Psychoderelict
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| Psychoderelict | |||||
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| Studio album by Pete Townshend | |||||
| Released | June 15, 1993 | ||||
| Genre | Rock | ||||
| Length | 63:12 | ||||
| Label | Atlantic | ||||
| Producer | Pete Townshend | ||||
| Professional reviews | |||||
| Pete Townshend chronology | |||||
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Psychoderelict was a concept album written, produced and engineered by Pete Townshend. Some characters and issues presented in this work were continued in Townshend's later opus The Boy Who Heard Music, first presented on The Who's album Endless Wire and then adapted as a rock musical.
Released in 1993, Psychoderelict is a rock opera conceived by Pete Townshend in 1991 as the follow-up to The Iron Man, but despite having recorded several demos, a bicycle accident in September 1991 forced him to delay work on the album until his wrist was able to heal properly. Laid out more like a radio play than the more "traditional" rock operas Townshend had recorded (both with The Who - Tommy, Quadrophenia, and the unreleased Lifehouse album - and as a solo artist - White City and The Iron Man), the album centers around Ray High (real name Raymond Highsmith), a reclusive sixties rock star who is well past his prime and burned out. Ray's manager, Rastus Knight, attempts to shake the rock star up and get him to record new material, but to no avail. Press reporter Ruth Streeting devises a plan with Rastus, where she sends Ray letters posing as a fourteen year old girl named Rosalyn, trying to learn the ropes of singing stardom. Along with her first letter, she sends a pornographic photo that she took of herself when she was twelve; Ray responds to her immediately. He and "Rosalyn" have several correspondences, where Ray admits his darkest feelings of insecurity and something he can not believe has happened - he has fallen inlove with Ruth. Inspired by the letters, he starts to write songs again. Ruth eventually publishes the photo, which stirs up controversy not only around "Rosalyn," whose song, 'Flame', was written by Ray and becomes a hit, but also around Ray himself. However, all of it works to Ray's advantage: his previous albums are re-released, and his newest album, Gridlife, becomes a huge hit. And at the end in a meeting with Ruth springs the surprise that he has known all along that Ruth and Rosalyn are one in the same.
[edit] Commentary
The album is a critical, perhaps satirical look at Townshend's own life: the dedication of his music to Meher Baba's teachings, and his Lifehouse project, which closely resembles the Gridlife project the Ray character is working on. The album also makes use of Townshend's earlier song "Who Are You" which is sampled on the track "Meher Baba M4 (Signal Box)."
Only one single proper was released from the album: 'English Boy', both non-dialog and dialog versions, was released with a variety of B-sides and non-album songs, including 'Psycho Montage' (a collection of dialog from the album) and 'Electronic Wizardry' (written and recorded in 1970 as a potential track for The Who's unreleased Lifehouse album), as well as demos for 'Flame' and 'Early Morning Dreams'. 'Don't Try To Make Me Real', 'Outlive The Dinosaur', and 'Now And Then' were all issued to radio stations with dialog excised. A previously unreleased track, 'Uneasy Street', was later released on the 1996 Pete Townshend compilation The Best Of Pete Townshend:Coolwalkingsmoothtalkingstraightsmokingfirestoking.
After slow sales of the initial, dialog-intense release, a "music-only" version (tracks listed below) was issued, though sales - and reviews - were still disappointing. Fan reception was divided: some felt that Townshend's ideas were too pretentious, even for him, while others have embraced it as the first worthy concept since Who's Next. To date, it remains the final Pete Townshend solo album of all-original material, although further compilations have surfaced.
The Ray High character would resurface in 2005 as the central character in The Boy Who Heard Music, a novella written by Townshend for his Web site; and again the following year in Townshend's rock mini-opera adaptation of that story, Wire & Glass. That mini-opera would become the centerpiece of The Who's comeback album Endless Wire.
[edit] Track listing
Dialog version
- "English Boy"
- "Meher Baba M3"
- "Let's Get Pretentious"
- "Meher Baba M4 (Signal Box)"
- "Early Morning Dreams"
- "I Want That Thing"
- "Dialogue Introduction to "Outlive the Dinosaur"
- "Outlive the Dinosaur"
- "Flame (demo version)"
- "Now and Then"
- "I Am Afraid"
- "Don't Try to Make Me Real"
- "Dialogue Introduction to "Predictable"
- "Predictable"
- "Flame"
- "Meher Baba M5 (Vivaldi)"
- "Fake It"
- "Dialogue Introduction to "Now and Then (Reprise)"
- "Now and Then (Reprise)"
- "Baba O' Riley (Reprise)"
- "English Boy (Reprise)"
Music Only version
- "English Boy"
- "Meher Baba M3"
- "Let's Get Pretentious"
- "Meher Baba M4 (Signal Box)"
- "Early Morning Dreams"
- "I Want That Thing"
- "Outlive the Dinosaur"
- "Now and Then"
- "I Am Afraid"
- "Don't Try to Make Me Real"
- "Predictable" (contains an extra verse not found on dialog version)
- "Flame"
- "Meher Baba M5 (Vivaldi)"
- "Fake It"
- "English Boy (Reprise)"
[edit] Meher Baba instrumentals
There are four instrumental tracks which originated from Townshend's 1970-1971 synthesizer demos for The Who's album Who's Next. Some of these experiments were released as 'Baba O'Riley' that year and as 'Who Are You' in 1978. On Psychoderelict, the Meher Baba instrumentals appear in this order:
- Meher Baba M3: features a hypnotic synthesizer backing that may have been created specifically for this album. During this song, Ray High can be heard on a tape machine, listening through songs he had demoed as early as 1970 (an obvious allusion to Townshend trawling through his archives for Psychoderelict).
- Meher Baba M4 (Signal Box): a heavier track that sounds similar to 'Who Are You', though this song undoubtedly features overdubs recorded by the musicians Townshend employed for Psychoderelict.
- Meher Baba M5 (Vivaldi): an upbeat arrangement with draws its inspiration from classical composer Vivaldi.
- Baba O'Riley (demo): a demo recording of the classic Who track, this time of the "Irish jig" finale that would later feature a violin solo.
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