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The guitarist that Pete Townshend said was his biggest influence
The Who is one of the most important Rock and Roll bands of all time and certainly wouldn’t have been the same with Pete Townshend. Besides being one of the co-founders and the guitarist, he also is the main songwriter and wrote most of the songs of the band. So he always was an integral part of their sound and really influenced countless bands which appeared since the 60s all over the world.
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Over the decades he talked about many guitar players who influenced him but there is one he really credited as his biggest influence. It is, obviously, a rhythm guitarist, since Townshend always played more as a rhythm guitar player.
The guitarist that Pete Townshend said was his biggest influence
It’s not a secret that Pete’s favorite band has always been The Rolling Stones and he praised the group many times, including the guitarist Keith Richards. Already in 1980, in an interview with Sound International, Townshend said that Richards was his biggest influence as a rhythm guitarist.
“I think my biggest influence in that area was Keith Richards. And I still really like the way he plays but in that particular area I don’t think I’m topped. There’s nobody to touch me. What’s really strange is I don’t think there’s many people who have actually heard me play rhythm in the function of a rhythm guitar. That’s where I really get off very well.”
He continued:
“I wouldn’t object at all to have a guitar player in The Who so that I could just concentrate on rhythm. Because I love it. It’s a physical thing, it’s like a dancing thing. There’s a strong syncopation element in it. There’s no guitar player that I’ve ever worked with that hasn’t said it – Jimi Hendrix, Stephen Stills, Eric. They’ve all said it was great to play with you.”
Townshend and Richards are good friends since the 60s. The Stones picked The Who’s guitarist to induct them into the Rock and Roll Hall Of Fame back in 1989. During his speech (Transcribed by Rock and Roll Garage) the musician called them the “greatest”.
“Keith Richards once told me that I think too much. The truth is that I think that generally I talk too much. But I don’t think first. Faced with injecting the Rolling Stones this evening I realized that thinking is not going to help me very much.”
“I can’t analyze what I feel about the Stones because I am a really absolute Stones fan, always have. Their early shows were just shocking. Absolutely riveting, stunning, moving and they changed my life completely. The Beatles were fun, no doubt about that. I’m talking about they’re live shows. I’m demeaning them in any way.”
Pete Townshend continued:
“The Stones were really what made me wake up. On the Beatles shows there were a lot of screaming girls and at The Stones were the first to have a screaming boy. The sheer force of the Stones on stage and that perfectly balanced audience: 1000 girls and me (laughs). It kind of singled them out.”
“They are the only group that I’ve ever really been unashamed about idolizing. So much of what I am I got from you, The Stones and I had no idea most of it was already secondhand (Laughs). No more gags, the Stones are the greatest for me. They epitomize British Rock for me. Even though they are now my friends, I’m still a fan.” At another point of his speech, he also joked that The Stones ripped-off many R&B artists.
Pete Townshend loves the Rolling Stones but Keith Richards is not a big fan of The Who. Talking with Rolling Stone in 2015, he called them a crazy band and said that the group’s vocalist Roger Daltrey was “all flash”.
