Counterculture Conservatism: Pete Townshend, Self-Confessed ‘Neo-Con’
via Pete Townshend’s political confession: “I’m a bit of a neocon” | Power Players – Yahoo! News.
If you ask Pete Townshend and Roger Daltrey about political messages behind the The Who’s music, they’ll be quick to tell you the band steered clear of mixing politics and music. But when these rock legends sat down with ABC’s Jonathan Karl to talk about their work for teens with cancer, they didn’t shy away from talking about both politics and music.
Townshend, who described himself “a bit of a neocon” politically, said he was surprised that Mitt Romney lost the election to President Obama.
“I thought he [Romney] was throwing the money in such buckets and I thought Obama looked, looked tired,” Townshend said of the presidential election.
While Townshend said he mostly tries to stay out of politics, he thought the election’s outcome was good in the sense that it provides consistency in the midst of an economic recovery. “You need a continuum now I think,” said Townshend.
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It’s a good thing that Townshend and Daltrey do steer clear of politics, if he thinks he’s a neo-con.
“You need a continuum now I think,” Of what? Failure? You’re supposed to break a losing streak, not double down on it.
Hey, the “Meet the new boss/Same as the old boss” line should have been a clue Townshend wasn’t completely buying into the counterculture movement even 40 years ago. It may not make him an actual conservative, but it also shows he was never an all-in rah-rah type for whatever idea of the moment is in the left’s collective heads.
Don’t forget The Who were the biggest Mod band. Mods were very materialistic,preening and focused on technology etc. That is the antithesis of hippy dippy california dreaming. They are the sons of London fog,grey days and growing up among the bombsites. I miss seeing Keith play,was there ever a more entertaining drummer?
Nope. That era saw many great rock drummers, but there was only one Keith Moon.
Townshend is one of a few rock stars I still admire. I disagree that the election result was a good thing, but at least he’s no intellectually vaccuous liberal like Cher or Barbara Streisand.
And, as he said, The Who stayed away from expressing their political views in their music. I have never understood why any artist would want to cut their potential audience nearly in half by going out the way to offend people and insult them.