One of my earliest rock and roll memories was when my older cousin invited me to join other cousins in his bedroom to stand in front of his mirrored closet door and pantomime a band performance of "Pinball Wizard" over and over again. I think it was about 1972 when this happened. It was a lot of fun and we must have done it about three times before it got old. This made The Who one of the first rock bands I had consciously listened to. The memory isn't all gravy though, this same cousin told me Tommy had lost his sight because a fluorescent lamp bulb blew up in his face which gave me a paranoia about light bulbs for years. Funnily enough, when I used to work at a thrift store a customer asked me to test a Christmas light they were interested in and when I plugged it in the light did blow up in front of me while I was looking at it. Thankfully I wasn't injured or blinded, though this incident did not help with my paranoia.
Where was I going with this? Oh yeah, for decades I've seen snippets of a performance by The Who performing "Won't Get Fooled Again." Even before I liked The Who (my wife is responsible for getting me into this group) I thought the video clips from this performance looked awesome. I didn't know where the recording came from and when I would see the edited bits on a tv program here or there I would think it was amazing. After watching an episode of Classic Albums featuring Who's Next, I decided to search You Tube for this performance. And it is an incredible performance. It's everything rock and roll is supposed to be: A powerful and majestic adrenalin fueled rush complete with screaming and laser beams. The thrill of hitting a guitar to make beautiful noise with abandon. Crashing drums. Rumbling bass. And soul shredding vocals. That makes "Won't Get Fooled Again" my song of the moment! Keep on rockin' in the free world.
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