Tell me… Who are you?
On the release of his punchy memoir, Roger Daltrey talks broken bones, fear of failure and the possibility of new Who music…
WHAT immediately strikes you about Roger Daltrey’s new autobiography, Thanks A Lot Mr Kibblewhite: My
Story, is the sheer bruising physicality of it all. The book begins with a broken back and ends with Daltrey making a full recovery from a life-threatening bout of viral meningitis. In between, the narrative is peppered with car crashes, fistfights (“I could become a monster when the red mist came down,” Daltrey admits), flying drumsticks and explosions, all recounted matter-of-factly as occupational hazards of fronting The Who, a band with destruction hardwired into their DNA. “The way we used to play together, it was like putting the key in the ignition of a jet engine,” he reflects. “I don’t know whether it was all aggression, just complete abandon.”
even away from the maelstrom of The Who, Daltrey isn’t safe. He writes that Ken Russell “seemed hell-bent on killing me” on the set of
Tommy; and while renovating his Sussex pile he drops a boulder on his toe, contracting gout. Although he claims never to have brained anyone with his own mic-swinging antics, when Gary Glitter tries to emulate him in rehearsal for the 1996
Quadrophenia show in Hyde Park, he knocks Daltrey out cold, breaking his eye-socket. Rog simply dons an eyepatch and gets on with the show. “everybody thought the patch was part of the act, but it was basically holding my eyeball into the socket,” chuckles Daltrey, still fighting fit at 74, biceps bulging out of his tight black T-shirt. “every time I did a high note, it wanted to leave my head!”
What gave him this extraordinary drive to ensure the show must go on? “fear of failure,” he says instantly. When Daltrey was expelled from school on his 15th birthday, the headteacher Mr Kibblewhite made a point, in timehonoured fashion, of telling him that he’d never amount to anything – hence the namecheck in the book’s title.
“I used it as a motivation. I was determined from that day to make something of my life.”
Much like the man himself, Daltrey’s memoir is candid, pacy and bullshitfree. There is little axegrinding or selfaggrandising; in fact, he is largely dismissive of his ’70s solo career. “It was always a hobby,” he says. “My serious life was The Who.” Daltrey insists that he’s “not a natural songwriter”, yet his recent album As Long As I Have
You featured a couple of decent selfpenned efforts, prompting Pete Townshend to opine that if there were to be a new Who album, it should be half Daltrey songs.
“I don’t know whether I can come up with six songs,” he shoots back. “for me, that would be six years of my fucking life – if I’m lucky!”
At least Townshend’s statement suggests that another Who album is a possibility… “Who knows?” says Daltrey. “Pete’s work ethic is extraordinary and he writes all the time. Whether we can turn that into something you would call a Who album, let’s see. I think I’m singing better than I ever have in my life.
“There’s a rawness in the emotions that comes with a life lived. If we can capture that, we could probably make one of the best Who records ever. I’ve always said that Pete was the kind of writer that had the potential to write some of his best material at the age we are now. If he wants to do it, I’ll do everything I can to make it work.”
Thanks A Lot Mr Kibblewhite is out now via Blink Publishing
“I think I’m singing better than I ever have in my life…”