The Who – Tommy

1969 Track records 613 013/4, ex condition, strangely MADE IN USA. Can anyone explain this

why it took me until 2022 and after collecting who for 43 years now i do not know why I WAITED this long to get an original 1969 uk complete copy, this comes with the numbered booklet and the lamination is still very shiney for a sleeve almost 53 years old, the records are almost mint and have a killer sound to them!!! i have so many copies of tommy but i am finally completing my track uk original pressings and im just about done!!!! real glad i got a vg++ copy all around!!!!~ i got this from a guy in the uk that saw this tour and was at the infamous LONDON COLOSIUM 1969 SHOW!!! he explained he got this lp a few months before the show wich brings us to late summer 1969..... also like the original german pressing of tommy on the rear of the sleeve on the bottom right hand corner the polydor logo is printed in WHITE!! all reissues have the RED polydor logo..

What a great album. Why did I wait until 2021 to own it?
Great sound stage and depth from my UK original. I was lucky and got a minty copy.

I bought this 2 LP set when it came out in 1969 and I think I wore it out ! The WHO'S "TOMMY" contained the hits "PINBALL WIZARD" , "I'M FREE" , and "WE'RE NOT GONNA TAKE IT" . " I'M FREE" b/w "WE'RE NOT GONNA TAKE IT" was a "45" released the same year. At the WOODSTOCK CONCERT in 1969, the WHO did "WE'RE NOT GONNA TAKE IT" .Of an interesting note is that TWISTED SISTER recorded "WE'RE NOT GONNA TAKE IT" in 1984.

12/12

“Tommy” is absolutely one of my favorite albums of all time. It has been my number one on my album ranking for a while. I adore concept albums and rock operas and this was one of the most prolific ones of its time. “Jesus Christ Superstar” is another, that is also one of my favorites, where it started as a concept album and then was made into both a musical and a film. There’s something so valuable to me about an album that started as a record before it hit the stage. Maybe it’s the same as people who love the book more than the film. For me, it’s probably because I would love to write concept albums that almost share a cinematic or theatrical format, but to release it as a record before it would be converted into a production.

The story follows Tommy who is a blind, deaf, and mute boy who lost his senses after traumatically seeing his father murdered by his wife’s lover. Throughout his story, we see the struggles of being a disabled youth, which includes bullying, rape, and an early introduction to sex and drugs, and how one’s story can be exploited into a national, beloved freak show. As with most demagogues, there tends to be a falling off point where they reach a level of fame and recognition but some thing, whether financial or political, ruins their character and many people lose their following.

With the music, I adore the hard rock style combined with subgenres of progressive rock and art rock. I also noticed that The Who tends to have a bit of a folk/country western/southern rock element to them. This may go for other 60s bands as well, but I noticed this throughout some of the songs, where you can hear elements of 60s culture with the outdoorsy, hippie, Woodstock element to it. It’s fascinating and adds both culture and a timestamp to it. Some of the style reminds me a little bit of Arlo Guthrie or more southern rock bands like Mountain.

Another great element about this album is the singability. Every song is so catchy and easy to sing along to and it makes it more enjoyable to listen to.

“‘21” is a really interesting song because it helps explore the unconscious little bit more. It shows the things in your childhood, especially trauma, can have serious mental and physical effects on you. It’s also some interesting backstory, which shows the effects that something as simple as being unfaithful to your partner can have.

This album is super bold including a subplot that only lasts one song. It’s about the story of Sally Simpson who is a fan of Tommy’s and accidentally got slashed in the face being at the front of the stage, and then moved on and got married to someone else and forgot about him. It’s not completely relevant to the entire story but it’s such an interesting, short story that connects some of the themes and plays off the main narrative. This is one of the earliest examples of postmodern storytelling that I could think of in music.
To really mimic operas, the album has an overture, underture, several songs under 30 seconds, and instrumental pieces that serve as a sort of bridge or background music.

