The Commercial Appeal - Go Memphis
The Who comes to Memphis: What to expect at the show
Forty years after their first “farewell” tour, Rock ‘n’ Roll Hall of Famers The Who are playing Memphis this week. The group is out on the road as part of its post-pandemic return, dubbed The Who Hits Back! Tour 2022. The upcoming concert, taking place at 7:30 p.m. Friday at Fedexforum, will mark the band’s first appearance in Memphis in four decades.
Here are five things to know before you go.
The Who Hits Back! Tour
The Who Hits Back! Tour will feature band founders and rock icons Roger Daltrey on vocals and Pete Townshend on guitar. The pair will be joined by an expanded lineup that includes Townshend’s brother guitarist/backup singer
Simon Townshend, keyboardist Loren Gold, second keyboardist Emily Marshall, bassist Jon Button, drummer Zak Starkey (son of Beatles drummer Ringo Starr) and backing vocalist by Billy Nicholls (who is something of an underground legend himself, for the 1968 album “Would You Believe”).
The performances also prominently feature a full 48-piece orchestra led by conductor Keith Levenson, and anchored by violinist Katie Jacoby and cellist Audrey Snyder.
The Who’s history in Memphis
If the internet and The Commercial Appeal’s own archives are to be believed, it has actually been 42 years since The Who last played Memphis proper. Since reuniting and touring in semi-regular fashion starting in the late-’90s, the
group has been regular visitors to Tennessee and the region, however. They’ve made multiple stops in Nashville (in 2012, 2015, 2019) and even played Little Rock in 2007. But the group’s last official Memphis performance would’ve taken place in July 1980 at the Mid-south Coliseum, one of three gigs the band played at the venue, following its 1970 Bluff City debut at the Ellis Auditorium.
The reviews
The Who’s North American tour kicked off in late April in Miami. After about seven dates in Florida, Texas and Oklahoma, the show will reach Memphis this weekend. So far the reviews have been overwhelmingly positive. Though most have also observed that the concerts have seen the group shaking the rust off, having been away from the stage since the COVID-19 pandemic, which cut short The Who’s 2020 tour.
The Consequence of Sound website reviewed the band’s opening night in Miami. Critic Celia Almeida noted that the opportunity to see ’60s icons like The Who — with Daltrey and Townshend both in their late-70s — added to the emotional weight of the proceedings.
“The underlying subtext of the pandemic — which became an existential threat to the very existence of live music as we know it — colored the emotional tone of the entire evening,” wrote Almei
da.
“It was felt during small, sweet moments (such as Townshend’s barely-hidden smile during his first ovation), and more overtly at other times, including when Roger Daltrey forgot the lyrics to ‘Won’t Get Fooled Again.’”
Overall, Consequence praised the performance, hailing the band’s expanded lineup, which brought “reinvigorated” energy to the old classics, concluding that, “The Who Hits Back! is a compelling show both for Who diehards and those who wrongly think they’ve heard these songs enough times.”
The setlist: ‘My Generation,’ ‘Baba O’riley’ and more
The Who Hits Back! Tour announcement promised that Daltrey, Townshend and company would be delivering some of their “many classics, as well as songs from their most recent album,” 2019’s “WHO.” So far — after half a dozen shows — the setlists are reflecting just that with orchestral versions of some of the band’s rock opera set pieces (off “Tommy” and “Quadrophenia”), plenty of signature hits (“My Generation,” “Won’t Get Fooled Again,” “Baba O’riley”) and a few newer numbers from the band’s most recent studio effort (“Ball and Chain,” “Hero Ground Zero”).
Tickets
As of this writing, good seats remain in almost every tier for the Fedexforum show. Floor seats will set you back anywhere from $98 to $375.