Tommy (1969 Original Concept Album) | 
 enlarge | Artist: The Who
Label: Mca
Category: Music
List Price: $13.98
Buy Used: $4.99
You Save: $8.99 (64%)
New (40) Used (40) Collectible (15) from $4.99
Avg. Customer Rating:  271 reviews
Sales Rank: 1248
Format: Original Recording Remastered
Media: Audio CD
Discs: 1
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.2
Dimensions (in): 5.6 x 5 x 0.5
MPN: 008811141721
UPC: 088111417214
EAN: 0008811141721
ASIN: B000002OZY
Release Date: March 12, 1996
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
Condition: Excellent condition.
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| Tracks:
| • | Overture | | • | It's A Boy | | • | 1921 | | • | Amazing Journey | | • | Sparks | | • | Eyesight To The Blind (The Hawker) | | • | Christmas | | • | Cousin Kevin | | • | The Acid Queen | | • | Underture | | • | Do You Think It's Alright? | | • | Fiddle About | | • | Pinball Wizard | | • | There's A Doctor | | • | Go To The Mirror! | | • | Tommy Can You Hear Me? | | • | Smash The Mirror | | • | Sensation | | • | Miracle Cure | | • | Sally Simpson | | • | I'm Free | | • | Welcome | | • | Tommy's Holiday Camp | | • | We're Not Gonna Take It |
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| Editorial Reviews:
Product Description
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Amazon.com essential recording
Tommy had the dubious distinction of being the first-ever rock opera; however, it's none the worse for that, Ken Russell's adaptation notwithstanding. Due largely to Pete Townshend's skill as a songwriter and composer, Tommy tells a coherent story and includes quality rock and roll at the same time, an impressive feat by itself. While surprisingly more linear than the later Quadrophenia, Tommy boasts several songs that stand up well on their own, including the classic "Pinball Wizard," "The Acid Queen," "I'm Free," and "Sally Simpson." Much of the rest doesn't make much sense lyrically unless you listen to the entire album, but you'll probably want to do that anyway, preferably with the lights low and the stereo cranked. --Genevieve Williams
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| Customer Reviews: Read 266 more reviews...
 Doctor Who August 15, 2008
A clinical and seminal meditation on alienation, popularity-seeking, and the decline of Western man encased in a rock opera about a handicapped boy. Albert Einstein spoke of his own "retarded" youth, being withdrawn from the world, and how that aided him in opening new vistas in science. "Tommy" isn't so fortunate.
"Amazing Journey" shows the advantage of Tommy's "retardation" yet shadows of "normalcy" lurk. Pete Townshend's medicinal lyrics bring to mind the Christian sentiment that only one with a child's disposition can enter the Kingdom of G-d.
"Ten years old
With thoughts as bold as thought can be
Loving life and becoming wise
In simplicity
Sickness will surely take the mind
Where minds can't usually go
Come on the amazing journey
And learn all you should know..."
Tommy's infirmities are an opportunity for his family and others to practice compassion. The boy is a living embodiment of "The Other" as found in the ethical philosophy of Emmanuel Levinas. Tommy's line of "See me, feel me, touch me, heal me" (and, Levinas might have added, "...in order for both to be healed.") is the invitation to caring. The invitation is ignored.
The boy's path to "normalcy" opens when he becomes a "Pinball Wizard." Pinball reflects Tommy's upbringing, being bounced from one relative to another, one bad experience to the next. Townshend is also opening a window into the culture of games and entertainment and how that is held out by the mass media as the most desirable escape from poverty and isolation for Britain's lower classes. Soccer mania would be the real-life equivalent in today's Europe.
Modern medicine intervenes and, in short order, Tommy is wallowing in celebrity, laziness, and profligacy. Worse, he uses his new circumstances to entice others into the nihilism that Anglo-American capitalism and social democracy abet.
From "Welcome": "Come to my house, be one of the comfortable people..."
"I'm Free" gives us a stark picture of how the worst get on top (to borrow a phrase from F.A. Hayek's "The Road to Serfdom") -
"If I told you what it takes to reach the highest high,
You'd laugh and say `Nothing's that simple...' `'
Ten years later "Dallas" soap opera villain J.R. Ewing would state it more plainly - "Once you give up integrity the rest is a piece of cake."
"Tommy" was released in 1969, a time of great confusion about man's individual and social responsibilities (things haven't gotten much clearer since). The Who's music penetrates to the reality of an anarchy of ever-increasing individual rights (read: demands) and unchecked government leading to loss of social cohesion amid waning family, school, and neighborhood affections. This, in turn, breeds popularity seeking as the most attractive island in the rising tide of despair. Fellow Brits Pink Floyd would touch on this in "The Wall" a decade after Townshend.
