in order to get from one bit of blues to the other, he would do an extraordinary shred.
So it was a bit flashy. Maybe it was just to show he could do it. So, I don't know.
"I think it's just the disconnect that has happened sometimes.
"And where you see it stop is when that kind of artist, and there are many on Instagram - one of my favorites is a guy called Angel Vivaldi, who's a brilliant, brilliant player - but when he works with other musicians, he changes. He actually listens to them and fits in. He can play anything that he wants.
"And there are a couple of others that I follow as well, but a lot of them are just solo musicians that have mastered their craft and got really, really fast.
"So, I think what needs to happen is they need to be fitted into the music world, somewhere other than Instagram. That's the challenge for them. I think it's the challenge right now, as it is for a lot of electronic music musicians: they are very isolated, working on their own."
"So The Who have just done a tour of the UK and I don't expect people to go on YouTube and get their minds blown, but I do think that some of the playing, some of the solos, some of the chordwork, some of the surprises, some of the avoiding tricks and being willing to take risks is really what I feel the guitar is great for."
"What I'm happy about is I can do two days of practice and learn some really flashy runs if I want to, though I'm still stuck with the old order, which is trying to make sure I don’t let my fingers play a series of cliches."
"I remember Leslie West saying to me about Eric Clapton: 'I prefer your licks, Pete, to Eric's, because Eric seems to be playing things that he's learned, that he's picked up from other blues players.' And I think that is a fair comparison, although I have seen Eric play live, where he really goes sky high."
Typically though, his views are clouded in negativity. However, Townshend seems to have changed his tune of late, safe in the belief that rock music is in good health.
No longer ago, Townshend declared the death of rock ‘n’ roll and lost faith in the younger generation to carry the torch. He felt very few artists were using music as a vehicle of protest, and rock ‘n’ roll had lost the authentic fury that once fuelled it.
“I think rock music is about to throw off some of its testosterone-driven defiance. Wherever I look today I see younger musicians demanding a new level of intimacy from their audience. This is not entirely about protest, rather about music performed gently that expresses a single idea, even anger is delivered gently.”
However, in an interview with the New York Times, Townshend accepted that rock music no longer had the same definition as it did when The Who began. Over the years, the genre has constantly evolved and is more than a sound or hit song, it’s the voice of the youth.
”Authentic is the key word for Townshend, and even though he admits that authenticity is an attribute that he lacks, The Who man is still a rockstar. In his eyes, anybody who can put on a live performance in a stadium is deserving of the mantle. Therefore, according to Townshend’s metric, Adele, Ed Sheeran, and Taylor Swift are the faces of modern rock, despite their sound suggesting otherwise.
“Authentic to the perceived, accepted ideal of a rock star. Now, online, you’ll see a throwaway statement – ‘rock is dead’ – which is something that we in our genre have been considering since the ’70s. But what is rock? Rock is hip-hop. Rock is probably Taylor Swift. Rock is, dare I say it, Adele and Ed Sheeran.
They’ve dared to take on that mantle, and they have to deliver. They’ve got to do something spectacular as performers. Not just as recording artists.”
“They’ve got to do something amazing, and if it includes dancers, if it includes too much video, then they’re cheating. They know that, we know that, and the audiences know that.
That’s why audiences will come to something like a Who concert or a Stones concert, where there might be some video, there might be a symphony orchestra, but at the end of the day it’s about: ‘Can you dance for two and a half hours without dropping dead?
Can you sing without lip-syncing for two and a half hours?’ It’s about sport. It’s about entertainment as a physicality. It’s about an endurance test.”
Source: New York Times - Faroutmagazine- Ultimate Guitar.com-
