Pete Townshend began writing My Generation as an anthem for his disaffected peers.
Then the queen got involved.
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The Whos manager loved what he heard but told the guitarist to give it a bit more oomph.
It also helped turn the Who into stars, giving them their first top-five hit in England.
it’s possible for you to hear the full interview withSwitched on Pops Charlie Hardinghere.
It began with a degree of societal disaffection.
I was sharing an apartment with my best friend, Barney, in West London.
I had a little studio there, where I wrote the first demos forthe Who.
So they brought me to Belgravia, which was very posh.
I spent about three or four months in that apartment, and it was kind of blissful.
Id written Cant Explain and Anyway, Anyhow, Anywhere, which became hits.
Meanwhile, our stage act was getting more violent.
It had all sprung from my guitar-smashing routine.
Keith Moon then started to smash his drums up.
Roger was using his microphone on the cymbals.
This became a big trademark of what we were doing in public.
Once Cant Explain was released, we were playing in an Irish club in Shepherds Bush.
We think its important.
In what way is it important?
And they said, Well, thats not the way we hear it.
I remember thinking,Wow, Ive got a brief here.Ive also got an audience.
One day I took a train to Swindon, way out of London.
I had bought myself an old hearse with a 12-cylinder engine.
Anyway, I parked it outside my house.
I called the police.
They said, It hasnt been stolen.
Its been towed away.
I said, On what basis?
Im allowed to park my car outside my house!
She obviously just said to her driver, Oh my God, that awful thing, have it removed.
The words just tumbled out.
The song didnt come from a very good place in me.
And I never wanted to live that way.
There was a sense, too, that I was a young kid.
I was only 20 coming up to 21 and thought,Fuck it.
I dont want to be old.I would prefer to be dead than to be like these people.
I rocked it up a little bit.
Then the second version, I pretended I was taking amphetamines.
I started to burble: P-p-p-people have a go at put us down.
I was a big fan of John Lee Hooker, who actually had a stutter.
But it wasnt meant to be a piss take about stuttering.
I grew up in this group of boys who took so many pills that they stuttered.
Then I did another version with some key changes.
It grew in an interesting way because it had so many different demos.
I mean, it was the most Ive ever done for a song.
I did it over and over again because I knew that I needed to get it right.
I didnt change any of the words.
I just added more stutters and key changes.
We went into the studio to record it.
Plus, we were a three-piece band with a singer.
One didnt play guitar solos if youre playing rhythm or driving the band.
So it felt natural to do what John did with it.
We were all shocked at how well it worked.
I think we did it all in one take.
I just knew this thing was a big hit.
Well, Im afraid thats the story.
I was and still am very sensitive.
The people who were older than we were, they had fought for their country and we hadnt.
We were expected to be very grateful that we didnt have to do that.
We were like whinging brats.
So we drew a line and started again.
We rebuilt our traditions and our history.
Once the song was finished, we tried to get on television and the radio.
I think the people who banned it were intelligent people.
They were just being protective.
I dont think it was because they felt it would create a revolution.
It wasnt about politics.
There were no musicians or artists speaking about politics.
There was nobody suggesting who you vote for.
It was considered to be passe to even have a political stance then.
Later, the song eventually became a burden for me and the band.
We were still playing it as our closing song when we were in our late 20s.
We didnt want to keep playing it.
Roger and I just did a couple of shows for teen cancer recently at the Royal Albert Hall.
We played My Generation and I hated it.
What I would like to do for the survivors is just write a series of checks.
Just say, Go buy yourself a nice car.
The joy for me with My Generation was knowing that I set out to do something and it landed.
The success of it was just doing the job that I was born to do and doing it right.
But also the fact that it has lasted so long!
Were talking about theLibrary of Congress recognizing it.
But people should be writing their own My Generations today.
