The Who releases new single

“All This Music Must Fade” is first new music from Who album

As opening lines go “I don’t care, I know you’re going to hate this song, and that’s fair we never really got along” from The Who’s new single “All This Music Must Fade” is perhaps the most confrontational and catchy of 2019 so far. “All This Music Must Fade” is available now at all digital retailers and will appear on their forthcoming WHO album, available December 6th via Interscope Records.

The song, which debuted on the BBC Radio 2 Breakfast Show on Wednesday (Oct 2nd), opens the WHO album and Pete Townshend describes it as “A song is dedicated to every artist who has ever been accused of ripping off someone else’s song. Seriously? Our musical palette is limited enough in the 21st Century without some dork claiming to have invented a common chord scheme.”

Fifty-five years after they made their first recordings, The Who is back with their first new album in thirteen years. The 11 track album was mostly recorded in London and Los Angeles during spring and summer 2019 and was co-produced by Pete Townshend & D. Sardy (who has worked with Noel Gallagher, Oasis, LCD Soundsystem, Gorillaz) with vocal production by Dave Eringa (Manic Street Preachers, Roger Daltrey, Wilko Johnson).

Singer Roger Daltrey and guitarist and songwriter Pete Townshend are joined on the album by long-time Who drummer Zak Starkey, bassist Pino Palladino along with contributions from Simon Townshend, Benmont Tench, drummers Carla Azar and Joey Waronker, bass player Gus Seyffert and Gordon Giltrap.

The album cover has been created by famed pop artist, Sir Peter Blake who first met the band in 1964 at a taping of the legendary TV show Ready Steady Go. Sir Peter designed and contributed a painting to the sleeve of The Who’s album Face Dances in 1981.

The songs on WHO cover a myriad of subjects including the Grenfell Tower fire, musical theft, spirituality, reincarnation, the power of memory and ‘an old rock star that has lost his marbles’. Singer Roger Daltrey rates it amongst their strongest “I think we’ve made our best album since Quadrophenia in 1973, Pete hasn’t lost it, he’s still a fabulous songwriter, and he’s still got that cutting edge.”

After their triumphant return to Wembley Stadium in the summer, the band will be embarking on a UK tour featuring a full orchestra in spring 2020.

CD | LP

  1. All This Music Must Fade
  2. Ball And Chain
  3. I Don’t Wanna Get Wise
  4. Detour
  5. Beads On One String*
  6. Hero Ground Zero
  7. Street Song
  8. I’ll Be Back
  9. Break The News**
  10. Rockin’ In Rage
  11. She Rocked My World

All songs written by Pete Townshend except
*Pete Townshend/Josh Hunsacker **Simon Townshend
Produced by Pete Townshend & D. Sardy
Roger Daltrey Vocal production Dave Eringa
Mixed by D. Sardy

Buddy Iahn
Buddy Iahn

Buddy Iahn founded The Music Universe when he decided to juxtapose his love of web design and music. As a lifelong drummer, he decided to take a hiatus from playing music to report it. The website began as a fun project in 2013 to one of the top independent news sites. Email: info@themusicuniverse.com