The Who: Who Are You

Besides being the last studio album issued prior to drummer Keith Moon's passing in 1978, Who Are You holds the distinction of being the most enervating release in the British quartet's discography, even more so than the previous album, The Who By Numbers (MCA, 1975).

Featuring as it does only one outside musician, the late pianist extraordinaire Nicky Hopkins, The Who By Numbers was refreshing and authoritative in its simplicity even as its material, authored in the throes of angst by Pete Townshend, was a veritable morass of personal and creative contradictions. From that perspective, the record might well be seen as a blueprint for its successor.

This eighth record of the iconic band is literally all over the place in both stylistic and thematic terms. But that's in keeping with chief composer Townshend's difficulty in coming up with suitable new material, a situation that fostered the inclusion of three originals from bassist John Entwistle, the most songs by "The Ox" ever on a single Who LP (two of which, including "905," were originally part of a rock opera that Entwistle never completed).

Multiple configurations of Who Are You comprise a reissue campaign featuring the usual remastering of the original recordings, plus outtakes from the studio sessions, demo recordings plus live material, in a varying array of breadth and depth. Along with the usual accouterments of printed prose and photographs, these collections present varying but nonetheless unmistakably revelatory levels of insight into the distracted mindset of the Who at the time of its creation.

The foursome recorded some, but not all of the final takes, with long-time collaborator Glyn Johns (a full album mix of which was rejected by the band but included in a Super Deluxe Edition). As with the massive Life House project that would be distilled down into Who's Next (MCA, 1971) the engineer/producer for The Beatles, The Rolling Stones and Eagles would only enter the picture after initial sessions produced merely scattered, acceptable results.

Indicative of the misfires are the literal-minded likes of Townshend compositions "New Song"—too terribly bitter to ring ironic even when the author sings—and "Music Must Change," where Roger Daltrey sounds passionate, almost desperately so, in keeping with his role as the band member who always refused to overthink the work of the Who.

The content on disc two of the double set, featuring tour rehearsals and newly-mixed live tracks from their first road jaunt without Moon, reaffirm the troubling perceptions that arose from Jeff Stein's film The Kids Are Alright (New World Pictures, 1979) as well as the audio and video releases of The Who Live At Shea Stadium (Eagle, 2015/2024). The volatile dynamism of the Who on stage, which so often in the past erupted into destruction of equipment, had for all intents and purposes disappeared.

With Kenney Jones at the drum kit, precision took precedence over power. Accordingly, the ex-(Small) Faces drummer would see his finest hour on Face Dances (Warner Bros., 1981), the first studio album in the wake of The Loon's passing, nimbly accenting the feisty punctuation of Townshend's guitar and Entwistle's machine-gun bass. As documented here on stage during the otherwise thought-provoking "Sister Disco," however, he keeps the beat of the song at hand, no more and no less.

In a stark contrast (at least in terms of overall quality), the rendition of "Had Enough" sans orchestra echoes the streamlined unity of the original Who. There is a palpable intimacy to this pared-down mix, but unfortunately, no such atmosphere arises from the session outtake of "Empty Glass;" instead, there is an unmistakable fury in the playing and singing of author Townshend on what would become the title song of his third solo album of 1980.

Along the same lines, without the strings of the official take on the longplayer, "Love Is Coming Down" echoes "Song Is Over" on Who's Next in both the forthright words and the ringing piano of Rod Argent. And this brisk "Trick of the Light (Unused Olympic Edit)" sums up the issues at the core of Who Are You; the band second-guessed itself into a stodgy state of indecision that robbed their performances of the majestic abandon that keynotes their earlier work at its best.

For instance, "Guitar And Pen" is too stilted to work because it is pompous and self-referential to a fault. Not the title song though, this despite the fact author Townshend has related the particulars of the actual scenario behind the composition; as Daltrey's dynamic delivery proceeds, the lyrics turn into a real-life narrative even as, musically speaking, it sounds too much like a strained replication of the synthesizer-laced style of the landmark album of 1971.

Given that this archival package arrives so close upon the heels of The Who Live At The Oval 1971 (UME, 2025), a cynical response from some quarters may be a given, particularly as Daltrey and Townshend were conducting "The Song Is Over" farewell tour at the time of this release. Knee-jerk truisms like "cash grab" come to mind.

More pertinent to these proceedings, however, is the very ironic reality that the courage manifest in the best moments of post-Moon tours (and those of even more recent years in the wake of Entwistle's passing) render the perception of Who Are You as a valid testing ground for stretching the boundaries of style rather than ending up an object lesson in being constrained by them.

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