The Who – Baba O’Riley
About The Song
“Baba O’Riley” is a song by the English rock band The Who, written by the guitarist, Pete Townshend. It is the opening track to the Who’s fifth album, Who’s Next (1971). In Europe, it was released as a single in October 1971, coupled with “My Wife”. Performances of “Baba O’Riley” appear on several Who live albums.
Townshend wrote “Baba O’Riley” for his Lifehouse project, a rock opera intended as the followup to the Who’s 1969 opera Tommy. In Lifehouse, a Scottish farmer named Ray would have sung the song at the beginning as he gathered his wife Sally and his two children to begin their exodus to London. When Lifehouse was scrapped, eight of the songs were salvaged and recorded for the Who’s 1971 album Who’s Next, with “Baba O’Riley” as the lead-off track. The song title refers to two of Townshend’s major inspirations at the time: Meher Baba and Terry Riley
According to Townshend, at the end of the band’s gig at the 1969 Isle of Wight Festival, the field was covered in rubbish left by fans, which inspired the line “teenage wasteland”. In another interview, Townshend said the song was also inspired by “the absolute desolation of teenagers at Woodstock, where audience members were strung out on acid and 20 people had brain damage. The irony was that some listeners took the song to be a teenage celebration: ‘Teenage Wasteland, yes! We’re all wasted!'”
Widely regarded as one of the Who’s finest songs and as one of the greatest rock songs of all time, “Baba O’Riley” appears in Time “All-Time 100 Songs” list, Rolling Stone’s list of “The 500 Greatest Songs of All Time”, and the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame as one of the 500 Songs That Shaped Rock and Roll.
