KGSR: You mentioned that the people in Texas took Ronnie to their bosom when he lived here and that was from 1987 to 1992. For most of us, besides the Small Faces material, we were exposed to Ronnie Lane through the album that you were just talking about, “Rough Mix”. You also said earlier that you were not a collaborative songwriter, how much of “Rough Mix” actually was a collaboration, or was it a Pete song, a Ronnie song, a Pete song…
Pete: It was the latter; it was one on, one off. However, for me, that album was a divine collaboration. It was a very life changing record for me. 1976 was a very critical year for me in a whole number of different ways and a very intense, very packed year. I did a lot of work; I did a lot of stuff with The Who and I did a lot of extramural stuff too. And I can remember it was the first time when I realized that Ronnie was getting sick. We had a little argument about something, he accused me of treating my wife very badly, and said something a bit indecent about me and I pushed him or punched him and he just went flying. I thought ‘well, he is a little guy, but God this is a bit strange.’ He really went flying. I helped him up and I said “what’s up, what’s up?” and he said, “oh, I just lost my balance,” and I said, “you know, you look like you are drunk,” and then I went back and somebody else in his circle said to me, “we think Ronnie might have MS.” That was the very first time that I realized that was happening. So it was wonderful time, in a way, to be with him and supporting him and you know trying to knock him out in the middle of a rile (laughter). We were so close we were the kind of people that we could have stand up riles, but we would very, very quickly make up. That’s not the case with everybody in my life I have to say.
It was a really, really important time for me. The other thing was, of course, the record was critically acclaimed. It didn’t sell a lot of copies but it was absolutely critically acclaimed when it came out. So that was really good for both of us because I’d never made a solo record; it made me confident that I could pursue a solo career. It may also, in a bad way, perhaps from a Who fan’s perspective, been the record that sewed the seed of doom for The Who. I think already by ’76, I was running out of ideas as to how to get The Who to move to the next level, if there was one. We were so busy on the road, we got this reputation for being a hotel room smashing roustabout rock band, which didn’t fit in with many of my personal ideas, but I was in it, I was of it, I’m not denying my role in it. It was a tricky one really, and so the reviews made me feel ‘oh, actually maybe I could do this, maybe I could do solo work as well,’ and if I can do that as well then that will be good because maybe then that will give me a way of adjusting to the fact that there are things about The Who recording career which were not as fulfilling as they used to be in the old days. So that record was very critical for me and Ronnie’s role in it was absolutely as a collaborator, without question, he was a true collaborator. We didn’t actually write songs together, that was my fault, not his.
KGSR: Six years later, The Who made its final studio album, “It’s Hard,” up ‘til now. Later this month, you are releasing “Endless Wire”. You are on the road with The Who right now. How is the new material coming across for you and the audience?
Pete: It’s going very well. People are being quite kind. The part of the new record which I call a mini-opera, which is called “Wire and Glass” is fairly rockin’ so that goes down quite well. But we play a couple of other songs that are really very different, they are almost like folk music more like Fairport Convention or Bob Dylan or even Dave van
Ronk than traditional Who songs and it’s just Roger and me on the stage for two of the songs with an acoustic guitar and Roger sings and it’s all going down very well. The record is a good record. It’s a slightly different record; I made it entirely by myself at home. I often thought about Ronnie while I was making the record. I often thought about the encouragement he gave me to work at home and to stick to my guns and to play as much of the music myself as I could. I did that and this was easier for me to do this time because there is no Who band, as such, we have a great band that we tour with, but the Who, if there is a Who nowadays, its definitely Who 2. It’s definitely just me and Roger, we are a duo now, and everything is very new for us. So I was able to shape the record using the techniques that I used way back in those days with Ronnie. I worked on an 8-track tape machine. I used computer very, very little. I’m pleased with the record and I am really pleased to be out on the road, I am really enjoying it. My partner, Rachel, has come with me for the tour. She’s not coming just to go shopping. She’s working. She’s doing a program for Sirius satellite, which she presents a Who channel. She’s plugging her own EP, which is called “Shine,” which has been released by Barnes and Noble and so she is doing some Barnes and Noble book shop appearances. She’s doing a few shows of her own, she did one at the House Of Blues here with (?) and a really great new artist and writer, who I’m sure you guys down there would love is a young guy called Willy Mason have you heard of him?
