Pete Townshend
Pete Townshend
Peter Dennis Blandford "Pete" Townshendis an English musician, singer, songwriter, and multi-instrumentalist, best known as the lead guitarist and songwriter for the rock band The Who. His career with the Who spans more than 50 years, during which time the band grew to be considered one of the most influential bands of the 20th century...
NationalityBritish
ProfessionGuitarist
Date of Birth19 May 1945
CityLondon, England
writing rocks rock-and-roll
The problem for me, still today, is that I write purely with one dramatic structure and that is the rite of passage. I'm not really skilled in any other. Rock and roll itself can be described as music to accompany the rite of passage.
song writing sondheim
I am writing better Stephen Sondheim songs than even Stephen Sondheim is writing.
writing thinking firsts
Good old Pete. That's me. But I find it hard to think of myself in the first person when I'm writing about The Who. So many times he has willingly sat down to write about the good old Who. Isn't he too old to masturbate?
believe writing years
I just could not believe that 30 years later we're still looking at people who are supposed to write little 2-minute pop that when they actually try to do something that's a little bit more they regard it as pretentious.
writing men political
Early British pop was helped tremendously by the writing of Bob Dylan who had proved you could write about political and quite controversial subjects. Certainly what we did followed on from what was happening with the angry young men in the theatre.
writing want knows
If you don't want anyone to know anything about you, don't write anything.
writing discipline finest
Songwriting is best. It's the hardest ... finest ... tightest. It also requires the most discipline.
band believe dependent duty family guide help rest roger simply ticket whom
I simply believe we have a duty to go on, to ourselves, ticket buyers, staff, promoters, big and little people. I also have a duty to myself and my dependent family and friends. I also want to help guide Roger and the rest of the band at this time, all of whom have been shaken by John's death.
child research sexually
I think I may have been sexually abused as a child and I was doing research into it
common low mass money paid people performers
I don't view the fans in the way that most performers do. As a mass of people who have paid money, I know what they want. It's a very, very, very, very, very low common denominator.
almost distinct everybody exactly learned pop quite reflect
What we learned quite early on is what was really important to early British pop that we produced-and this is where we were distinct from almost everybody else in this respect-is that it had to reflect exactly what the audience wanted us to say.
art brian bullied happier
To be completely honest, I think if I hadn't been bullied into the band, I would have been happier as an art student. I would have been happier in a Brian Eno world.
chord incredible lethal looking order picked visual whereas
I used to try and make up visually for what I couldn't play as a musician. I used to get into very incredible visual things where, in order just to make one chord more lethal, I'd make it a really lethal looking thing, whereas really it's just going to be picked normally.
art collect five guitar listen players playing properly records until
I didn't start to collect records and listen to guitar players properly until I went to art school, when I'd already been playing for five years. So my style was already formed, and that's why I think it's so unique.