tommy lyric sheets

7/23/2019 Tommy Lyric Sheets

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2004 Geffen Records.All rights reserved. Unauthorized distribution prohibited without written permission.


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companion piece to the Tommy DVD-Audio.

hotographs by Baron Wolman and Barrie Wentzell.


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A WORD ABOUT THE WORDS

Tommy was a serious project. Although the recording sessions

were fun, and there are legends about how long we spent in the pub talking

about things, no lyrics were written in the studio with the band, and none

were written in the pub. All my lyrics were written at home, in my home

studio, or in various hotel rooms.

In most cases, what youll see on the following pages are not

the original lyrics at all, but copies of them, produced for various

purposes. Some would have been put together for editing. Others may have

been copied out simply to guide a studio overdub. A few of the scraps

arent even in my handwriting, which suggests they may have been copied

out for Roger, or by Roger. In cases where the lyrics are original, I

tore them from a pad or book in order to photograph them for some purpose,

and I didnt want people to see what was in the rest of the book, likemy shopping lists.

In many cases, I didnt write lyrics out at all until after the

demo was recorded. I may have made words up as I went along or committed

words to memory in order to make the demo. Youll see where some of the

lyrics have been crossed out and others added. This is because the lyrics

were continually being changed and reworked to fit changing songs and the

evolving storyline. For example, at first there was no Holiday Camp theme,

just Welcome - come to this house, be one of us. Keith came up with

the camp theme, and I interpolated it back into all the relevant songs.

Richard Barnes and I wrote a book, The Story of Tommy, which

explains how the original idea for the story evolved. In short, I wantedto deal with a spiritual theme that decried phony religions, drug abuse

and the star system. I wrote Underture in 1967, the lyric to Amazing

Journey in 1968, and the rest followed.

I brought a completed idea to the band that I had developed with

Kit Lambert. The problem was, when it was almost finished, we - as a

creative band, not musicians recreating what PT wanted - realized that

the story was rather heavy: postwar, child abuse, bullying, etc. It needed

colour and air. This was the tough bit, and it took several weeks of

brainstorming to come up with the last few final trimmings. Adding the

reprised Listening to You chorus (from Go to the Mirror) to the end

of the opera was one of the very last things we did. And of course, it

was vital to the success of the piece.

Pete Townshend

February 2004

A WORD ABOUT THE WORDS

Tommy was a serious project. Although the recording sessions

were fun, and there are legends about how long we spent in the pub talking

about things, no lyrics were written in the studio with the band, and none

were written in the pub. All my lyrics were written at home, in my home

studio, or in various hotel rooms.

In most cases, what youll see on the following pages are not

the original lyrics at all, but copies of them, produced for various

purposes. Some would have been put together for editing. Others may have

been copied out simply to guide a studio overdub. A few of the scraps

arent even in my handwriting, which suggests they may have been copied

out for Roger, or by Roger. In cases where the lyrics are original, I

tore them from a pad or book in order to photograph them for some purpose,

and I didnt want people to see what was in the rest of the book, likemy shopping lists.

In many cases, I didnt write lyrics out at all until after the

demo was recorded. I may have made words up as I went along or committed

words to memory in order to make the demo. Youll see where some of the

lyrics have been crossed out and others added. This is because the lyrics

were continually being changed and reworked to fit changing songs and the

evolving storyline. For example, at first there was no Holiday Camp theme,

just Welcome - come to this house, be one of us. Keith came up with

the camp theme, and I interpolated it back into all the relevant songs.

Richard Barnes and I wrote a book, The Story of Tommy, which

explains how the original idea for the story evolved. In short, I wantedto deal with a spiritual theme that decried phony religions, drug abuse

and the star system. I wrote Underture in 1967, the lyric to Amazing

Journey in 1968, and the rest followed.

I brought a completed idea to the band that I had developed with

Kit Lambert. The problem was, when it was almost finished, we - as a

creative band, not musicians recreating what PT wanted - realized that

the story was rather heavy: postwar, child abuse, bullying, etc. It needed

colour and air. This was the tough bit, and it took several weeks of

brainstorming to come up with the last few final trimmings. Adding the

reprised Listening to You chorus (from Go to the Mirror) to the end

of the opera was one of the very last things we did. And of course, it

was vital to the success of the piece.

Pete Townshend

February 2004


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Written by Pete Townshend

ublished by BMG Music o/b/o/ Towser Tunesabulous Music, ABKCO


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Written by Sonny Boy Williamsonublished by Arc Music Corp.


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My method of songwriting has always been based on tape recording.

As 14-year-olds in 1959, John Entwistle and I were in a school band called

the Scorpions with Pete Wilson (lead guitar) and Mick Brown (drums). Mick

had a tape recorder, a rare possession for such a young man in those days.

