There will be long faces today at in-strument manufacturers, who have just lost one of their most reliable clients: Pete Townshend claims to have smashed his last guitar. The gold-sprayed Fender Stratocaster that was taken apart during The Who’s tour of Japan two years ago is supposedly the last to suffer the rock star’s climactic concert rage: the splinters are to be autographed, encased in Plexiglas and auctioned for charity. Guitar-smashing, Townshend admits, has become something of a cliché, a signal to ecstatic audiences that his arm-whirling performances were over.
The hardest of rockers has to admit that time is the most unforgiving stage on which to perform. A certain Paul McCartney (remember the baby-faced mop top?) turned 64 yesterday — and the screaming children are now as likely to be grandchildren as fans. For The Who, the re-creation of their 1970 performance at Leeds University union was probably too demanding an exertion for some at the original event — anyway, they would no doubt have preferred to spend their time at an antiques fair.
Like the Sixties themselves, The Who are on a roll again. Saturday’s performance not only marked the start of a world tour but brought out the first new material in the repertoire since 1983. Who now can deplore the cult of youth when rock is dominated by golden oldies? Their apotheosis at the Golden Jubilee Palace concert has brought back an entire generation from pensionable obscurity. For those who could not get a ticket and for those who have forgotten that they attended Saturday’s show, there will be a repeat gig next weekend.