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Tommy
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Editorial
Amazon.co.uk Review
Tommy had the dubious distinction of being the first-ever rock opera; however, it's none the worse for that, Ken Russell's adaptation notwithstanding. Due largely to Pete Townshend's skill as a songwriter and composer, Tommy tells a coherent story and includes quality rock and roll at the same time, an impressive feat by itself. While surprisingly more linear than the later Quadrophenia, Tommy boasts several songs that stand up well on their own, including the classic "Pinball Wizard", "The Acid Queen", "I'm Free", and "Sally Simpson". Much of the rest doesn't make much sense lyrically unless you listen to the entire album, but you'll probably want to do that anyway, preferably with the lights low and the stereo cranked. --Genevieve Williams
Incredible is almost an insult
Review date: 2008-12-02 Rating: 10 out of 10
Awesome concept album. The songs all link into one another smoothly and perfectly. You can hear a pretty strong classical influence on it. It's based around the concept of a dumb deaf and blind boy, called tommy. Buy it.
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Reviews
Fantastic album !!
Review date: 2008-09-07 Rating: 10 out of 10
I must point out one thing first. This is not really the sort of album that you can dip into at random points and rock along too. To truly enjoy it you must follow the rock opera theme.
Once you do this the album starts to make sense and becomes really a great one at that. There are so many good songs on here that it's up there with 'Who's Next' and 'Quadrophenia'.
Obviously there's everybody's favourite, 'Pinball Wizard', but, there are so many others that the people who gave this 1 star have overlooked. There's 'Amazing Journey' with Moon's incredible drumming, 'Eyesight to the Blind', 'I'm Free' (Brilliant bass by Entwistle), 'The Acid Queen', 'Sally Simpson' and 'We're Not Gonna Take It'.
It does take some time to appreciate this album but persevere and you will not regret it. Genius from Townshend, a definite 5 stars !!
A spiritual narative...
Review date: 2008-04-30 Rating: 10 out of 10
A great musical album? Yes, but a whole lot more.
This is Townshend in his role as spiritual prophet. The narrative which is "Tommy" contains spiritual guidance for us all.
The hero of the piece, Tommy the deaf dumb and blind boy, is you and me, and indeed all of us who have not yet become truly aware of who (what) we really are. Even the selection of the name "Tommy" by Townshend is genius. As the universal creator repeatedly calls Tommy, the name can be heard as "To me" - reflecting the constant invitation and pull of God.
Like the rest of us, Tommy experiences the universe through the vibrations of pain and suffering. He becomes a wizard pinball player - that is he puts himself into the hands of the creator and lives fully in faith that all things are just as they are meant to be. Through this, and the meditation/contemplation (gazing), or prayer(free me, heal me), Tommy becomes free (aware).
This is a calling for us all to become "pinball wizards" to live our lives in the everlasting "holiday camp", starting from right now.
Oh, and the music is totally ace too!
Excellent example of British songwriting
Review date: 2007-10-16 Rating: 10 out of 10
When I first came across this album in the mid 1970s, I shared some of the feelings of other reviewers , namely that it was less exciting or interesting than, say, "Who's Next", or "Quadrophenia". However, as I got older and my music tastes evolved, this is probably the Who album I play most often. Why? Well, it is a complete piece, musically and lyrically, and the playing is excellent, the lines memorable and, to be frank, there is much less posturing than some of the "meatier" albums. I would point out that, contradicting what another reviewer said, they play extracts in many of their shows to this day - their recent tour saw excellent performances of "Sparks", "Amazing Journey", "Pinball Wizard" and "See me Feel Me".
I would recommend unhesitatingly. I would also recommend to get an diea of the power of this album live, to get "The Who Live at the isle of Wight 1969" DVD.
An album of two halves
Review date: 2007-08-06 Rating: 8 out of 10
'Tommy' the rock opera, one of the most talked about and hyped rock albums in the history of popular music. It changed what people thought could be done on a rock album and propelled its creators to super stardom. I've always wanted to listen to it, and i finally got around to it. The 1st 13 track ('Overture' to 'Pinball Wizard') are extraordinary pieces of music. There are beautiful, grandiose instrumentals ('Overture', 'Sparks' and 'Underture'), some humorous tracks ('Cousin Kevin', 'Fiddle About') and fantastic yet simple songs (i give you 'Pinball Wizard'). I was planning in my head how I was going to describe the brilliance of the album to my fellow amazon reviewers in mere words. However, as luck would have it, i had no need to find my dictionary to find synonyms for the word good because the last half of the album was far from it. Townsend appears to have focused on his weird story, rather than making good music. The results range from mediocre to bad to irritating and worst of all boring.
So for those who haven't heard it - worth a listen, but if you press stop after 'Pinball Wizard' you won't be missing much.
Four stars because the first half deserves five, but the seconds disappoints.
Product Details/Specifications
Artist(s):
The Who
Recording label: Polydor Group
Manufacturer: Polydor Group
EAN: 0731453104327
Binding: Audio CD
Format: Original recording remastered,
Release date: 1998-02-02
Universal product code (UPC): 731453104327
Number of discs: 1
Running time: 75 minutes