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Pete Towshend confirms Who’s Next reissue for 2022

Words and video from the horse’s mouth

By Paul Sinclair

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54

The Who’s Pete Townshend has taken to Instagram to offer fans a tour of his studio and to confirm reissue plans for next year.

In a four-part post yesterday (under his ‘yaggerdang‘ account) Pete tells viewers that he has spent 3 days in his studio until five in the morning trying to “keep up with Who demos for the Who’s Next / Lifehouse reissue that is happening next year” (Lifehouse is an unreleased rock opera that Townshend has dabbled with on and off, over the years).

What follows is a fascinating peek behind the curtain, as Townshend shows off a set-up he half-jokingly says he’s “ashamed” of, which involves connecting an old Studer 8-track machine to some Dolby-equipped gear since the old recordings were made with Dolby’s noise-reduction system and presumably need to be decoded correctly.

He then offers a glimpse off some old demo tapes with Lifehouse material, the song ‘Bargain’ (which ended up as track two on the Who’s Next album) and ‘Ambition’, “a song we’re trying to recover”. He also shows a tape with some 8-track home demos including ‘Too Much of Anything’ and another with “a long version of “Baba O’Reily'” without vocals.

Some of the tapes Pete has been working with were shown in his Instagram video

Pete then reiterates that “it’s not just Who’s Next that we’re talking about, but Lifehouse” and he mentions that it should have come out this year (2021). Then with a wry smile he says “If I’m looking a little shattered… I am! Goodnight”.

There will be more news on The Who’s reissue plans in 2022.

Another screenshot from Pete’s video shows some old multi-track demos

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54 thoughts on “Pete Towshend confirms Who’s Next reissue for 2022”

  4. I’m still holding out hope that Pete and company will find ANY and ALL missing multi-tracks for this SDE.

    This album deserves a proper surround-mix!

  6. I’m considering this. As much as I love “Sell Out” there just wasn’t enough new material to justify that set and I was happy (largely) with the two disc set. At least they are offering this on multiple formats including CD unlike, say, U2 who are disappointing this fan again.

  8. I love Who’s Next so potentially happy with this – I just hope they do a vinyl super deluxe which they didn’t with The Who Sell Out. I bought the coloured double vinyl of that, which was enough for me as I don’t love Sell Out massively but I’m in the market for the full vinyl bells and whistles here – please make it so.

  9. There’s a Lifehouse box set on eBay that I was going to bid on (expensive). Will now hold off until after Who’s Next SDE in case there is some cross over.

    1. It seems like there will be a lot of cross over.Because the Lifehouse box was a very limited release through Pete’s web site for most people the contents remain effectively unreleased.Rumours suggest 2 discs of Pete’s Lifehouse demos.

  10. I love Who’s next, just like everybody else, but I don’t know much about Lifehouse. So I guess this forthcoming SDE allow me to catch up with this 50-years old project ! Sell out was a very extensive boxset, so I suppose this one will follow the same standards.

  11. You might think I am crazy, but I am not really a Who fan & I HATE this album majorly…early Who was decent to good to very good, very English, but with Who’s Next, they went fullblown American corporate crappy “classic rock”…nothing remotely English about this album…and I really despise “Baba O’Reilly”!! Oh gosh, if ever I hear that song, with that weird middle Eastern keyboard intro, I get all violent in my mind…hate it, one of the worst songs of all time IMO… Bargain, Behind Blue Eyes & Won’t Get Fooled Again are okay to decent…this album is nowhere near deserving of it’s so-called “classic” status…only my opinion, but I just had to state it…will be steering clear of this SDE…

    2. Who can hate Who’s Next? One of the greatest albums of all time! Only John Entwhistle’s “My Wife” makes me grin. Fullblown American corporate crappy classic rock? Far from it!

    4. I’m not sure what you mean by American corporate crappy ‘classic’ rock. Surely ‘classic’ rock is a category created in the future after the fact for older music. When they released it it wouldn’t have been classic rock – it would have been a new rock album. One interpretation of the cover is of The Who p**sing up an old monolith and bringing in the new so I doubt they would have considered it classic rock when they released it.

    5. Larry, just so you know, you are not alone. I absolutely loathe this album. For me it typifies the kind of stadium rock that is really the opposite of what I look for in rock music. The way it deals in lighters in the air anthems that almost always involve the plural pronoun “we” is like the musical equivalent of dumbed down right wing populist politics. “Won’t Get Fooled Again” Roger? An unintentionally ironic anthem for a guy who passionately supported Brexit has to be said. The best rock music, has a wit about it, a sense of joyous chaos and an awareness of the intrinsic ridiculousness and ephemerality that is at the core of rock music and makes it special. It is fun. Think garage rock, The Kinks, The Mekons, Half Japanese, Billy Childish, The Sonics, X Ray Spex, that is what I want from rock music. This album, in contrast, is earnest, meticulously polished, self-important, pretentious, bombastic. It is like an Andrew Lloyd Webber musical, for God’s sake. Yeah, absolutely the most overrated album I can think of. It is the antithesis of everything I love about rock music.

