Musical Ideas Change
In the early days of rock ‘n roll from 1953 to 1964, singles were the main money maker for the music industry. Instead of an artist or group recording an album and releasing songs off of that album to promote themselves, singles were released one at a time from an artist and based off the strength of those singles, the artist would be given the right to release an album. These albums were essentially greatest hits that were just thrown together on a whim without any forethought just in time for the Christmas holiday season. So even when albums were released they didn’t sell very well.
However that all changed in 1966 when the Beatles released their pioneering album titled
Rubber Soul. This vinyl is important because it is the first one ever to be taken as a serious art from. The Beatles spent time on this album and made sure that every single song was up to par. Every single song stood out as its own and yet, it seemed as if all the songs fit in the right place. If you removed even one song, the album would seem incomplete and wouldn’t be as good as history has looked back on it. That is why when it was first released, Capitol Records decided not to release any singles off of the album in the U.S. because they believed that the record should be viewed as a whole (Leaf 8). Rubber Soul was such a hit that it fell on many ears, and many other artists took notice as well.
One of these musicians was Brian Wilson, leader of the Beach Boys. When Wilson listened to that vinyl he instantly knew that this was the future of rock n roll and the future of music in general. “An album with all good stuff!” he said. Brian’s musical instincts were awakened and he decided to out do the Beatles and record the greatest album ever written (Leaf 9).
The album that would be released later that year was Pet Sounds. Pet Sounds was considered, at the time, the greatest album ever made and to this day still is regarded as one of the most important American musical recordings of the last century. Pet Sounds was a break from the traditional Beach Boys “surfer sound” with the surf style guitar and drums that heavily influenced Keith Moon. Pet Sounds’ focus however, is on the message. All the vocal parts are turned up almost twice as loud as the instruments. The lyrics too give hint of what was later to come in rock n’ roll in the way of a concept album. Pet Sounds seemed like a journey of love, a journey of a man trying to find love and telling the world about it. Needless to say, the Beatles had been beat. Now it was their turn to answer back.
The Beatles answer was Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band which was released in the spring of 1967. It has been hailed by generations of music fans, and critics as the single most important record of all time. Its ideas of concept, songwriting, and musical quality had never been heard before. It’s as if the Beatles had only built upon the foundation laid down by Brian Wilson. Sgt. Pepper’s is considered the original “concept” album in the fact that it is centered on a theme. The theme, though it be a rather weak one, is that the Beatles are really this band called Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band. It doesn’t sound like the Beatles. It sounds as if some other band is playing the songs written by the Beatles. So needless to say, the 1960’s music scene was rapidly changing as far as overall musical concept, vision, and ideas. And the catalyst for all this change is due to the friendly competition between the Beatles and the Beach Boys in the mid nineteen sixties. The three albums that were just mentioned got one, two, and three on the Rolling Stone 500 Greatest Albums list. One being Sgt. Pepper, two being Pet Sounds, and three being Rubber Soul (Leavy).
Radio Stations and Rock Operas
I: The Who Sell Out - The First Serious Concept Album
The summer of 1967 was the summer of love. The hippie movement was at its full swing, LSD was in, and Sgt. Pepper was getting heavy rotation both in the states, in the United Kingdom and all over the world. The highlight of that summer took place June 16th, 17th, and 18th at the Monterey International Pop Music Festival in San Francisco. Monterey is the predecessor to Woodstock that would later come in the summer of 1969 as the last hoorah for the hippie movement. Monterey is famous for the U.S. debut of four major artists. Janis Joplin, Otis Redding, Jimi Hendrix, and the Who.
It is now an infamous story about the festival that both Pete Townshend and Jimi Hendrix got into an argument back stage. Neither one of them wanted to go after the other for fear of not living up to the other artist. Finally after a few moments of arguing Pete shouted, “We’re going first and that is it!” Jimi was alright with that. However, since he was going second, he said that he would “pull out all the stops and play a better show.” And play a better show Jimi did. The most endearing picture of this concert is the picture of Jimi Hendrix lighting his guitar on fire while on stage after performing a cover of the classic Bob Dylan song, “Like a Rolling Stone” (Albright). Clearly the Who had been upstaged but it did not get them down. Pete Townshend had a greater resolve to make better songs and have better guitar work on future Who material.