Is there a better way out? The Who echoes Oswald Spengler in showing that there is. Spengler's "The Decline of the West" (first published in the 1920s; interestingly, the time line of "Tommy" begins around 1921) likened cultures and civilizations to life patterns, calling them "organic." While holding civilization will move in the direction of its destiny, Spengler advised people to discern the direction of movement and contribute positively to it. Townshend and his bandmates did that in "Tommy."
In reckoning outcomes, the workings of the human body, with its voluntary and involuntary organs, are an apt metaphor. How we consciously react and govern ourselves are the voluntary muscles (thus the importance of individual character). Yet some choices and our surroundings impact us in ways of which we are not aware.
The final words of "Tommy" remind us of the importance our individual actions have on others and the social fabric. The mountain imagery remind us of the biblical Moses, the servant of G-d; the early Israelites, and the Ten Commandments, holding out hope that the door swings both ways between the great society (not to be confused with LBJ's version) and the sick society.
"Listening to you I get the music
Gazing at you I get the heat
Following you I climb the mountain
I get excitement at your feet
Right behind you I see the millions
On you I see the glory
From you I get opinions
From you I get the story."
Tommy in Surround Sound August 13, 2008
0 out of 1 found this review helpful
I"ve always been a big Tommy fan. My car now has a 5.1 surround sound system, so I HAD to get this DVD. It is awesome.
 Do You Think It's All Right? August 11, 2008
That was the question that the Who asked as they hit a dry spell going into 1969. It was answered by Pete Townshend in the form of "Tommy", the embodiment of Gospel and Rock Opera. Tommy the main character and central theme throughout the album has a breakthrough as only a deaf, dumb and blind boy can, through pinball. It's his eyes, ears and voice through which he makes contact with the rest of the world. Truly inspiring, it's the platform on which he attains stardom. The rest is history.
The blueprint July 26, 2008
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
In their late '60's - early '70's heyday, the Who were an incredible, transcendent band. However, I can't help but feel that studio recordings failed to do justice to their intense, dynamic, and energetic sound (until "Who's Next," that is). In an old edition of the Rolling Stone Record Guide, John Swenson hit the nail on the head: "The early Who albums present one of the most interesting problems posed in rock & roll history. The band was considered at the time to be much better in live performance than on record..." After listening to live renditions of "Tommy" (especially the great "Live at Leeds" deluxe edition), I can't agree more.
First of all, the studio "Tommy" feels padded, perhaps to extend it to double-record length. There are a few forgettable songs (the sequence from "Sensation" to "Tommy's Holiday Camp" comes to mind), a couple of head-scratchers (how does Sonny Boy Williamson's "Eyesight to the Blind" fit in?), and some songs (particularly "Underture") seem over-extended. Second, the production, on the whole, is too tidy and rather flat: we get little of Townshend's roaring electric guitar, and the band, in general, sounds too careful - like they're trying not to color outside the lines. However, all of these flaws go out the window in the live performances from 1969/70. The band trimmed some of the fat (cutting several numbers and shortening others), and, more important, they summoned up a monumental energy and collective spirit that made "Tommy" an overwhelming - and yes, cohesive - listening experience (something that, ironically, the studio record does not accomplish with total success). After hearing and seeing scalding live versions of "Amazing Journey/Sparks" (the Woodstock video footage is incredible), I actually have a hard time listening to the studio version. The same applies to "Pinball Wizard" and "We're Not Gonna Take It." Live, as in so many of the band's peak performances, they throw caution to the wind and play on the brink of total implosion, led by Keith Moon's frantic drumming.
Okay, after all this complaining, why four stars? To be honest, I considered "Tommy" an unquestioned five-star album until I heard these live renditions. Over time, the studio album's flaws became more apparent to me. However, there are some incredible songs here, and it really is the record that took The Who to the proverbial "next level." I actually prefer the studio version of "Christmas" to the live ones (which lack the excited, "chirping" background vocals). "Cousin Kevin" is a great - though disturbing - John Entwistle song that was almost never performed live. "Go to the Mirror!" and "Smash the Mirror" form a powerful central climax, with Daltrey's vocals working superbly. In addition, I do enjoy many of the production touches only possible in the studio, such as Entwistle's horn overdubs and some of the background vocal "choir" effects.
In conclusion, I can't bring myself to give this record fewer than four stars, but if you haven't heard the "Leeds" version yet, please check it out. I must warn you, though: you'll never hear the studio version with the same ears again.
Now this is The Who... July 21, 2008
2 out of 2 found this review helpful
Before "Tommy" The Who was just another band like The Beatles who were your typical 60's pop group, once this album hit they evolved from those 3 minute song rockers to the complex, progressive artists driven by Townshend's power lyrics and Daultry's amazing vocals (backed by argubly the greatest drummer and bassist of all-tme). If your trying to get into this band, I would start with "Who's Next" as it showchases their biggest songs but from there you NEED "Tommy" and "Quadrophenia".
This is the album that made The Who memorable and legendary. Buy, listen, and appreciate.
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