{"id":235828,"date":"2025-10-31T11:45:10","date_gmt":"2025-10-31T11:45:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/235828\/"},"modified":"2025-10-31T11:45:10","modified_gmt":"2025-10-31T11:45:10","slug":"the-who-song-pete-townshend-thought-would-be-their-greatest","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/235828\/","title":{"rendered":"The Who song Pete Townshend thought would be their greatest"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"The<\/p>\n

(Credit: Alamy)<\/p>\n

Fri 31 October 2025 9:42, UK <\/p>\n

The Who<\/a>\u2018s Pete Townshend has made many predictions throughout his career, and while he\u2019s adept in a recording studio or parading on stage, he is less talented at looking into the future. Despite what his many interviews may allude to, Townshend isn\u2019t quite the all-seeing rock deity he might sometimes believe he is. <\/p>\n

His most wildly significant incorrect prophecy came when he believed one single by the band was destined to become \u201cthe biggest-selling record in music history\u201d.<\/p>\n

The track in question was \u2018I Can See For Miles\u2019, released in 1967. While The Who had enjoyed a string of hits before this moment, they were yet to score a number one single, unlike their peers such as The Rolling Stones and The Beatles. However, the band came agonisingly close to topping the chart with \u2018My Generation\u2019, which peaked at number two in 1965.<\/p>\n

With \u2018I Can See For Miles\u2019, Townshend finally felt The Who had successfully cracked the code and were destined to elevate their superstardom to a new level. However, to his surprise, the track failed to top the charts. To this day, The Who have still never had a number one single <\/a>despite crafting an array of classic songs.<\/p>\n

Townshend later recalled to Rolling Stone: \u201cKit Lambert, who was our manager and my songwriting and composing mentor back then\u2026 His godfather was William Walton, the English classical composer. And when he heard \u2018I Can See for Miles,\u2019 he wrote Kit a letter thinking that Kit had written the song\u2026 he didn\u2019t think any of us goons could have done anything like that, praising him for the adventurous harmonies.\u201d<\/p>\n

He continued: \u201cMaybe I just got carried away with how clever I thought I was. I was disappointed. It wasn\u2019t just disappointing that we didn\u2019t get a hit. It was that I was worried that I couldn\u2019t do any better. And that I had exhausted my sense of humour, my sense of irony with songs like \u2018Pictures of Lily,\u2019 \u2018I\u2019m a Boy,\u2019 and \u2018Happy Jack.’\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Pete<\/a>A young Pete Townshend of The Who. (Credits: Bent Rej)<\/p>\n

After \u2018I Can See For Miles\u2019 only sneaked into the top ten in both the United States and the United Kingdom, Townshend accepted that chart dominance wouldn\u2019t happen for the band. He said: \u201cWe were [once] knocked off the top by some comedian [Joe Dolce] whose song was called \u2018Shaddap You Face\u2019\u2026 There was another song that was number one coming up to Christmas in the UK that I think knocked the Beatles off the top of the charts. I can\u2019t remember the exact context\u2026 it went, \u2018Grandad, we love you\u2026\u2019 I remember thinking, \u2018Jesus, this stuff just shouldn\u2019t be in the charts!’\u201d<\/p>\n

It was a slap back down to earth for Townshend. He had to quickly realise that great art didn\u2019t always make great money, and he needed to accept that. The Who needed to make the music they wanted and forget about how it was received, even if it was a dagger blow to the heart.<\/p>\n

However, there was a silver lining to the disappointment, and Townshend used the experience to fuel The Who\u2019s next project, the pioneering rock opera Tommy. \u201cI don\u2019t know, I suppose I was fooling myself. I [had] thought, \u2018This is a masterpiece, and it will be treated as such. It will become the biggest-selling record in music history!\u2019 I just wondered, \u2018What do I do now?\u2019 And that led to concepts and to Tommy,\u201d Townshend revealed.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe most raucous rock \u2018n\u2019 roll, the dirtiest thing they\u2019d ever done,\u201d was how The Who song was described in the press, and while it might not have sold a billion records, it did get one reaction from Paul McCartney, who allegedly wrote The Beatles\u2019 anthemic \u2018Helter Skelter\u2019 in reaction to the track.<\/p>\n

While \u2018I Can See For Miles\u2019 never became The Who\u2019s signature song as Townshend had initially envisaged, more importantly, it did spawn Tommy. The latter became the defining project of the band\u2019s career and mattered more to their legacy than scoring a number one. <\/p>\n<\/p>\n

Related Topics<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"(Credit: Alamy) Fri 31 October 2025 9:42, UK The Who\u2018s Pete Townshend has made many predictions throughout his…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":235829,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[28],"tags":[96,128,33162,9738,56,54,55],"class_list":{"0":"post-235828","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-music","8":"tag-entertainment","9":"tag-music","10":"tag-pete-townshend","11":"tag-the-who","12":"tag-uk","13":"tag-united-kingdom","14":"tag-unitedkingdom"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/235828","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=235828"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/235828\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/235829"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=235828"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=235828"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=235828"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}