The Who’s Tommy LP had been a blessing and a curse. It was a blessing in that it finally established the Who as a headline rock act in the United States and most of the rest of the world. But it was curse in that Pete Townsend didn’t know what he could do to top it.
The band stalled. Instead of a studio album, they released a live set, The Who Live at Leeds. That actually proved to be a shrewd move. The band sounded way better live than they did in the studio at the time Tommy came out. Bands also make way more money on their live gigs than do on their records. So, Live at Leeds cemented their well-deserved reputation as one of the very best live acts in rock, but Townsend was still stuck. How was he going to top Tommy with a studio album?
Pete came up with a new concept he called Lifehouse. In brief, Townsend envisioned a storyline that took place in the near future when people live indoors because of pollution and only experienced things that are fed to them inside all-encompassing suits. In a way, Pete had correctly foreseen the rise of social media and virtual reality, which has cut down on face-to-face human interaction significantly. What Lifehouse would actually be – an album, a film, a stage musical – kept shifting. But he began to write songs for the project.
One of his main ideas for the project revolved around the musicians and audience fusing together to create something musicians couldn’t create by themselves. Excited, Townsend booked the Who into the Young Vic Theater in London and began playing these new songs for audiences. However, he never got the feedback from the crowd he was looking for, so the Who flew across the pond to New York City and began trying to work out the album at the Record Plant. However, Kit Lambert, one of the band’s managers who had accompanied them to the States had gotten involved with heroin and Townsend feared Keith Moon might soon head down that path if they stayed in New York.
So, back they flew to London and holed up at Olympic Studios. As the rest of the band had cooled considerably on the Lifehouse idea, engineer/co-producer Glyn Johns convinced the group to jettison the idea of a concept album, but just develop the songs that Pete had written for the project. You know, just focus on releasing a really good studio album.
And that’s just what they did.
First of all, they were impressed with Johns at the control board. He was able to get the band to sound in-studio pretty much the way they sounded live. Next, Townsend began incorporating synthesizer into his songs in a way no rock band had before – using it not just to add loopy little flourishes, but as one of the main instruments in the mix. He also found ways to infuse the synth parts with rock rhythms, again, something nobody had done before.
As there was no longer any need to adhere to an overall concept, the boys asked John Entwistle if he had a song he’d like to contribute. The Ox had one left over from a solo project he’d been working on, a little ditty that had been inspired (and exaggerated according to Entwistle) by a fight he’d had with "My Wife."
The album, now called Who’s Next, was released in August of 1971. It was an immediate commercial and critical success. It went to #1 in the UK and #4 in States (surprisingly, the Who have never had a #1 LP in America). It’s widely thought to be the band’s best LP with many of its tracks “Baba O’Riley,” “Won’t Get Fooled Again, “Behind Blue Eyes,” “Going Mobile,” and others, becoming staples of rock radio and in-concert favorites. It has been re-released multiple times, often with additional tracks from those sessions added as a bonus.
That cheeky cover shot? Yeah, only Townsend really took a leak against he monolith. The other three members of the band had their “marks” created with a little hot water.
BTW - Who’s Next also consistently shows up on lists of the greatest rock albums ever from sources like Rolling Stone, Village Voice and others.
