I’d done the demo, by the way. The difference between my demo and his was really the difference in age, the difference in experience, the difference in craft. It’s a masterpiece. It’s the last thing he did, sadly, since he didn’t live long enough to do Faust. He’d learned all the lines, apparently. Pete Townshend — vocals, guitars, keyboards, bass guitar, drums, percussion; harmonica on "Day of Silence" With the orchestra, it’s a similar effect. It’s almost like I could stand there for a good 50 percent of the show and play nothing at all. What’s interesting about that is that it gives me a chance to make sure what I do play, what I do do, where I look, how I behave on the stage, is more connected with the people around me, with the audience, and with, I suppose, to get prosaic about it, an inner sense. In other words, I don’t lose myself the way I did when I used to jump around, have a big adrenaline rush, and then come off the stage and someone would say, “Great show,” or someone would say, “Terrible show,” and I wouldn’t really know what I had done, to be honest, since I was like someone running a marathon. So the orchestra gives me space.

We did get paid out for our U.K. tour, which was fabulous since we were able to pay some of the debt that we had to people around us and help some of the crew and help some friends and family, and just generally charity stuff that we would normally do as a part of what we do every time we go out on tour. We were able to cover some of that in a period that was otherwise totally dead.

When we phoned up Pete Townshend last week at his new home in the English countryside, our only real goal was to talk about the Who’s upcoming American tour where the band will be paired with local symphonies. Before we knew it, an hour had passed and we’d covered everything from the Neil Young–Joe Rogan spat to the inflation crisis, the unlikelihood of a new Who record or solo LP, the brilliant use of his music on Freaks and Geeks, and his hatred of NFTs. Coming right in the middle of Who’s Next, Townshend is celebrating all of the music finally being written and having the opportunity to shout his salvation from every mountaintop he can. Although Daltrey eventually takes over for the choruses, Townshend’s voice overpowers his in terms of pure emotion, almost sounding like a spirit leaving his body as he ascends towards musical Nirvana.

That sums it up. I’ll let you go. I know you aren’t looking forward to the tour all that much, but I’m really looking forward to seeing the show when it hits New York. So there’s lots of stuff going on. We’re really looking at the way the pandemic has hit the country. And in the U.K., we’ve also had the effect of Brexit, the political upheavals, and all kinds of stuff. But the big news in the U.K. at the moment, and I’m sure you’re conscious of it in America even though you’re farther away, is what’s going to happen in Russia and Ukraine. I don’t exercise. I walk quite a bit, but my hobby of choice is sailing, and that’s not very physical. It’s mainly looking at the wind and trying to figure out where to steer. But that’s my main sport hobby, which I do and I love doing it. I do it as much as I can. To be relieved of that responsibility, in a sense … because Roger is of the opinion that he wants to sing until he drops. That’s not my philosophy of life. There are other things that I want to do, still want to do, and will do, I hope. I hope I’ll live long enough to do them.I’m pretty sure we’ve seen the end of Covid-19. I’m pretty sure that it’s behind us now. And the other thing, without getting into deep politics, this is something I’m sure you guys as journalists know far more than I do, but what we’re dealing with now is rising inflation. You go onto Bloomberg and you watch them, all they talk about is what’s happening with inflation, what the Fed are going to do, what they’re not going to do.