NakedSunfish ~ Issue6
John Alec Entwistle, 1944-2002
Who is the world's great rock and roll band--you can make a good argument for ending that sentence with a period and not a question mark, but there are several other deserving candidates. There is, however, no doubt in my mind that the Who's bassist was the greatest to ever play that instrument for a rock group. John Entwistle was the rarest of musicians, a innovator who revitalized and reimagined the way his instrument was played and heard. A completely unprecedented voice on the electric bass when the Who first bust on the scene in the early '60s, Entwistle changed the role of the bass in rock by playing in an upfront, melodic style. Like Charlie Parker on the saxophone, Jimi Hendrix on the guitar and, yes, bandmate Keith Moon on the drums, anyone taking up the instrument in his wake faces the decision of whether or not to pursue Entwistle's overall approach. Even now, a kid who may never have even heard of the Who is either going to play in one of the styles--hard rock, heavy metal, punk--that is their legacy or not. Anyone who tries to make the bass do anything besides sit in the back unobtrusively owes a debt to John.
Entwistle's impact was immediate. Jack Bruce parlayed his jazz and blues background into the heavy rock sound of Cream largely by following the trail Entwistle blazed. Six years after the Who sang My Generation, one of the landmark recordings on the road to punk rock, Black Sabbath released Paranoid, the album that completed the transition from blues rock to heavy metal. As crucial an ingredient in their brew as Ozzy's dark vocals and lyrics was bassist Geezer Butler and drummer Bill Ward's success in streamlining the furious styles of Entwistle and Moon into something a bit more controlled.
John died on the eve of the Who's current tour, another difficult loss for a band and fans that have suffered more than most. True to fashion, the band is soldiering on. They didn't stop for Keith, they didn't stop after Cincinnati, and they've kept on despite Pete Townshend's periodic attempts to bury the group. They aren't stopping now.
There are several possible interpretations why this band has kept and keeps going on in spite of each setback--their detractors simply (and often smugly) put it down to greed, fans like me point as well to the group's working class roots and work ethic, the existential dilemma faced by the performer trying to deny his vocation and, perhaps, denial in the case of the loss of first Keith and now John--but whatever their motivations, this is what the Who does, how they handle things. Had the timing been different, had the tragedy occurred two months earlier, I think the decision might well have been different. As it was, with everything ready to go, the crew in place, what else was there to do? On with the show, mates.
That said, I missed the tour's opening at the Hollywood Bowl. As much as I wanted to go, it was too soon for me, and John was too much a part of what I wanted to hear. It would have been too weird to see those guys on the same stage that I saw them on in 2000 without John. Still, everyone I talked to and everything I read about it said that the band, and particularly Pete, was incredible. They are supposed to reschedule their canceled date at Irvine Meadows in Orange County. I expect I'll be ready by then, though it won't be the same--just as it wasn't after Keith died, of course. But Who's worst is better than almost anyone else's best.
Ted's Top Five John Entwistle Basslines & Solos.
1.) My Generation-where
it all began .
2.) The Real Me-I'll never forget seeing him play this with his own group
at the House of Blues on the Sunset Strip. I was in the balcony overhanging
the stage, my eyes rivetted on his hands.
3.) Boris the Spider-even if he hated it and refused to play it at the gig
mentioned above, one of the very few songs he wrote for the Who that he
didn't play that night. "I'm not going to play fucking 'Boris the Spider,'"
he yelled at a fan, redfaced.
4.) Pinball Wizard-I thought parts of it were played on the guitar till
I saw Woodstock.
5.) Dreaming From the Waist-there's a great live version on the CD reissue
of The Who by Numbers alongside the studio version.