The Who was a beast of a band on the concert stage. There wasn't a single band in the Sixties who wanted share the same stage with the Who because the Who demolished every act they ever opened for including Jimi Hendrix, the Rolling Stones and Led Zeppelin.
The Rolling Stones suppressed the video release of Rock and Roll Circus for nearly three decades because the Who simply destroyed them in their performance on the television show. Jim Hendrix demanded a coin flip (which he lost) to avoid having to follow the Who onto the concert stage at the Monterey Pop Festival in 1967.
Many of those performers were technically better musicians than the Who but the Who was a force of nature and their anarchic live performances in the Sixties were and still are, legendary. I saw them twice once in August 1967 and once in November 1969 at Kiel Auditorium in St. Louis and both shows were near riots with fans rushing the stage. I'd never seen anything like it and probably never will again.
Led Zeppelin was supposed to share the bill with the 1969 St. Louis concert I attended, but they quit the tour after the Who blew them away in six consecutive dates at the Irving Plaza in New York City. Joe Cocker replaced Led Zeppelin on the rest of the tour dates.
The Who became more subdued in their 1970 American tour in support of Tommy. Tommy is still their best album but they never played as ferociously live after the release of Tommy. Fans who saw the Who live between 1963 and 1969 will tell you the Who played less frenetic and more predictable live shows after the 1969 American tour.
Live At Leeds was recorded when Tommy was at the top of the charts in the UK in 1970. The band deliberately omitted selections from their new "rock opera" which was already becoming an albatross hanging around the collective neck of the band. In later editions of Live at Leeds a version of Amazing Journey/Sparks appeared.
Live at Leeds was a real turning point for the band and the album really doesn't capture the full fury of the Who's 1963-1969 live shows, because the band was already transitioning into a quieter and more nuanced approached to playing.
There were better live tapes of the Who from their 1969 tour, but the band destroyed all of their 1969 tour tapes in a massive bonfire, so that none of the material would ever surface without permission. Too bad for us.
__________________
There are two types of music: the first type is the blues and the second type is all the other stuff.
Townes Van Zandt
|