  12. Dear listeners,

    The lifehouse boxset is specially dear to me while attending together with my mother the Quadrophenia 1997 in Rotterdam ahoy I brought a book with us for Pete’s upcoming birthday wich my dear mother managed to throw on the stage and Pete picked it up,inside it says: happy birthday and drop me a note…and he did inside the sleeve notes, lifehouse was like discovering the lost treassures of the ancient Inca’s gold,a deep connection communicating note,I love you dear Pete as a happy kids friend and I thank you as you are me and I am you
    Love and happiness to you all as One @royvzadel from the otherside of the north sea channel ❤‍✨☀️

  14. Back in 2020, there were a few hints on The Who’s site and socials, and in the conspiratorial media, that a 50th anniversary edition was in the cards. And in the interviews to pimp the Sell Out box, Pete had a couple of slips of the tongue where he coughed up that he was starting to go through the tape boxes even then.

    It’s my favorite album by my favorite band. It couldn’t be more more ‘auto’. And it’s been plenty of time since the warhorse was decorated and paraded. But what can they come up with this time that can supersede what they did in ’95 or ’03? The Cow Palace show from 1971 would be great, and a hi-rez Atmos version would be greater still. The notion of the “Baba O’Riley” intro whipping around the room is too much to resist. But years back, I believe Pete said that the multi-tracks for one of the sides of Who’s Next were lost, making a remix impossible. And in his Instagram posts, he seems to caution that this release might be more about Lifehouse, the roots of Who’s Next, than it will be about the album that eventually appeared. But wasn’t that what his limited-and-long-gone box set, Lifehouse Chronicles, was all about? Or is it worthwhile to reissue the demos that appeared there in a more populist box?

    Whatever. Gimme the damn thing.

  15. Who’s Next Super Deluxe has been discussed on the Steve Hoffman website for several years. The problem is, the multitrack tapes for three songs, “Song is Over”, “Getting in Tune” and “Bargain” were lost many years ago and as far as I know they’ve never been located. This would prevent a 100% remix of the album.

    1. I was hoping for a high-resolution reissue of this album (24 bit 96 kHz at least). Stereo is fine, personally I’m not a big fan of surround mixes. However, if some of the original multitrack tapes are well and truly gone, and there’s no hi-res mix in the box set, then I will probably pass. If no hi-res is available, the 2003 Deluxe Edition is good enough for me.

      1. Steve Hoffman was the one that discovered the two-track stereo mix down “master tape” of Who’s Next, sitting inside a filing cabinet at The Record Plant in Los Angeles in the 1990’s. The Canadian MCA CD and the 2003 Deluxe Edition both use that tape that Hoffman found.

    2. As I said below, there have been precedents for doing a 5.1 with not all the tapes. Steven Wilson’s remix of Tears for Fears’ Songs from the Big Chair being a prime example with both halves of “Broken” being Penteo upmixes.

  17. Actually the Lifehouse Chronicles was perhaps my most exciting ever purchase – because I attended the Who show in 2000, the last big tour with Ox, and I did not know that this item even existed until I saw it at the merch table before the show – wrapped it up in a bag and held on to it through the entire show. (Easily the best Who concert since the 70s.) I think the only other time in the recent decades of the internet that I was completely surprised by a box set release was when I walked into Decatur CD at the end of 2009 and saw the complete Buddy Holly on 6 discs – nearly cried since that’s something I wanted to exist for half me life. That’s before this website and after ICE magazine folded.

          1. This was one of my first deluxe CD box set purchases & cost me about £60, I was surprised to see the Discogs price :)

      2. Yes it does indeed.
        Buddy Holly “Not Fade Away – The Complete Studio Recordings And More”. 80 page hardcover book with 6 CD’s released in 2009 by Geffen Hip-O Select.com (Universal Music). As far as I know it is sold out and out of print.

      3. Hi Remi,

        if you don’t have the money or simply want to listen to it before you shell out 200 EUR + for it (the cheapest price on Discogs currently is 208 EUR – without p&p of course) it’s on Napster and possibly also on other streaming platforms.

    2. When the Lifehouse box came out I passed and bought the 2 disc Lifehouse Elements version because 6 discs on 1 album seemed ridiculously extravagant.How times have changed!
      Looking forward to this very much.The presentation of The Who Sell Out was outstanding and this should be at the same level.
      I wonder how much it will share in common with the 2 disc Who’s Next reissue?Also whether part of the box or in separate release surely we will get the much promised holy grail San Francisco ‘71 show as part of this roll out.

  18. I have the wonderful Lifehouse box but since that is out of print and has never been available in high-res, I would hope just the 2 discs of Pete demos show up in this…

  20. Looking forward to this one. My favourite Who album, followed by Quadrophenia. I’m not bothered by a surround sound cd. Sellout was great. Another box like that would do the business.

  24. i wonder just how many trax will be the WHO and how will be petes demos. ? sooo a 7 cd set sounds bout right, with discs 6/7 being the san fran 71 live show that we have bits and pieces of. i will be prepared.

  25. This is great news. Who’s Next is the best Who album for me, closely followed by Tommy. I love the fact there is a 5.1 mix of the latter I wonder what the chances are of a surround mix of Who’s Next?

    1. It’s been said that not all the multitracks of Who’s Next are available. Though upmixing technology has gotten to a point where they could deal with that problem.

  26. Who’s Next is a fantastic album. First Who album I ever brought. But with the Lifehouse box and the Scoop releases I’m surprised there’s anything much else left unreleased. Hopefully we’ll get a 5.1 mix though.

    1. The original album only scratches the surface of Townshend’s unbelievable creativity at the time. It should have been a double album. The quality was there.

  29. Looking forward to this. Lifehouse Chronicles is a great box set so hoping for more demos. I thought everything had been exhausted that was worth releasing but ‘Ambition’ sounds interesting.

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