{"id":266118,"date":"2025-11-16T13:36:08","date_gmt":"2025-11-16T13:36:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/266118\/"},"modified":"2025-11-16T13:36:08","modified_gmt":"2025-11-16T13:36:08","slug":"pete-townshend-on-if-weve-really-seen-the-final-tour-from-the-who-and-plans-to-finish-music-with-ai","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/266118\/","title":{"rendered":"Pete Townshend on if we’ve really seen the final tour from The Who \u2013 and plans to finish music with AI"},"content":{"rendered":"

Pete Townshend<\/a> has confirmed that The Who<\/a>\u2018s farewell tour<\/a> is indeed their last, and has said he\u2019s now looking to revisit his own music with the help of AI<\/a>.<\/p>\n

READ MORE:\u00a0Pete Townshend tells us about his new Quadrophenia ballet and the future of The Who<\/a><\/p>\n

Ahead of the launch of \u2018Quadrophenia: A Rock Ballet on Broadway\u2019, Townshend appeared on The Late Show with Stephen Colbert, who joked that he\u2019d been to multiple farewell tour shows hosted by the band in the \u201980s.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn \u201982, I left The Who,\u201d Townshend then explained. \u201cIt was my farewell. In \u201989, I pleaded with The Who to come back because I was broke, and we did a 25th anniversary tour.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThis time,\u201d he said, laughing, \u201cthe farewell tour is genuine; we are going to end it after we\u2019ve done as many shows as Elton John<\/a>.\u201d Notably, John\u2019s \u2018Farewell Yellow Brick Road\u2019 tour consisted of more than 300 shows<\/a> and wound up being a five-year undertaking thanks to delays from the COVID pandemic.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe did 330, we\u2019ve done 22,\u201d Townshend quipped. \u201cSo we just have another 308 to do.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

While he added that he hadn\u2019t enjoyed touring in a while, he said the recent run of dates felt different. \u201cI really enjoyed this last tour, it was great,\u201d he said. \u201cI decided I was going to try and make Roger happy, which isn\u2019t easy. Not because he\u2019s a nasty guy or anything, but because he sings, and he sings the way he sings, his whole body and life goes into it.<\/p>\n

\u201cI thought, I must forget about myself, and just do this for him, it could be the last thing we ever do together. And it worked,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n

Before that, Townshend had reflected on the band coming to an end, saying that he and Daltrey \u201cdon\u2019t communicate very well\u201d and \u201chave different needs as performers\u201d<\/a>. The musician also said the group felt more like \u201ca Who tribute band\u201d now.<\/p>\n

The pair had previously confirmed that\u00a0The Who would still be coming together in the future for the occasional charity gig or one-off event<\/a>, with Townshend\u00a0planning to embark on some solo shows<\/a>\u00a0too.<\/p>\n

Additionally, he had previously opened up about the strain of being on the road for extensive touring schedules<\/a>, saying he was mentally done with the idea: \u201cI don\u2019t love performing. I don\u2019t like being on a stage\u2026 it doesn\u2019t fill my soul.\u201d<\/p>\n

Daltrey responded soon afterwards<\/a>, explaining: \u201cIf Pete doesn\u2019t want to tour, I don\u2019t want to be back with The Who on the road, at 81, with someone who doesn\u2019t want [to] be there\u2026 if that\u2019s what he\u2019s saying.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

Later on in the conversation, the guitarist revealed aims to use AI technology to refine and finish unreleased songs in his vault. \u201cI\u2019ve got about 350, 450 pieces of music. A lot of it is probably terrible,\u201d he said, admitting he\u2019d managed to wade through \u201cabout half of it\u201d.<\/p>\n

He continued: \u201cI don\u2019t know what to do with it\u2026 I\u2019m also quite interested in AI. I\u2019m quite interested in getting some of my old songs that didn\u2019t quite work because I didn\u2019t quite get them right first time round, and put them up on [generative artificial intelligence music creation platform] Suno or some AI music machine and seeing what it can make of it. It might be some hits.\u201d<\/p>\n

As for The Who, it currently seems unlikely that there will ever be a final album. Townshend did express his desire for the band to make another record last year, but said there was \u201ca bit of a river to cross\u201d in convincing Daltrey<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Before then,\u00a0the guitarist spoke to\u00a0NME\u00a0about the possibility of more new music<\/a>, saying: \u201cI don\u2019t think there is. If there was a need or a place for a Who album, could I write the songs for it within six weeks? Of course I fucking could, it\u2019s a piece of cake. The problem is, I don\u2019t think Roger wants to do it again.\u201d<\/p>\n

When\u00a0NME\u00a0asked the frontman about the possibility of a new LP in 2023<\/a>, he laughed: \u201cWhat\u2019s the point? What\u2019s the point of records? We released an album four years ago [2019\u2019s\u00a0\u2018WHO\u2019<\/a>], and it did nothing. It\u2019s a great album too, but there isn\u2019t the interest out there for new music these days. People want to hear the old music. I don\u2019t know why, but that\u2019s the fact.\u201d<\/p>\n

The band\u2019s last appearances in the UK\u00a0were at London\u2019s Royal Albert Hall for the Teenage Cancer Trust shows<\/a>\u00a0back in March, where\u00a0Daltrey revealed that he was \u201cgoing blind<\/a>\u201d and they\u00a0played \u2018The Song Is Over\u2019 live for the first time, with Bill Murray in the crowd<\/a>.<\/p>\n

In other news, this summer saw\u00a0Roger Daltrey accuse Zak Starkey of \u201ccharacter assassination\u201d<\/a>\u00a0over comments the drummer had made about\u00a0his firing from the band<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Pete Townshend has confirmed that The Who\u2018s farewell tour is indeed their last, and has said he\u2019s now…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":266119,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[28],"tags":[554,96,128,3584,56,54,55],"class_list":{"0":"post-266118","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-music","8":"tag-ai","9":"tag-entertainment","10":"tag-music","11":"tag-rock","12":"tag-uk","13":"tag-united-kingdom","14":"tag-unitedkingdom"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/266118","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=266118"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/266118\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/266119"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=266118"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=266118"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=266118"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}