John Entwistle's solo albums - unfairly ignored?

TOO LATE THE HERO, and I just played it out of blue first time in years the other day, is disgracefully witness, ponderous, just thick and un-catchy and un-thoughtful and un-fun. Vitale especially terrible on it, tho Walsh does nothing to deserve his rep, and nor does John.

In an interesting bit of business biz, which I cannot explain but likely explains lack of streaming, the Atco lps copyright is NOT to the label but to John's company. Don't know how he got this perk that most much-bigger-than-him acts did not in this era, but interesting. Agree with above it was a failed attempt to fit in with rock radio at the time, but so undistinguished and dull.

 

I always thought the "deserted rock and roll" and "amended his decision" parts were Pete! I learn something new every day....

Next you'll be telling me it's McCartney on drums and Lennon on piano!

 

Thanks for the kind words!


And I don't regret the decision to not say the song title publicly in the slightest. <3

 

First two lp's are currently unavailable on CD, and have been for a while. I wish they'd get reissued.

 

A damn good one for sure. Crazy, but I had forgotten it was a JE song. I had it in my head it was Pete. Glad you brought it up. 3 really good songs by him on WHO ARE YOU, which IMO really make it good album. Pete's work on it is strong, but he's looking to make the epic statement all the time, instead of writing catchy rock songs, IMO. That's where Pete loses people often times, IMO.

 

Pete does sing those parts. I assume what @Spadeygrove is saying is that he doesn't consider them to be lead vocals.

 

I assume the word you meant here is "witless"... if so, I agree wholeheartedly. A John Entwistle album that's not at all funny or clever is simply not a good idea. I was really surprised to hear him produce something so generic, both lyrically and musically, when his strong suit had always been writing songs about topics that no one else would have thought to write a song about.

 

Too Late the Hero sounds like Who's Next compared to his next album The Rock. Talk about a slab of '80's generic hair-metal. But at least you can hear his bass work on that one, unlike the album he made with Glenn Tipton and Cozy Powell, which sounds like a bunch of heavy compressed noise and the bass player could of been anyone.

 

I like Too Late The Hero. I find the title track quite moving - Entwistle ‘78-‘82 is my very era of his work, but then I never needed The Ox to tickle my funny bone.

 

I do as well. You can find them online, but it will cost you.

 

I've never heard The Rock. The fact that it wasn't really a JAE album, coupled with my disappointment with Too Late the Hero and his weak contributions to It's Hard were reasons enough for me to avoid seeking it out.

 

Always loved Apron Strings,with Peter Frampton on guitar and BV....fantastic song.

 

Wish he'd have sung it! (and Trick of the Light)

 

The Rock sounds like pour man's Def Leppard. Very B class music but has a couple good moments. The only thing worse is the Tipton album. I paid through the nose for this as an import when it came out because of numerous US delays. What a piece. I'm not sure there was even bass on this as it was such a horrible mix of brown noise.

I absolutely love Whistle Rhymes though!!!

 

Is anyone a fan of either the Rhino or Sanctuary compilation cds in terms of sound quality, track selection? I never see the darn things.

 

There was a 30sec clip of "Had Enough" with John singing (presumably from the WAR sessions, or at least from that era) on YouTube that appears to have been taken down.

I have it on my computer, it was originally posted by YT user The Who Rarities, who I think is also a SHF member, though if he is idk his username here:

The Who Rarities

It sounds good with him on vocals, though the tape kinda sounds sped up so it gives a bit of a 'chipmunk' sound to it.

As far as I know the full version of "Had Enough" with John singing hasn't leaked/been released.

 

I remember picking up the 2005 Entwistle reissues at Borders--they offered a coupon attached to their store receipts, and I remember that if I bought a $2 cup of coffee at one Borders, saved the receipt, and took it to a different Borders I could get some ridiculous discount (something like 25% of any item?) saving me a lot more $$$ buying CDs than the $2 I paid for the coffee.

