With the 50th anniversary of the Who's 1971 masterpiece Who's Next coming up this month, Pete Townshend looked back on the album's iconic opening track, “Baba O'Riley.”
Townshend told Guitar Player, “'Baba O' Riley' is about the absolute devastation of teenagers at Woodstock, where everybody was smacked out on acid and 20 people, or whatever, had brain damage. The contradiction was that it became a celebration: “Teenage wasteland! Yes! We're All wasted!”
Townshend said he still rates Who's Next as a highpoint in the band's career: “I was delighted with it. It felt like the Who's first proper album. It felt uncomplicated and simple and I just didn't care that the story had been lost. I was just relieved to have made anything.”