Roger Daltrey did not mince words when sharing his excitement for the Who’s upcoming LP. “I think we’ve made our best album since Quadrophenia,” the legendary singer proclaimed during a recent Q&A with fans.
Mentioning the new material in the same breath as the band's vaunted 1973 concept album is high praise, indeed. The comment also represents an about-face for the Who frontman.
Earlier this year, guitarist and cofounder Pete Townshend revealed that he didn’t even get a response from Daltrey after sending the singer 15 demos. "Just silence from Roger," Townshend said. "I had to bully him to respond, and then it wasn't the response I wanted. He just blathered for a while and in the end I really stamped my foot and said, 'Roger, I don't care if you really like this stuff. You have to sing it. You'll like it in 10 years time.'"
Even after giving the new music his attention, Daltrey only felt a connection with a handful of tracks. “When I first heard the songs I was very skeptical as I didn’t think I could do it,” the singer explained. “I thought Pete had written a really great solo album and I said to him, ‘Pete, what do you need to do this for? Release it as a solo album, it’s great.’ But he said he wanted it to be a Who album.
“So I took the songs away and I listened to them, and listened to them some more, and I had some ideas. [Pete] let me have a bit of freedom with changing a few things, changing the tenses of songs and other little things. And he gave me complete melodic freedom. And I gotta tell you that after being very skeptical I’m now incredibly optimistic."
"I think we’ve made our best album since Quadrophenia," he continued. “Pete hasn’t lost it, he’s still a fabulous songwriter and he’s still got that cutting edge, man.”
The band is in the midst of their orchestral ‘Moving On’ North American tour. Townshend only agreed to the trek, which keeps the group on the road through October, on the condition that the Who release a new album. The as-yet untitled LP will be the band's first new studio material since 2006.
