First, it was drummer Keith Moon. And now, bassist John Entwistle. Both of these members of The Who have made real the most famous brash statement ever set forth by their brash leader, guitarist/songwriter Pete Townshend, that statement being the semi-shocking and entirely snotty “hope I die before I get old.”
Entwistle was the quiet, dark figure who lurked in the shadows on the left side of the stage while Moon, Townshend and singer Roger Daltrey wailed, flailed and thundered away. (Roger once described his band as “The ‘Orrible ‘Oo. We make the worst noise on the planet.”) The fact that Entwistle was easily overlooked visually didn’t, however, mean that he got lost in the sonic mix. John became famed for pounding out this sort of half-bass, half-lead guitar sound that was utterly essential to the great chaos and muscle that was such a thrilling part of The Who’s sound. In so doing, he became one of the definitive bass players in electric music. Someone once described the stolid Entwistle as the necessary anchor of The Who, the guy who kept the others from flying off into the sky.
And make no mistake, The Who was truly special. Yes, they made great albums, especially those of their golden era of ‘67 to ‘74, which were, in chronological order, The Who Sell Out, Tommy, Live at Leeds, Who’s Next and Quadrophenia. But on stage, they could be positively mighty, at times even Olympian, achieving climaxes of both sight and sound that made most other bands seem trivial by comparison.
Before they became the makers of this great, grand rock music (I recall the praise of a respected classical music writer who said that on those rare occasions he wanted to listen to rock ‘n’ roll, he invariably reached for The Who), they were infamous for being the band that smashed up all their stuff at the end of each concert. They also developed a well-earned reputation as the premier hotel smashers in rock ‘n’ roll, advanced enough in this field to be ultimately banned for life from all Holiday Inns.
A lot of folks didn’t find much meaning in all the destruction, opting to view such behavior as the gimmicky antics of a bunch of pissed off lower-class English hooligans who were desperate for any kind of publicity. It’s a view that can’t be easily dismissed.
But it may be possible that there was a more sinister and ominous message intended by The Who in this department. It just could be that The Who, by destroying amps and drums and throwing TV sets into swimming pools, were telling “The Establishment” (remember them?) that they didn’t give two figs about this mess of a planet, they could care less about the political and economic systems that had resulted in things like Holiday Inns, and therefore, all you crazy baldheads better watch out for “The ‘Orrible ‘Oo.”
Then again, they might have had a truly great time bustin’ stuff up. Whatever is the case, their work remains gigantically good and powerfully influential to this day.