MEMORIES THAT DON’T F-F-F-FADE AWAY – THE WHO triumph at Charlton

[email protected] May 29, 2018

Very often, particularly as the years advance, we have difficulty pinpointing exactly where we were on a particular day in the past. Time passing can be measured by birthdays, anniversaries (happy or sad) while December 25^th obviously takes care of itself.

But for me there is one date, now far distant, that has always resonated – Monday 31^st May 1976.

Permit me to establish the background for those too young to recollect. In Great Britain the summer of 1976 has been officially declared not only the hottest of the 20^th Century, but also the warmest since records began.

There have been summers which produced hotter days (Friday 3 August 1990 broke long-held records for high temperatures as I recall only too well. It was the fifth birthday of my eldest son, (whose little friends eschewed the hired bouncy castle in favour of being continually sprayed with the garden hose) – but 1976 topped the chart as it produced the longest dry spell ever recorded.

Those old enough to remember ’76 will recall hearing the expression ‘hosepipe ban’ for the first time, a term never used before in peace time.

Such was the need to conserve water, standpipes became common place in many towns and when England played the West Indies in the final cricket test of a five-match series in late August, The Oval outfield had changed from a lush green to scorched beige.

You may well ask why Monday 31^st May 1976 is such a defining day for a small-town boy of 15. It was Whit Monday and therefore a Bank Holiday – and being a Bank Holiday it rained, boy did it rain. The skies opened as if to empty everything they had, knowing it would be almost three months before opportunity came again to drench the populace in such a way.

Where was I when the Whit Monday Monsoon occurred? The Valley, Charlton Athletic Football Ground London SE7 8BL. Why? I was there to see The Who.

My first Who show had been seven months earlier in October 1975 at Bingley Hall, Stafford and this impressionable teenager had never heard or seen anything like it as they roared through a ninety minute set with a ferocity no other band could match.

In 1975/76 The Who were simply untouchable, the undisputed Heavyweight Champions of live rock – and I was gripped with excited fervour at the prospect of again experiencing their incredible mix of power and subtlety, volume and energy, humour and dexterity (and that was just Keith Moon).

One abiding memory of the Charlton day is my mum waking me at 5.30am to tell me I was being picked up in half an hour and if I was going I’d better get up. ‘If I was going‘ – not going was not an option.

Attending with three older friends, one of whom was driving the 1965 Commer PB Campervan in which we travelled to London – my overactive imagination no doubt imaging it a tour bus – during the six hour southbound journey I heard for the first time ‘Music From Big Pink‘, ‘Deja Vu‘ and ‘Cosmo’s Factory.’

Hence tapes or latterly CD’s by The Band, CSNY and Creedence have been always in the glove-box of cars I have owned, the day significant in ways other than seeing The Who.

My recollections are not so memorable when summoning what I remember as the clothes I had on; obligatory cheesecloth shirt of the time, brown flared-trousers, tan coloured Dr. Marten shoes and black Harrington bomber jacket (the absence of denim due to the fact I had never seen Pete Townshend in any). No doubt thinking I resembled the last vestige of Mod, in hindsight my attire put me somewhere between Northern Soul fan (which at the time I wasn’t) and small-town youth in the capital for the day (which I certainly was).

Incidentally, the jacket, used as a sou’wester for much of the time, never regained its shape – much to the chagrin of my mum.

In the forty-odd years that have passed since, in truth I’m not sure now how much I remember or what has entered my consciousness from accounts since read – but I do recall the incessant rain that fell through the afternoon as support bands came and went. On the colour photographs in circulation, the skies are so dark it looks like a dismal day in November rather than an early summer Bank Holiday.

From memory none of the acts on the under-card made much of an impact. Widowmaker, Streetwalkers and The Outlaws barely caused a stir, while Little Feat, despite oozing class on record, simply brought their country-funk to the wrong place. The Sensational Alex Harvey Band generated some reaction, but it was all on a hiding-to-nothing basis – the rotten weather still creating the biggest impression on 99.9 per cent of an audience not likely to engage with anything other than opening another tin of beer before The Who came on.

The Valley was a horrible cavernous bowl that offered little shelter. Elements among the enormous crowd became bad tempered which led to the occasional fist fight and sporadic throwing of beer cans. Others in the audience were just plain mad – those who dangerously climbed the soaking wet lighting pylons seeking a better view for when The Who came on, were unceremoniously told to come down or the show would not proceed. Miraculously nobody fell while making their descent.

But then a miracle occurred (and this I do remember). Shortly before The Who took the stage, the rain stopped and a pale watery sun could be seen forcing its way into the slate-grey South London sky. It was almost time for the greatest rock band in the world to appear – so what else but divine intervention?

From my vantage point some forty yards from the stage, roughly in line with Pete Townshend when he stood at the microphone, in the moments before they appeared I have recollection (based on notes I made in the days that followed) of wondering how loud they would be in an outdoor setting – having a sense the ear-splitting volume with which they played at indoor shows might not be as imposing, given the large banks of football ground terracing and low cloud to contend with.

The sight of The Who emerging from the wings went through the crowd like a power surge from the National Grid, the slithery condition of the stage underlined when Roger Daltrey in trotting to the middle slipped and informed the soaked audience, ‘tonight we’re The Who on ice.’

In relation to how well The Who would make themselves heard, there was no problem in hearing what Roger had said. But nothing on earth served as preparation for the apocalyptic, thunderstorm burst that informed most of the Northern Hemisphere The Who were on and underway with ‘I Can’t Explain.’

