Straight out of Wiki -- DYOFR you lazy git.
Only did this because of personal memories and knowing Roger ( slightly) as he is a not so distant neighbour .
"
Baba O'Riley" is a song by the English
rock band
the Who, and the opening track to their fifth album
Who's Next (1971). It was issued in Europe as a single on 23 October 1971, coupled with "
My Wife".
Roger Daltrey sings most of the song, with
Pete Townshend singing the
middle eight: "Don't cry/ don't raise your eye/ it's only teenage wasteland".
Widely regarded as one of the Who's finest songs and as one of the greatest rock songs of all time, "Baba O'Riley" appears in
Time magazine's "All-Time 100 Songs" list,
Rolling Stone's list of "
The 500 Greatest Songs of All Time", and the
Rock and Roll Hall of Fame as one of the
500 Songs That Shaped Rock and Roll.
It also features on the live albums
Who's Last,
Live from Royal Albert Hall,
Live from Toronto, and
Greatest Hits Live. The original recording's violin solo is played on harmonica by Daltrey when performed live.
The song is often incorrectly referred to as "Teenage Wasteland", due to these oft-repeated words in the song's chorus refrain. "Teenage Wasteland" was in fact a
working title for the song in its early incarnations as part of the
Lifehouse project, but eventually became the title for a different but related song by Townshend, which is slower and features different lyrics.
[4] A
demo of "Teenage Wasteland" features in
Lifehouse Chronicles, a six-disc set of music related to the
Lifehouse project, and in several Townshend compilations and videos.
The song's title refers to two of Townshend's major inspirations at the time:
Meher Baba, and
Terry Riley.
[5
