THE WHO: Bargain (LIVE 1971)

Four viewer opinions:

  1. The DRUMS in this song, along with the rest of it make it another timeless WHO CLASSIC !!!
  2. excellent, simply excellent, i'm speechless!
  3. truly incredible daltrey vocals
  4. was at this concert, in SF, 14 years old, flat against the stage on Pete's side, 15 feet from his HiWatts. Literally changed my life.

Howard’s thoughts:

Here’s Pete really loosing his temper with parts of the audience. Possibly rightly so. I have many live versions of this track and  this is the most exciting one. PT was never more compelling than when:

  1. he was hoping mad
  2. using an SG with twin P-90s into ...
  3. highly modified (mid-range distortion boost) Hi-Watt 100-watt heads driving
  4. multiple 4 x 12 cabinets

Just listen to those demolition power chords; my phrase incidentally! No foot pedals. Little if any  effects. As an aside, I saw them a few weeks earlier at The Rainbow. This youtube clip captures the sound as I remember it after all these years. I saw them 17 times subsequently.

They remain the ultimate power trio plus one power vocalist. The sound pressure level was like a physical assault. Predominantly a bloke audience it was, in a sense, a curious sort of belonging; curious because I never consciously join anything. And yet somehow ……  Truth be told they were in my late teenage years and early manhood the ultimate trip for me. I miss them.

 

One thought on “THE WHO: Bargain (LIVE 1971)

  1. Editor – you’ve done it again! Terrific version! Listening to this performance sent me scurrying to my CD collection as I knew it was somewhere in there, and yes, it is on disc 3 in the ‘Thirty Years of Maximum R & B’ boxed set, bought many years ago at vast expense. Better sound quality than YouTube, naturally.
    They were MY band too – and the first proper gig I went to: 1965, Orpington Civic Hall, just after the release of their first album. Couldn’t hear for three days afterwards. Cost me 5/- to get in, that’s 25p in old money. Doesn’t sound much, I know, but in those days you could buy a house in the suburbs of Manchester for 50p…..in fact…I think you still can!

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