We used to make up plays, comedies, like the ones we heard on BBC Radio.

One day, Mick recorded me playing Man of Mystery solo on an acoustic

guitar. It was plaintive and beautiful, and I heard myself as a real

musician for the first time. As soon as I could I got hold of my own

tape machine and started to record various things, sometimes made up.

By 1963, I had written a couple of pretty decent songs.

Later in 1964, Pete Wilson arranged for the Detours (the band John

and I went on to play in with Roger Daltrey) to record at the home studio

of Barry Gray, who wrote film music for children's series like Fireball

XL5. We recorded It Was You and Please Dont Send Me Home. Barry used

two mono machines like Phil Spector, and from that day forward, I worked

on two machines as well. As soon as he took over management in 1964, Kit

Lambert arranged for me to buy two very robust and rugged film recorders

by an English company called Vortexion. These became my workhorse machines,

working mono to mono. In 1966, I upgraded to stereo machines. In 1967,

I moved to stereo Revoxes running at high speed and got a big quality

jump. Some of the last demos for Tommy were made on those machines.

I was the first home studio user of Revoxes to use full-size Dolby

A301 noise-reduction processors for stereo-to-stereo bouncing. The album

I produced in my house in Twickenham with the band Thunderclap Newman

(available through www.eelpie.com) was mainly recorded in this manner.Although inventor Ray Dolby was an American, he developed the first units

in the UK. That's why I got two of the earliest units for home use. They

reduced the characteristic buildup of tape hiss and distortion caused by

doing a large number of tape bounces from machine to machine. Some recordings

from the period, even those done in professional studios, got very hissy

and distorted if more than three bounces were made. That distortion has

now become rather celebrated. Nowadays, though, even modest home tape

machines have Dolby or DBX noise-reduction systems.

Even today I use a similar process, one which is now through

computers very sophisticated in potential but simple in execution. I

am partly responsible for the kind of software and machinery that exists

today: I helped conceive the first 4-track cassette portastudio, forexample, and built many specialized 8-track demo studios for songwriters

like Cat Stevens, Ronnie Wood and Ronnie Lane. For that I am obviously

proud. I can write a song on a 4-track cassette machine costing $200

as easily as I can on a digital workstation costing $20,000.

Pete Townshend

February 2004

OTHER STUFF

My method of songwriting has always been based on tape recording.

As 14-year-olds in 1959, John Entwistle and I were in a school band called

the Scorpions with Pete Wilson (lead guitar) and Mick Brown (drums). Mick

had a tape recorder, a rare possession for such a young man in those days.

We used to make up plays, comedies, like the ones we heard on BBC Radio.

One day, Mick recorded me playing Man of Mystery solo on an acoustic

guitar. It was plaintive and beautiful, and I heard myself as a real

musician for the first time. As soon as I could I got hold of my own

tape machine and started to record various things, sometimes made up.

By 1963, I had written a couple of pretty decent songs.

Later in 1964, Pete Wilson arranged for the Detours (the band John

and I went on to play in with Roger Daltrey) to record at the home studio

of Barry Gray, who wrote film music for children's series like Fireball

XL5. We recorded It Was You and Please Dont Send Me Home. Barry used

two mono machines like Phil Spector, and from that day forward, I worked

on two machines as well. As soon as he took over management in 1964, Kit

Lambert arranged for me to buy two very robust and rugged film recorders

by an English company called Vortexion. These became my workhorse machines,

working mono to mono. In 1966, I upgraded to stereo machines. In 1967,

I moved to stereo Revoxes running at high speed and got a big quality

jump. Some of the last demos for Tommy were made on those machines.

I was the first home studio user of Revoxes to use full-size Dolby

A301 noise-reduction processors for stereo-to-stereo bouncing. The album

I produced in my house in Twickenham with the band Thunderclap Newman

(available through www.eelpie.com) was mainly recorded in this manner.Although inventor Ray Dolby was an American, he developed the first units

in the UK. That's why I got two of the earliest units for home use. They

reduced the characteristic buildup of tape hiss and distortion caused by

doing a large number of tape bounces from machine to machine. Some recordings

from the period, even those done in professional studios, got very hissy

and distorted if more than three bounces were made. That distortion has

now become rather celebrated. Nowadays, though, even modest home tape

machines have Dolby or DBX noise-reduction systems.

Even today I use a similar process, one which is now through

computers very sophisticated in potential but simple in execution. I

am partly responsible for the kind of software and machinery that exists

today: I helped conceive the first 4-track cassette portastudio, forexample, and built many specialized 8-track demo studios for songwriters

like Cat Stevens, Ronnie Wood and Ronnie Lane. For that I am obviously

proud. I can write a song on a 4-track cassette machine costing $200

as easily as I can on a digital workstation costing $20,000.

Pete Townshend

February 2004

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