It was November 1973 and rock giants The Who were performing at Newcastle Odeon on Pilgrim Sreet. It would prove to be a troubled evening.
The following day's Evening Chronicle reported: “The band lived up to its reputation for violence on stage with an expensive display of guitar and amplifier smashing last night. The concert was stopped in chaos when Pete Townshend bawled out sound engineers, destroyed pre-recorded backing tapes, and smashed up equipment. It was a ridiculous display of violence.”
The band, upset by ongoing sound problems, partied heavily later that night at the Five Bridges Hotel (later the Swallow Hotel) in Gateshead. “Police went to the band’s luxury suite in the early hours of the morning to investigate a disturbance,” it was reported.
READ MORE: Tyneside 70 years ago: 10 photographs from around our region in 1953
For a band who earned a notorious reputation for heavy excess during their instrument-destroying, drug-abusing, hotel-wrecking 1960s and '70s hey day, it was perhaps just a typical day and night on the road. That was 50 years ago and life is calmer now. The Who have just announced they will be performing in our region this summer on their first UK tour since 2017. Backed by a full orchestra and with support from UB40, they will appear at Durham's Seat Unique Riverside ground in Chester-le-Street, County Durham, on July 19.
Singer Roger Daltrey said: "Having not toured the UK for six years, it's great that at this time of our careers we have the chance to go to places that are not on the usual touring map - Edinburgh Castle and Derby - as well as the other cities across the country that we haven’t been to for decades. It will make this very special for me." Read the full story here.
The Who of 2023 is a very different animal to The Who of 1973. When Roger Daltrey and Pete Townshend step out in County Durham this summer they will very much be senior citizens - 79 and 78-year-olds respectively - firmly putting paid to Daltrey's famous line “hope I die before I get old,” from the band’s 1965 hit, My Generation.
Two members of the original classic quartet did, however, sadly fall by the wayside. Drummer Keith Moon died in 1978, aged just 32, after years of heavy boozing, drum-kit demolitions and hell-raising antics caught up with him. And bass player John Entwistle passed away in 2002, aged 57, in a Las Vegas hotel room, in bed with a groupie and having taken cocaine.
The Who are one of popular music's most important and enduring voices, graduating from Mod upstarts in the early 1960s, to US stadium rockers in the 1970s and '80s, to rock royalty today. Their best-known songs include the likes of Substitute, Pinball Wizard, and Won’t Get Fooled Again - while their albums include the pioneering 'rock operas' Tommy and Quadrophenia, and arguably their finest work, 1971's Who's Next, the famous cover photo of which was captured in Easington Colliery when the band stopped the van for a toilet break on the way back to London after a show up North.
The Who have performed many times in our part of the world. During the '60s, they were regulars at Newcastle City Hall. In 1967, they appeared on a bill with Traffic and the Tremeloes; 1968 saw them touring with the Small Faces; and, in 1970, the City Hall rocked out to their newly-released opus, Tommy. The band also played at the city’s Mayfair Ballroom.
Notwithstanding later equipment malfunctions on Tyneside during the 1970s, they were back in 1981, with Kenney Jones replacing 'Moon the Loon' behind the drums. “The Who turned down the lights, turned up the volume and turned on the magic for the first of their two nights at the City Hall,” wrote our reviewer. “Classics like Substitute, I Can’t Explain, Won’t Get Fooled Again, Pinball Wizard, and Who Are You still can’t be beaten.”
Their first Newcastle Arena show came in 2000. Our reviewer declared: “The Who were all about raw power, and even in 2000, the grand old men of rock still have the ability to roll back the years.” The band returned in 2007 - and again in 2013, performing their 1973 concept album Quadrophenia. Their Who Hits 50 tour in 2014, which included an another Arena date, was billed by Daltrey as "the beginning of the long goodbye". With a North East show in the offing once again this summer, it's a long goodbye which still has no end in sight.
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A now-vanished Newcastle record store was getting ready to open its doors
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