One of the beauties of concept albums are leitmotifs, as they are basically themes that tie the story together and make connections across the album. Tommy has both leitmotifs in its themes and music. There are a lot of rhythms and melodies that reappear throughout the album, especially with a stylistic similarity of driving beats and an emphasis on bass, whether that’s bass guitar or bass drum. Those specific rhythms are typically very loud and prominent, maybe as a sort of symbolic way of representing deep vibrations, which is one of the only things Tommy can sense. As for themes and lyrics, there is the “See me” and “Tommy can you hear me” motif. Those appear throughout the album in many different songs and add a nice touch to each song that it’s part of. Typically, these sections will contrast the songs they are part of, yet fit at the same time and some of the pieces feel more like a classical piece than a rock song. It’s a little bit of the best of both worlds, with the rock opera genre.

Another common theme throughout the album is glass and mirrors, which is representative of reflections of identity and the concept of smashing and releasing. The song “I’m Free” is extremely cathartic and wonderful feeling as Tommy can finally sense and a lot of this symbolism goes along with smashing a mirror. This is all about destroying what people expect of you and why you’re supposed to see. It’s a liberation.

One of the most interesting things about the album is the perspective. It’s all about Tommy, clearly, but it seems to be from the point of view of other people in his life. We see a lot from cousin Kevin, uncle Ernie, his mother, and even a whole section about perspective of some random girl named Sally Simpson. With these themes of reflection, it might be very well that all these people in Tommy’s life see themselves in Tommy and by telling his story from their perspective, they’re relating their experiences to his and in some situations, like Kevin’s bullying and Ernie’s diddling, their negative actions towards Tommy might just be a reflection of their own insecurities and problems, that they choose to take out on him because he’s easy to manipulate and take advantage of.

I also love the masterful musicianship of the band on this album. Every instrument is fantastic. I love how the vocals incorporate harmonies from the other band, like the Beatles would, and how the lead singer uses a lot of vocal distortion, soul, screaming, and explores his vocal style throughout. He’ll switch between clean and raw and incorporate some elements of normal singing versus goofy singing versus spoken word. One of the biggest things about the album is the drums. They are incredible and prominent throughout, specially with the dotted eighth note rhythm that stands out throughout the album.

Overall, “Tommy” is a masterpiece, musically and conceptually, pioneering the rock opera genre and telling an inherently strange and fascinating story of a disabled demagogue. Unless, I hear another concept album that has even more of a postmodern story with folk and progressive styles, then this will be my number one for a while (in slight competition with “Punisher” by Phoebe Bridgers.

“It’s a Boy”, “‘21”, “Amazing Journey”, “Eyesight to the Blind (The Hawker)”, “Christmas”, “Cousin Kevin”, “The Acid Queen”, “Do You Think It’s Alright?”, “Fiddle About”, “Pinball Wizard”, Go to the Mirror!”, “Tommy Can You Hear Me?”, “Smash the Mirror”, “Sensation”, “Sally Simpson”, “I’m Free”, “Welcome”, Tommy’s Holiday Camp”, and “We’re Not Gonna Take It”

ALBUM ARTWORK:

10/12

I’m not entirely sure what the cover is supposed to be. I wish it was more relevant to the story or visually interesting. However, that particular shade of blue will always stand out immediately to me with the black diamonds. It’s unique-looking and I’ll be able to guess it upon even a brief glance.

I ed some images of the 3 side of my version from the Matrix / Runout (Record 2 - Side C, Stamped Variant 5): 613014 B//1 1

For those interested you can find the images also here:
Matrix / Runout (Record 2 - Side C, Stamped Variant 5): 613014 B//1 1
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https://fransschmitz.nl/wp-content/s/2020/09/1_613014-B1-1.jpg

As I mentioned before the arrangements of various tracks is also completely different.

If one has the ear and the time, you can hear chords from Tommy being worked out as far back as “The Magic Bus” by The Who. And while it may seem easy to dismiss such anomalies as just matter of fact, or that these are the chords Pete Townshend hears in his head, I can't help but feel that Pete had been working toward this release subconsciously for many many years.

