‘Ours is music with built-in hatred. Pete Townshend
Peter Stanfield's book "A Band with Built-In Hate" chronicles The Who's journey from the Detours to the late seventies, exploring their ambition, anger, glamour, and grime through the lens of pop art and the cultural revolution.

Format: Hardback
Length: 320 pages
Publication date: 15 March 2021
Publisher: Reaktion Books

‘Ours is music with built-in hatred. Pete Townshend A Band with Built-In Hate pictures The Who from their inception as the Detours in the mid-sixties to the late seventies, post-Quadrophenia. It is a story of ambition and anger, glamour and grime, viewed through the prism of pop art and the radical levelling of high and low culture that it brought about – a drama that was aggressively performed by the band. Peter Stanfield lays down a path through the British pop revolution, its attitude and style, as it was uniquely embodied by The Who: first, under the mentorship of arch-mod Peter Meaden, as they learnt their trade in the pubs and halls of suburban London; and then with Kit Lambert and Chris Stamp, two aspiring filmmakers, at the very centre of things in Soho. Guided by contemporary commentators – among them George Melly, Lawrence Alloway and most conspicuously Nik Cohn – Stanfield describes a band driven by belligerence, and of what happened when Townshend, Daltrey, Moon and Entwistle moved from back-room stages to international arenas, from explosive 45s to expansive concept albums. Above all, he tells of how The Who confronted their lost youth as it was echoed in punk.

Ours is music with built-in hatred. Pete Townshend

A Band with Built-In Hate

pictures

The Who

from their inception as the Detours in the mid-sixties to the late seventies, post-Quadrophenia

It is a story of ambition and anger, glamour and grime, viewed through the prism of pop art and the radical levelling of high and low culture that it brought about – a drama that was aggressively performed by the band

Peter Stanfield lays down a path through the British pop revolution, its attitude and style, as it was uniquely embodied by The Who

first, under the mentorship of arch-mod Peter Meaden, as they learnt their trade in the pubs and halls of suburban London

and then with Kit Lambert and Chris Stamp, two aspiring filmmakers, at the very centre of things in Soho

Guided by contemporary commentators – among them George Melly, Lawrence Alloway and most conspicuously Nik Cohn – Stanfield describes a band driven by belligerence, and of what happened when Townshend, Daltrey, Moon and Entwistle moved from back-room stages to international arenas, from explosive 45s to expansive concept albums

Above all, he tells of how The Who confronted their lost youth as it was echoed in punk

Weight: 494g
Dimension: 147 x 223 x 34 (mm)
ISBN-13: 9781789142778