Who Are You (song)
| "Who Are You" | ||||||||||||
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UK single sleeve
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| Single by The Who | ||||||||||||
| from the album Who Are You | ||||||||||||
| A-side | "Had Enough" | |||||||||||
| Released | 14 July 1978 (UK) 5 August 1978 (US) |
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| Format | 7" | |||||||||||
| Recorded | 4 October 1977 | |||||||||||
| Genre | Rock | |||||||||||
| Length | 6:20 (Album Version) 5:01 (Single Edit) 3:24 (US Single Edit) |
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| Label |
Polydor 2121 361 (UK) MCA (US) |
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| Writer(s) | Pete Townshend | |||||||||||
| Producer(s) | ||||||||||||
| The Who singles chronology | ||||||||||||
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| 9 tracks |
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"Who Are You", composed by Pete Townshend, is the title track on The Who's 1978 album, Who Are You, the last album released before Keith Moon's death in September 1978. It was released as a double-A sided single with the John Entwistle composition "Had Enough", also featured on the album. The song became one of the band's biggest hits in North America, peaking at number 7 in Canada and at number 14 in the US. The keyboard pieces on the track are played by Rod Argent.
Musically, the origins of "Who Are You" can be traced back to "Meher Baba M4 (Signal Box)", a 1971 synthesizer instrumental track that was later released on Pete Townshend's solo album, Psychoderelict. Early performances of the song were seen in both 1976 and 1977.
The lyrics of "Who Are You" were inspired by an incident Townshend experienced. After going out drinking with Steve Jones and Paul Cook of the Sex Pistols, Townshend was found in a "Soho doorway" by a policeman, who let him go if he could safely walk away.
"Who Are You" was written about meeting Steve Jones and Paul Cook of the Sex Pistols after an awful 13-hour encounter with Allan Klein who, in my personal opinion, is the awesome rock leech-godfather. In one sense the song is more about the demands of new friendship than blood-letting challenge. Roger's aggressive reading of my nihilistic lyric redirected its function by the simple act of singing "Who the fuck are you..." when I had written "Who, who, who are you..." Steve and Paul became real 'mates' of mine in the English sense. We socialized a few times. Got drunk (well, I did) and I have to say to their credit, for a couple of figurehead anarchists, they seemed sincerely concerned about my decaying condition at the time.
"Who Are You" was released as a double-A side with the John Entwistle song, "Had Enough", but "Who Are You" was the more popular song, reaching the Top 20 in both the US and UK. The song has since been featured on multiple compilation albums. The single mix contains an alternate acoustic guitar solo to the album mix.
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Wikipedia