Like most people in 1969, I dug the album, but then I didn’t really know the words, as I had gotten the release on cassette, where I was filling in a lot of spaces with la la la’s and such. And despite the beauty of the music, and the fact that this piece had been released as a rock opera of sorts (though I grow gravely tired of the notion of a rock opera) from the very first listen, there was something that did not sit just right with me. Yeah, I listened to it, I played it for friends, I even recommended it as a great body of work, yet in the same breath, there was a bad taste left in my mouth with each listen, something that festered within me, and after a month of listening, I put the album away, never to be played again.

Rather then the music, I am speaking to the concept of the album here, where for me, the notion of the story of Tommy is akin to the notion of a rape fantasy, where the girl has been awakened to her sexuality, even though by rape, and has now blossomed into a raving beauty, strong and secure, perhaps even glad that she had been deflowered in such a violent manner ... no longer young, deaf, dumb or blind. But this work is far more insidious and dark, and perhaps true on a subconscious level for Mr. Townshend.

Townshend later wrote, “The greatest terror for an adult who re sexual abuse is the thought that other children might suffer as they did. This terror echoes for me. In my writing in the past, especially within the context of Tommy, I have created unusually unmerciful worlds for any infant characters. I am often disturbed by what I see on the page when I write these things, never more so than when I draw on my own childhood.” That said and paradoxically strange, Townshend claims to have come up with the concept of Tommy after being introduced to the work of Meher Baba, and attempted to translate Baba's teachings into music. Nevertheless, the story of Tommy is filled with dark and often subtle references to child abuse, and these references can be found on many levels on other albums by The Who. One of the most disturbing is when Tommy is left in the care of a bizarre relatives, Uncle Ernie and his cousin Kevin, despicable characters who prove that families do not offer safety, but are the first to take advantage of their own. He is subjected to the consumption of LSD without his knowledge or understanding, he suffers a mental breakdown without the necessary capacity to comprehend, and yet rises like a Phoenix from the ashes, as all great and exceptional artists are expected to do, drawing their inspirations from pain, suffering and tragedy, instead of a happy childhood.

This might seem acceptable, though tragic, but even after all of this abuse, once Tommy becomes the Pinball Wizard, his family again tempts and exploits the boy. This would certainly lend credence to the notion that Pete was abused as a child and that his parents ignored him until he became rich and famous, only then wanting their share of his fame.

For me, the album Tommy is as disturbing as Pink Floyd’s The Wall, another album that I can not listen to as a conceptual piece. In The Wall we finally see that the context of all Pink Floyd albums have revolved around the loss of Syd, the loss of Roger’s father during World War II, and the mental abuse inflicted on the school children by the instructors. This is all horror of the first magnitude, it is reality in this strange world, where I don’t believe that most fans connect with these releases on that level. If that is by choice or by omission, I could not venture to say. What I do know and understand, is that anyone who can listen to Tommy without feeling anger and rage, lacks a certain core value in their humanity.

As beautifully done and artistically excellent as this album is, this is still nothing more than pornography, yet another exploration into the “Story Of O,” where the truly helpless come out on the other side pleased that the lessons they have learned at the hands of others have valued their lives and made them the successes they are. Unfortunate that’s just not true, and the life of Pete Townshend proves that ultimately with a great deal of sadness.

It would be remiss of me not to say that looking at such issues found on Tommy does not have merit, as certainly anyone who enjoys this release should not be considered to the notion of child abuse, very much like the book “The Basketball Diaries” by Jim Carroll, who kept detailed notes, poems and thoughts during his downward spiral into drug addiction, where simply watching or reading his story is not tantamount to ing or glorifying drug addiction ... it is all a visual and musical journey, dark as it may be, in the life of one of the greatest musicians of our time.

Review by Jenell Kesler

I also have a copy that says Limited Edition number but no number!

I have a US press (MCA 2-10005) in trifold gatefold sleeve, it came out with insert "limited edition number" without any number written. First LP has side 1 and side 4, as many of this version but the weird thing is a misprint on the second LP which has 2 labels with side 2 (NO side 3) but it sounds normally with side 3. Does anyone has some more informations about it? Is there any of this misprinted versions already submitted? Thanks

this is the original 1969 uk pressing on track records, this comes in a nice tri fold sleeve and includes the poster and the insert, nice copy