And this material would come in the form of one of the first actual concept album to ever to be released. In the winter of 1967 the Who released The Who Sell Out. Sell Out plays like a radio station on vinyl. It is a celebration of pop music and serves as an ode to Radio London, and other pirate radio stations in Britain that were banned because of the passing of the Marine Broadcasting Act on August 14th of that year (Fletcher 220). The album came complete with radio jingles and advertisements between each song. Even the songs were tongue and cheek when it came to advertising a product. The love song “Odorono” is really an advertisement for a fake brand of deodorant. The album cover itself showed pictures of the band in pictures promoting the products that they sing about in the advertisements. Pete Townshend is seen with a stick of odorono deodorant, Roger Daltrey in a bathtub of Heinz Baked Beans, Keith Moon with “medac” lotion to cure pimples and John Entwistle is seen with a beach going girl around his arm thanks to his workout with the Charles Atlas program. So it’s easy to see that nothing like Sell Out had ever been released before. With its concept of a radio station on an album, with the idea of “selling out” to fake companies and products that didn’t even exist, this album has stood the test of time as one of the greatest pop records ever.
Not only were the concepts new, but the lyrics too gave hint at what was to come later on for the Who. The final song off of Sell Out, titled “Rael”, tells the story of the overpopulation of China in the year 1999. With the “red chins” having no where else to live, they decided to engulf and conquer other countries to make more room. One of these countries is the country of Israel. From there, the listener is taken on a six and a half minute voyage on a sea journey to redeem the planet from total destruction. This song was from an abandoned concept album that Pete Townshend was calling rock opera. And that term would become more popular than anyone could ever dream of.
So The Who Sell Out is very important in two ways. It builds off of songs and ideas from the past such as Pet Sounds, and Sgt. Pepper, and it also paves the way for even greater ideas in the future. The idea of having commercials or ads on an album between every song was used again on the 2002 album from Queens of the Stone Age titled Songs For The Deaf. This album plays like you are on a later night cruise in your muscle car flipping between stations to listen to whatever is on. But unlike Sgt. Pepper, and more like Sell Out, it sounds like all the songs are connected. There is a line of unity that holds it together. It’s not Queens trying to be another band such as the Beatles did, it’s Queens being who they are which is borrowed more from The Who Sell Out.
II: Tommy And The Birth Of The Rock Opera
“Glow Girl” was a song recorded for The Who Sell Out but never made it onto the vinyl. However, was released on the 1995 reissue of the album. “Glow Girl” tells the story of a pregnant woman who is involved in a plane crash. She barely survives and when the plane comes down and lands, she gives birth to a baby girl. The last lines of the song are, “It’s a girl Mrs. Walker, it’s a girl”. This song started the whole concept for what would later become the very first rock opera ever released.
Pete Townshend was constructing the story line of an album that he was calling “rock opera”. Its story consisted of an autistic child who was born deaf, dumb, and blind and was trying to overcome his physical limitations (Fletcher 244). The storyline was being written mainly by Pete Townshend with some assistance from John Entwistle on songs about sensitive subjects such as child abuse, and school bullying. When the storyline was completed it was a very vague, overly religious story that obviously was not going to sell. With a little editing from then manager, Kit Lambert, Pete’s dull knife of a message and story was sharpened into a fine point that didn’t give the story away, but it did keep the listener interested. With the addition of the song “Pinball Wizard” to the album track listing, from the suggestion of a young rock critic Nick Cohn, the storyline was complete. (Fletcher 245).
Tommy was a seventy minuet double vinyl album. That alone was risky enough to consider it a flop before it was released. Who songs, their two mini operas not withstanding, were always around the two and a half to three and a half minute mark. On Tommy, there is a five and a half minute “Overture”, a ten minute “Underture” and the final song, “We’re Not Gonna Take It” is seven and a half minutes. It was the Who growing up and many thought that there would be a heavy backlash for abandoning their right-to-the-point message.
