Amazing Journey: The Story of The Who

Let's be honest, like always (yeah right): I love the Who but I have yet to visit a lot of their stuff. Right now I'm listening to the Who a lot, the list of recent reproductions in my iTunes is basically of the Who, Tom Waits (can't wait to find a copy of the film Big Time), Kings of Leon (probably my favourite "modern" band, I'm listening a lot to their first two albums, also I love the third one and some songs of the latest one, and ready for their show in Mexico City in October!), Creedence Clearwater Revival (last week I got the new edition of Woodstock on Blu-Ray and I'm loving the 3 songs of CCR. Wish we had more CCR but still are awesome the bonus performances of them, of the Who, Canned Heat, Johnny Winter, Santana, etc.) and Isaac Hayes' (from the soundtrack of Shaft mostly) songs.

So I came across with the R4 DVD of this documentary, Amazing Journey: The Story of The Who, and I'm so glad I decided to get it. Frankly, I know much more about the Who after seeing it, one of the other two prolific authors here in the IMDb page of Amazing Journey remarks that he didn't learn anything new, I saw part of the documentary with my uncle and he pretty much knew everything but he agreed with me that this is extremely well-done.

Pretty much when the runtime marks 30 minutes is when "I Can't Explain" appears. At one point, just before we can hear "I Can't Explain" Roger Daltrey says this: "I got to admit that I felt that we were special…I remember one thing that we were very much aware of was that we were still copying another people's songs". And it's just great when the Who's first release starts, but what was going on before? Well, the first ones that began playing together were Pete Townshend and John Entwistle and later on John met the bully Roger…you know. Certainly it's awesome the chapter "Who the f*** are you?" that begins with Roger recalling when a ginger Beach Boys fan came and said to him with all the arrogance in the world something like "I heard you are looking for a drummer, well I'm much better than the one you got". A Who fan and original mod recalls how the Who came out as the High Numbers and how the drummer was absolutely mental! (just awesome that footage of the High Numbers at the Railway Hotel from 1964, there are bits in the film but the full 7 or so minutes of the only left footage of the uncompleted film by Stamp and Lambert are on the second disc).

Apart of having interviews with Roger, Pete, Who managers, familiars, etc. we have musicians, fans better said: Eddie Vedder, Sting, Noel Gallagher, the Edge. I love when the Edge picks up his acoustic guitar and plays "My Generation" ("when you're a kid and you pick up the guitar for the first time you just want to make that sound"). And well the different periods in the story of the Who, the tension between 1966 and 1967 (Monterey, going before Hendrix), LSD with Pete into Maher Baba (legendary American TV appearance, explosives!), 1968 with a change in the industry, Tommy (glorious years, balance, good marriage, I am you and what I see is me), that intro of the most successful Who album, Quadrophenia (fight between Roger and Pete), Keith ("can anybody play the drums?"), no more concerts and the awesome "Who Are You" after the return of Keith to England (Keith died weeks after Who Are You was released). Is just fantastic the "Won't Get Fooled Again" part from the Concert for the New York City, "just celebrating the old music". And sadly John passed away in 2002, he died like many musicians would like to and I just love what happened with Roger and Pete after their friend passed away. The Who is for sure one of the great bands of all-time and I simply loved this documentary… 10 out of 10

PS: I haven't seen yet the Tommy film. In the documentary is totally bashed by Noel Gallagher and Steve Jones yet Pete loves it.

Great documentary on one of rock's most influential bands. Includes interviews with band members and personnel, and artists who have been influenced by The Who. Also contains some fantastic concert footage, some of it pretty rare.

For anyone who was (or still is)an ardent Who fan,this is a "must see" documentary. It attempts to tell the tale of all four central members of The Who, from square one, incorporating interviews from not just surviving members of the band (Pete Townsend & Roger Daltry),but also the likes of The Edge (U2),Noel Gallagher (Oasis),Pete Townsend's brother,Simon Townsend,Shel Talmy (the Who's original manager),and a host of others. Ultra rare early film clips of the band are plentiful here (including a clip of The Who's Coca Cola advert from 1966,as well as footage of The High Numbers---an early version of The Who,from 1963 or 1964). The film also includes video footage of a recording session of the surviving members of The Who recording some new material,that is augmented with the likes of Greg Lake (from King Crimson & Emerson,Lake & Palmer),Zak Starkey (son of Ringo Starr),and John "Rabbit" Bundrick (from the early 1970's band,Free),that was filmed by D.A. Pennebaker & company (that originally filmed The Who at the Monterey Pop Festival in 1967,for his film 'Monterey Pop'). If you enjoyed 'The Kids Are Alright' as much as I did, you owe it to yourself to seek this one out. Available in two versions: the (nearly)four hour version (available on DVD),as well as a 90 minute cut version that briefly ran in cinemas. Not rated,but contains pervasive strong language.

WOW!!! Just saw a screening of the film at the Toronto International Film Festival. It was a great documentary. The directors and producers were on hand to answer questions.

The film follows the careers and lives of the members of The Who from the start of there musical careers till death or present day.

The directors and producers commented that they did not include much of the same footage as the Kids Are Alright because they wanted a different film not just an update of the other. They filtered through thousands of clips of footage and fixed up a large majority of it to be used in the film. Also an intense search for footage was done through an online website were fans could submit any bootlegged films they had.

An interesting side note, a section of the 2nd bonus disc to be released has a never before seen concert of The Who when they were the High Numbers. I grandson of a film maker found a canister of film at his grandfathers chalet and recognized the band playing in the film as an early performance by The Who. That is just amazing that this kind of footage is out there.

Overall it was truly and "Amazing Journey."

After the flood of Who-DVDs we've seen lately and the fact that "The Kids Are Alright" is a pretty definite document not only on the story of The Who but on Rock 'N' Roll as a whole, I was more than skeptical whether this new documentary on Roger Daltrey, Pete Townshend, John Entwistle and Keith Moon was really necessary. Well, I'm a fan so I picked the DVD up anyway and having just watched it I'm more than glad that I did.

I didn't learn anything completely new, but the "Amazing Journey" of The Who is so entertaining and peppered with such a great number of fantastic songs that it's just a real joy to watch it all being told once again. Besides, previous Who-films like "The Kids Are Alright" or "30 Years Of Maximum R&B" didn't really contain that many facts, but concentrated more on live performances. "Amazing Journey" takes a different approach and features lots of statements by the band, their producers, managers and folks who accompanied them along the way, as well as a few fans (Eddie Vedder, Noel Gallagher, Sting, The Edge, Steve Jones). The movie also features lots of amazing and previously unseen footage of live appearances, recording sessions and historic interviews. At 120 minutes running time the makers did a fine job touching most of the cornerstones in the band's career - just why didn't "Live At Leeds" get a mention? - while still keeping the pacing tight.

Yep, this is definitely recommendable for any The Who fan, even those who already have like 20 DVDs by that band on the shelf. "Amazing Journey" definitely inspires to dig them all up again and remember why Pete Townshend and the other three loons were one of the greatest bands that ever existed.