From John Entwistle came a gargantuan bass sound and along with Moon’s volcanic drumming it appeared to create shock waves underfoot – the band ripping through a set not dissimilar to the one presented at Stafford six months before and which had remained consistent through the UK, European and US tours they had undertaken since.

Even by their standards it developed into a remarkable gig, the wonderment unrelenting as they hurled ‘I Can’t Explain‘, ‘Substitute‘ and ‘My Wife‘ to a rapturous, 60,000 (some estimates put the figure much higher due to forged tickets), gathering of the faithful.

As a result of jockeying for position further forward than I was standing, a number of scuffles occurred through the opening numbers only to be quelled by a plea for calm by Townshend and the mesmeric synthesizer intro to ‘Baba O’Riley.’ While front man Daltrey was left to introduce each song, between them Moon and Townshend maintained a constant stream of humorous barbs and asides, culminating in a funny, at times affectionate exchange, that proceeded the half-hour excerpt from ‘Tommy.’

Due to release the previous year of a successful film version of their 1969 rock opera, in which Daltrey took the lead role, several songs from the piece had made a return to the set-list (mostly at the expense of material from ‘Quadrophenia‘ from which nothing was aired that night). When the ‘Tommy‘ segment came to its natural conclusion with the ‘See Me, Feel Me‘ finale it brought sense of being in the grip of the sound of The Who – in other words no hesitation or pretense, every single bass run, vocal line, guitar break and whack on the drums mattered.

The following day, with my mind agog and ears still ringing from the incredulity of it all, this fifteen year-old Who obsessive sat down and entered into a notebook a mark out of ten for each song performed. ‘Squeeze Box’ and ‘Summertime Blues‘ were rated lowest with eight, but the ‘Amazing Journey/Sparks‘ medley that opened the ‘Tommy‘ sequence must have been utterly astounding.

In my notes I wrote ‘Keith incredible‘ – and awarded it 12…………..

Also awarded top marks was the skyscraper rendition of ‘Won’t Get Fooled Again‘ that went beyond belief in bringing things to a conclusion. During the climatic synthesiser break a bewildering web of lasers turned a dilapidated football ground into a space age amphitheatre, the stage bathed in searing white light for the final two minutes of the song – the crescendo and illumination lasting just long enough for The Who to say goodnight and be gone.

During a performance that rose to a plateau only The Who could reach – in the years since rock scribes have referred to it as ‘the gig of gigs‘ – Pete Townshend defied gravity, Keith Moon pummelled his huge kit into submission, Roger Daltrey had shouted the place down while John Entwistle held it all together with understated panache. Somewhere I still have the ‘New Musical Express‘ published at the end of that week and above a picture of the group taking their final bow it reads: ‘Who Are The Greatest?’

Beneath the photograph it simply states: ‘We Are’.

In reviewing the show for ‘Sounds‘ Barbara Charone wrote: ‘Charlton was magic because it pulled the very best out of The Who. The lasers were just decoration, The Who were the real magicians…absolutely brilliant.’

For many years the show was officially listed in the ‘Guinness Book Of Records‘ as the loudest ever played, measuring 120 on the decibel level. For a gig so loud I recall no issues with feedback, indeed the only problem I had with the sound of The Who was that for days afterwards I couldn’t listen to them, or anyone else for that matter – this due to a humming noise in my ears that occasionally sounded like the opening flourish of ‘Pinball Wizard.’

Yet sadly an era was drawing to a close. Along with two more UK football ground shows that followed in the next fortnight, this trio given the title ‘The Who Put The Boot In‘ they would be the last performed by Moon before a paying audience in Britain – the irrepressible drummer succumbing to an accidental overdose of barbiturates prescribed to curb his alcoholism in September 1978. With Kenny Jones, formerly of the Small Faces and Faces, installed on the drum stool, The Who resumed live performances in the summer of 1979, by which time this devotee had also undergone something of a change.

Despite being no less a fan, he had become smitten with Springsteen, Elvis Costello and particularly The Clash – a band whose idealism and articulation of adolescent frustration, mirrored The Who at the time of their mid-60s breakthrough, but were ten years closer to me in age.

Less than a fortnight after Charlton The Who played at Vetch Field, then home of Swansea City FC, this on a day when the crowd were continually hosed to keep them cool in stifling heat – and once again The Who were worth getting soaked for.

During my career as a football writer I returned a number of times to The Valley, which has long been a modern, well-appointed stadium. On those visits, in sunshine and rain, I have witnessed some fine performances – but none to match the display given by Pete, Keith, Roger and John on Monday 31^st May 1976.

On the cusp of the long hot summer of 1976 it rained on South London – and The Who reigned over everyone else.

THE WHO: Charlton Athletic Football Ground, London, England – May 31 1976;

I Can’t Explain/Substitute/ My Wife/Baba O’Riley/Squeeze Box/Behind Blue Eyes/Dreaming From The Waist/ Magic Bus/Amazing Journey/Sparks/The Acid Queen/Fiddle About/Pinball Wizard/I’m Free/Tommy’s Holiday Camp/ We’re Not Gonna Take It/Summertime Blues, My Generation/Join Together/ Won’t Get Fooled Again;

This article was first published on 29/5/2018.

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NEIL SAMBROOK is the author of MONTY’S DOUBLE – an acclaimed thriller now available in paperback and as an Amazon Kindle book.