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One of the most important guitarists in the history of Rock and Roll, Keith Richards was not only a huge influence on countless players who emerged over the past decades, but also on many of his contemporaries. The Who\u2019s Pete Townshend is one of them, as The Rolling Stones<\/a> are his favorite band and he has revered them ever since he first had the chance to see them in a small club in England in the early 60s.<\/p>\n Richards is known for being quite sincere, never hiding his true opinions about other bands and musicians, even when they are negative. Over the decades, he has shared his thoughts on many guitar players, including Townshend.<\/p>\n What is Keith Richards\u2019 opinion on Pete Townshend<\/p>\n Although Keith Richards never liked The Who, he admires Pete Townshend a lot as a songwriter and musician. \u201cI always thought\u00a0(Roger) Daltrey\u00a0was all flash. And I love\u00a0Pete Townshend, but I always thought the Who were a crazy band, anyway. You would say to\u00a0(Keith) Moon<\/a>, if you were in a session with him, \u2018Just give me a swing,\u2019 and he (couldn\u2019t). He was an incredible drummer, but only with Pete Townshend<\/a>. He could play to Pete like nobody else in the world. But if somebody threw him into a session with somebody else, it was a disaster. There\u2019s nothing wrong with that; sometimes you\u2019ve got that one paintbrush, and you rock it.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cI just was never really interested in that many English rock & roll bands actually, at all. I mean, I usually like guys like Johnny Kidd and the Pirates, and that was before I was even recording. But there was something (about) the Yeses and the Journeys and all them that just left me a bit cold,\u201d Keith Richards told Rolling Stone<\/a> in 2015. If Keith never really liked Daltrey as a frontman, the singer was also never a big fan of the Stones, having called them a \u201cmediocre pub band\u201d.<\/p>\n He said:<\/p>\n \u201cYou can not take away the fact that Mick Jagger<\/a> is still the number one rock \u2018n\u2019 roll showman up front. But as a band, if you were outside a pub and you heard that music coming out of a pub some night, you\u2019d think, \u2018Well, that\u2019s a mediocre pub band! No disrespect,\u201d he told Coda Collection<\/a> in 2021.<\/p>\n A great example of how highly Keith regards Townshend as a guitarist is that he mentioned him alongside Jimi Hendrix when saying that aspiring musicians couldn\u2019t expect to reach their level easily or quickly. \u201cI firmly believe if you want to be a guitar player, you better start on acoustic and then graduate to electric. Don\u2019t think you\u2019re going to be Townshend or Hendrix just because you can go wee wee wah wah, and all the electronic tricks of the trade. First you\u2019ve got to know that fucker. And you go to bed with it. If there\u2019s no babe around, you sleep with it. She\u2019s just the right shape,\u201d he said in his biography \u201cLife\u201d.<\/p>\n Pete \u201cstole\u201d the windmill guitar move from Keith Richards<\/p>\n Pete\u2019s favorite band has always been The Rolling Stones and already said there was no one in Rock he admired more than Keith. He was lucky enough to see them back in the early \u201960s when they were still playing in clubs and The Who<\/a> was their opening act. Interestingly, he once revealed that his famous \u201cwindmill\u201d guitar move was inspired by Keith Richards, who did it once without realizing it, and Townshend thought it was a fantastic thing to incorporate into his performances.<\/p>\n \u201c(We) supported the Stones for two shows. They were young, they were brand new and they had one hit, with a Chuck Berry song called \u2018Come On.\u2019 I met them backstage and they were all very charming. As the curtain opened, Keith Richards is doing this (The windmill move). I was thinking, \u2018Wow, that\u2019s so cool!\u2019 I thought it was part of his \u2018thing.\u2019 A couple of weeks later, we supported them again in a club in south London. I\u2019m watching carefully, waiting, and he didn\u2019t do it.\u201d<\/p>\n (After asking Richards why) \u201cHe (Keith) went, \u2018What?!\u2019 I can\u2019t tell you exactly what he said. But the inference was, \u2018I\u2019m Keith Richards. Do you really think I\u2019m gonna do ballet?\u2019 That was the inference,\u201d Pete Townshend told David Letterman<\/a>\u00a0in 2012.<\/p>\n Pete Townshend said the Stones are the only group he was never ashamed to idolize<\/p>\n