KGSR: I have.
Pete: Oh god, his songs are wise beyond their years. He is such a towering performer. Where he is going to go with this stuff I really don’t know. And my brother, Simon, played and, of course, Mikey played, and Rachel did a set, so she just does a few shows like that. So I am happy on the road because I have got my partner, my family. I miss the dogs, I miss my son and I miss my home but it’s as good as it gets. We are having a really good tour.
KGSR: We are wrapping up with Pete Townshend. He is talking to us from Chicago. He and The Who will be in Texas, Houston and Dallas, in November. Pete, one of the songs we have been favoring on our radio station is called “Tea and Theatre” it sounds like something that we could have heard Ronnie doing in the Passing Show in the DVD.
Pete: Yeah, that’s right. It does. Roger does it with such sensitivity on the stage, I hope you’ll get to come and hear it. We close our show with that song now and it’s a very moving moment. I think people think it’s about us, but it’s the closing song from the mini-opera – it’s about two very old people, they are in their eighties, and one of them is in an old people’s home, a sanotorium, whatever you want to call it. He’s not very well mentally, but his ex-partner comes to see him and they watch a little theatre show at the home and then they have a cup of tea and its about the end of a story, it’s the epilogue of a story. But when we play it live, it seems to be about The Who story, it seems to be about Roger and I, and I am very touched that you said that. Like I said, when I was making this record, I thought a lot about Ronnie and I thought a lot about those days because its 25 years since we put a record out. I’ve done some solo work, but I had to kind of pick up the pieces. I had to pick up where I left off, and where I left off with The Who wasn’t very satisfactory so I had to kind of find some way to link back a little bit further, so I was back in the years before the decline and make that connection. Watching “The Passing Show” as I did before I came out, I have to say that the person I thought really shone out in that was the guy that ran my companies for a while in London, Russ Schlaugbaum.
KGSR: Oh, he was great.
Pete: But also towards the end when you suddenly see all the people in Austin playing his music and reviving his memory, this is something I knew nothing about really and it was just so great to see. Ronnie was like a brother to me. I just hope one day that I get to come and play in Austin. My girlfriend, Rachel, did SXSW and I think she wants to do it next year so maybe I’ll come and hang out with her and do something then.
KGSR: Well, we would love to see you. The last time The Who played Austin was in the summer of 1980. We have been talking with Pete Townshend, who is on the road with The Who, coming back to Texas in Houston and Dallas in November. And talking with us about the new DVD about the life of Ronnie Lane, “The Passing Show.” Pete, it is so nice to know you were as inspired by that DVD as those of us that have already seen it.
Pete: Cool, yeah. I suppose a lot of you were in it. It’s very good, you know these things sometimes turn out to be sentimental, but it’s very good. Ronnie had quite a life, didn’t he? Outside of the Faces and certainly outside of his time in the UK, when he really hit America, he had another life. When his last wife, Susan, talked about going up into the mountains and looking out at the elk, and whatever it was they had out there, my eyes fill with tears. I just felt this is what he needed sometimes was just some real peace and quiet, and she was certainly able to give it to him. But he also needed to have a good time or feel that he was still a musician, and I think that is what you people did for him, made him feel that he still had music as part of his life. It was a really great period for him. And I want to thank you.
KGSR: Well, Pete, it’s nice to share the love that we share for Ronnie together on the airwaves today. And I think you would agree with me that he was an April fool.
(Pete laughs)
KGSR: And that’s what’s we will play right now. Pete Townshend, thank you very much.