Of course, all the money I saved I probably sank into the copy of "Music from Van-Pires" I bought at an inflated price several years later, once I found out that it was a thing that existed. I'm glad I did, however. On paper, it sounds terrible (writing music for some short-lived syndicated kid's cartoon isn't exactly the most romantic capper to a rock and roll career) but it's certainly better than "The Rock", which really is as terrible as it sounds on paper (see all previous posts in this thread).

I'm telling myself I need to put on the deluxe "Left For Live" when I get home. If memory serves, it was something of a warts-and-all expansion of the single-disc original release into a 2-disc set, including false starts and other weirdness. Has anybody ever been able to nail down which show or shows (date/location) are heard on that release?

 

I bought LEFT FOR LIVE as very cheap digi-tracks from Emusic back when I was an Emusic customer and it hasn't been a go-to for relistening I must say. A bit too much in the "super trebly crunch attack" with John and not a lot going on with rest of band.

Last time i checked was ONLY John on spotify so anyone can check it out and decide for themselves.

 

"B Class"? You are being very kind regarding THE ROCK.
I am pretty sure I bought that CD via his website at the time; what a waste. Absolutely shocked by how bad it sounded.
I think it was "remixed" at least once since then, but I am not sure why -- you can't polish a turd.

Now WHISTLE RYMES on the other hand --- has always sounded perfect to me A++++ Class Music.

 

I just came across this thread and it reminded me of a 45 by John I found back in the 80s, called "I Wonder". Hadn't listened to it in years but I just brought it up on YouTube and...it's fantastic! What a horn riff. I haven't heard his albums yet but I remember hearing a radio advertisement for his "Smash Your Head Against The Wall" LP back in the 70s when I was in high school. I was a Who fan from the 70s on but the only solo LP I ever owned was Pete's 1972 LP.

 

I have all of John's solo albums. Most are weak or tragically inconsistent. My faves by far are the first 2 - the Smash and Whistle albums. I only wish they were recorded better. Smash pretty much sounds like a Who album!

 

Need to dive into his solo work..

 

I think it's tragic that "What Are We Doing Here?" wasn't a Who song.

He had a few other songs that I also think would've been better had they been recorded by The Who, including "My Size", "Try Me" and "Too Late the Hero".

 

With regards to Pete, I'm not a proponent of the "his-solo-stuff-would-have-been-better-if-performed-by-the-Who"argument, but hearing it applied to John just now kind of stopped me dead in my tracks.

My generally controversial take is that Pete's songwriting had started to focus beyond that which was expected of the Who by the mid-1970's. John, on the other hand, was really coming into his own as a songwriter in 1978--the problem may have been that
he apparently just wasn't prolific enough to ease Pete's songwriting burden? I guess what I'm trying to say is that while Pete kept writing and recording music after 1982, John no longer had an outlet to have his music heard after that point.

Again, I like "Too Late The Hero", although I can understand some of the objections to that album's change in music direction voiced above. I guess we'll just never know how Entwistle might have followed up that album, because I can't accept that "The Rock" is representative of anything else other than what Entwistle did to stay busy until the 1989 Who Revue tour came along--he only wrote four of the eleven songs, and didn't sing. So, who knows where he might have gone as a songwriter and a solo act, given the opportunity simply to have his stuff heard.

Still, I should take a song-by-song listen to John's catalog someday. I think the only stuff I'm missing are a live version of "Boris The Spider" from a compilation of Ringo Starr's All-Starr Band, and he also contributed a cover of "Here Comes The Sun" to a George Harrison tribute album. (This begs the question--I can't think of a single cover of an Entwistle song off of the top of my head. But there have got to be at least a few of them out there? An Entwistle tribute album could be very interesting to hear...)

 

While that opinion may be controversial, I think it's exactly right and I've said similar things in slightly different terms, revelation after listening to lots of 70-73 era live stuff---the musical machine of Pete-John-Keith was just a monumental megarock monstrosity, the best in the world at that sort of intensity and power, and certainly by BY NUMBERS Pete has ceased to want to write for what that machine at its best could do. Keith and John I think did a very skilled job at playing along with Pete's more restrained or mechanical stuff for those last two lps, and I love them, but clearly the unparalleled destroy the universe and rebuild it power of them as a live act in that period is something Pete didn't care about anymore....