The Who- The Ultimate Collection

Who Are You!
After all these years, The Who,along with the other Many British Bands like The Kinks,The Animals,The Yardbirds,The Dave Clark five,Herman Hermit's & Of Course,The Beatles, The Music Still Lives on!

Great but pointless
If you already love The Who enough to buy this thing, thing you already probably have all the songs here. Nice sampling of songs though. I still hate Squeezebox, however, and was annoyed by its presence here. :D Ivan Rorick

Classic Rock Radio Staple
I don't know, maybe it isn't self-evident that anything that can be described as a staple of classic rock radio is rather low on the totem pole of popular music. Perhaps it's enough to remind readers that Foreigner and Lynrd Skynrd are also classic rock favorites and anyone who likes those bands is really not on an adult level and thus should not be allowed to purchase anything relating to music unaccompanied by someone with a little more taste and intelligence. This is probably about the 59th "best of" compilation that the Who have released since about 1983. The sad thing is they're all about the same depending on whether it's a single disc compilation or a double like the one in question. Has "Won't Get Fooled Again" ever not been included on one of these superfluous "best of's"? I highly doubt it and if nothing else it is comically ironic as some fans who have reviewed this item have shown that they will indeed get fooled again and again. A journey with one of rock's most overrated and least deserving of virtually any accolades they've ever received begins largely uneventfully with a healthy slab of harmless, run of the mill R&B based 60's pop. We won't judge them too harshly here as all of their contemporaries went through this phase, even the markedly superior Kinks. There is one exception to this rule however, the putrid and remarkably dated "My Generation". I don't know why anyone thought this song was worth the paper it was scribbled on, but it has to be one of the worst singles of the 60's or any time for that matter. The bright side of course is that it has put Townshend and company in the embarrassing position of having to sing a line like "hope I die before I get old" at 65. A virtual gift to all critics. Keith Moon's wish was granted. Tonwshend's, perhaps to the chagrin of anyone with taste, was not. "Boris The Spider" is a daft ditty about a spider dubbed Boris. Its main point of interest comes in the way of providing ample justification for why John Entwistle was rarely allowed to write songs for The Who. "Happy Jack" is the kind of song you'd be embarrassed to listen to if anyone else was around. Even alone, you may well blush. "Magic Bus" is a silly song about some idiot that catches a bus to see his girlfriend. It has perhaps the worst lyrics in Townshend's catalogue, though granted the list of contenders is legion. The listener is spared the tedium of the various live versions which often found a lame 3 minute song inexplicably and unjustly extended to 10 or longer. Really painful experience. Next we come to three contributions from the "Tommy" album, which is a very bloated and overrated album whose tracks deserve no serious commentary and so they won't get any. If we can gloss over "Summertime Blues" because it sucks (not that it stands alone in that category by any means) let's mention that we next have five selections from the 1971 album "Who's Next" plus two songs that were from those sessions and subsequently released as singles. The message here is clear. If anything good can be said about this band, it's located solely in the realm of "Who's Next". The band knows it and that is why every complilation is packed with material either from this album or from its sessions while most of the rest of the albums are glossed over or treated disparagingly (as in the case of Tommy and Quadrophenia which have only 3 songs each present here although the full albums both contain close to 20) "Long Live Rock" is an absolutely embarrassing and pathetic single recorded in about 1972 and understandably shelved for seven years. The only mystery is why it was ever released but the answer seems fairly clear; Whatever there was to Townshend's songwriting "genius" had been steadily drying up since about 1973 and he was probably at a loss to come up with anything at all, let alone something good (he usually is as records prove) "Who Are You" is not bad lyrically, but the music is very, very dated and a little sad to listen to now. All 59 Who compilations edit this song, which is understandable because it does go on for far too long, but they stupidly cut out the third verse which incidentally is the best verse in the song. There's more than enough dull musical interludes and repeat chorus chants that should have gone in its stead. "Sister Disco" is Townshend's attempt at a scathing commentary and it's perhaps unnecessary to say here that it is largely unsuccessful. Townshend I think mistakenly believed that the rise of disco in the late 70's was a direct threat to his livelihood, not perceiving that his own total dearth of inspiration and fresh ideas was much more damaging. Not surprisingly the eighties period of the Who is barely mentioned and this can be attributed to the fact that they only made two albums that decade and more importantly to the fact that the most interesting thing about them then was the myriad ways in which Townshend attempted to conceal his hair loss. This compilation begins with 1964 and ties it all up with one track from 1982 which may lead a less informed listener to believe the band dropped out after that. Sadly, in spite of releasing only one new album in the last 27 years and losing too another member in 2002, neither Daltrey nor Townshend has done the respectable thing and hung up their rock and roll shoes (probably velcro by now given that they're both well into senior citizenship) Instead they've mastered the art of self parody as they continue to spread their revival act to audiences whose only excuse for still showing up is that maybe they've suffered the same degree of hearing loss as Townshend over the years.

Don't bother
I gave this CD one star because there was maybe one song I actually liked. Go with the "Guess Who" instead.

The Who - Ultimate "Great Collection"
I purchased this collection because I did not have a good archive of Who songs spanning their entire career. The last collection I had purchased was "The Who's Greatest Hits" (on vinyl) many years ago which contained only about 10 or 12 songs. I purchased the two disc DVD of the "The Kid's Are Alright" a few years ago which I have enjoyed watching tremendously and wanted to update my music CD collection of The Who. I would highly recommend to anyone to purchase this set if you are into this band. I wish the liner notes had went into a little more depth about the tracks and included more band history, but I got some of that when I purchased "The Kids Are Alright", so....... just buy this set, you won't be disappointed.