Other than the song length, the content was very different as well. Of course the Who had always stood out for their unique songwriting and their unique story telling, but for 1969 the topic of child molesting, and child abuse was very touchy and many just kept their mouths shut about it. And to make matters even worse, the abuse was done to an autistic child who couldn’t see what was going on, who was doing it to him, and he couldn’t scream for help. However, The Who tried to play down the heavy handedness of the album by releasing songs that weren’t the darkest musically or as lyrically controversial. So on paper it seems easy why Tommy wouldn’t sell. Who would want to listen to an hour long “Jesus opera” about a handicapped boy who is doomed to live a life of emptiness and finds spiritual redemption?
That is where the Who proved doubters and skeptics wrong. None of the singles released from the album were the more questionable songs. “Pinball Wizard”, “I’m Free” and “Listening To You” were all songs about celebrity, spiritual salvation, and redemption. This is why Tommy sold so well. When Tommy was released in the late spring of 1969, it peaked at the number two spot on the charts on both sides of the Atlantic. Single handedly the Who has created a new rock medium thanks to the critical and fan acclaim of the album.
Tommy has gone onto critical acclaim and has been presented in many formats all around the world. From the opera movie staring Anne Margaret and Roger Daltrey himself as Tommy in 1975 to the Broadway musical that has been playing for many years and has won awards around the world. Tommy has gone on be a cultural phenomenon and the album is number ninety six on the 500 Greatest Albums list done by Rolling Stone in 2003 (Leavy) Tommy was such a hit musically that it opened the door for a slew of rock operas and concept albums that carry a plot and storyline. David Bowie‘s The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars, Pink Floyd‘s The Wall, Rush‘s 2112, Husker Du‘s Zen Arcade, Frank Zappa‘s Joe‘s Garage, and the most recent, American Idiot by Green Day are all rock operas or concept albums with a storyline thanks in part by the success of Tommy (The Who 12).
Green Day’s opera is perhaps the most closely Who related album of all time. The very fact that it is a rock opera is direct influence brought on by the Who because the Who created the rock opera. American Idiot features two nine minuet long songs called “Jesus Of Suburbia” and “Homecoming”. These songs are almost exact carbon copies of the Who song “A Quick One While He’s Away”. “A Quick One” is also a nine minute long pop song that is comprised of six shorter pop songs that are all a part of a giant narrative. “A Quick One” tells the story of love, marriage, betrayal, and ultimately - forgiveness. Even the characters names are somewhat similar if not the same. Green Day has Jesus of Suburbia, the main character of the opera, while the Who has Ivor The Engine Driver. Green Day has a St. Jimmy in their album while the Who have Jimmy as the main character in their second rock opera, Quadrophenia. Even the sound of American Idiot harkens back to the Who during their first albums from 1965 and 1966. Both bands have the use of Marshall Stacks, both bands have a talented bassist, and both bands have a crazy man from a drummer who hits whatever he wants to. Apparently this must not be a bad idea because in the year 2005 American Idiot sold four million copies in the United States alone making it one of the ten best selling albums of the year (Hiatt)
Bibliography
Albright, Randy (Lecturer). (2001). Z301:1967 And Monterey .IUPUI school of music
Fletcher, Tony. Moon: The Life And Death Of a Rock Legend. New York: Harper Entertainment, 1999
Gilbert, Pat. "From Despair to Where?" MoJo. February 2006: 147
Guitar Legends: The Ultimate Guide To Green Day. (2005).Guitar Legends (USA) 81.
Hiatt, Brian. “Music Tanks in ‘05” Rolling Stone. January 26, 2006: 992.
Leaf, David. Pet Sounds historical essay, Pet Sounds. (Capitol (D) T 2458. 2001)
Levy, Joe. Rolling Stone’s 500 Greatest Album’s of all Time. New York. Werner’s Books, 2005.
“Mod (lifestyle)”. Wikipedia.(28 March 2006) 4PP. 30 March 2006
Savage, Jon. England’s Dreaming: Anarchy, Sex Pistols, Punk Rock, and Beyond. New York. St. Martin’s Griffin, 2001.
“The Who”. Wikipedia. (10 March 2006) 10 March 2006
by Jon Lafollette
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