Near the end of The Who’s concert at the United Center Sunday night, purportedly the last time that Roger Daltrey and Pete Townshend will ever perform here as The Who, right before the climax of “Won’t Get Fooled Again,” you could feel the audience leaning forward en masse. You could sense a hint of anxiety. Could he still do it?
Could Daltrey, at 81, nail The Scream — the ol’ YEAHHHHHHHHHH?
Go listen to the song right now, and while you do, ask yourself if an 81-year-old — who has told interviewers this year that his vision is going, his hearing is abysmal, and who flatly wonders if he would finish the tour — can still rattle skulls the way he did in 1971?
The short answer is, yes, powerfully, surprisingly yes.
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And that was coming off a moving take on “Love, Reign O’er Me” moments before, arguably the most histrionic song in a histrionic catalog, another ‘70s lungs workout, recorded during the halcyon days of three-pack-a-day cigarette habits and the jogging boom, when respiratory systems were simultaneously collapsing and strengthening. A similar thing felt true of Daltrey, who seems more like my Aunt Evelyn these days than a golden god. The howl is there one minute, then, wisely, he backs off and softens.
“Not tonight,” he said plainly, abruptly stopping before one more refrain.
Townshend, ever the instigator, quipped: “Want your money back? I (expletive) would!”
The real question, the one that every aging rock act and audience now faces as the superstars of the Classic Rock Era enter their last years, is, Should we even try to revisit the blush of youth? That’s been an ongoing concern at least since The Who first went out on a farewell tour, 43 years ago. This time, The Who — which has rolled its eyes for decades at critics who note they once promised to die before they got old — found a thoughtful, tender reply for 2025. They seemed to be stating up front they will no longer pretend they are young. I’ve seen the same recent TikTok clips you have — of Daltrey and Townshend faltering one instant, sounding remarkably strong the next. I’ve cringed along with you at many social-media posts of David Lee Roth, a mere 70, not so much channeling sex, drugs and power chords any more as much as Robert Preston in “The Music Man.”
Part of the problem, which The Who sought to address Sunday, is that audiences, as much as the vintage acts they still see, never agreed on how to accept aging bands. We pay for their fury of youth but we don’t know how to watch them when they grow older.
Some of these acts, like the Rolling Stones, hide in a stadium spectacle. The Who still plays on the kind of stage that bands used in 1973. It’s an intimate, simple stage. No platforms and no ramps; the drummer’s kit sits on the stage itself, not elevated above anyone, and other than a river of ancient clips on a video screen, there’s no spectacle.
Growing old itself became the theme, and The Who, with some unintended Spinal Tap panache, leaned into creaks and groans of age with laughs and even genuine tension. A band once known for being explosively volatile has remained so, for different reasons. I counted at least two crises in the first 20 minutes: At the start of “Who Are You,” Townshend tossed his guitar into the darkened wings and signaled for a new guitar, then another. Then another. At the end of “See Me, Feel Me,” Daltrey got frustrated at the sound mix — which was lousy at first — and shouted: “It’s like singing in a tin can!” Later, as Townshend began a gorgeous reading of “I’m One” from “Quadrophenia,” his guitar went so badly out of tune that Daltrey turned to the backing band in clear terror.
And it was lovely.
I mean that. I know tickets are stupidly expensive now. But you can see a smooth as rails, machine-tooled, no-hiccups concert any week at the United Center. A human, ragged, charming one, in which a band, in real time, acknowledges what works and doesn’t, a show in which performers lean into the struggle to recreate cohesion — that’s rare, and oddly moving. Townshend, probably sensing how chaotic they appeared, joked: “Don’t worry, we won’t die. Not tonight. We were saving that for Philadelphia.”
Daltrey still marches in place, but slower. Townshend, at 80, still windmills guitars, just stiffer. They’re what’s left of the original band; Sunday’s show marked the 47th anniversary of the death of drummer Keith Moon. Bassist John Entwistle died in 2002. They’re backed now by a spry six-piece band that fills out what they no longer can. The Who were once the angriest of the angry young men of the British Invasion. On Sunday night, which opened with a set by Joe Bonamassa, Daltrey and Townshend finished alone, looking vulnerable. Daltrey held a cup of tea. Townshend sat on a stool with an acoustic guitar. They played “Tea & Theatre,” the last song on one of their last studio albums, 2006’s “Endless Wire.” It’s a quiet goodbye, melancholy, bittersweet and plainly states “We’re older now” and “This story is done / It’s getting colder now.”
Fifty years ago, no one would have guessed this is how rock would die. Not with a smashed guitar but a hand on the shoulder of an old friend.