Although marooned at home like the rest of us and left unable to tour with the Who, Pete Townshend found the pandemic a perfect excuse to keep creating within the safe womb of his studio. Townshend spoke to Guitar magazine, and explained, “Y'know, I'm not unbreakable. I've had some bad days and I've had some weird times. But I've gotten to spend so much time either in my studios or, what I feel is a key part of my creative process, creating studio rigs and set-ups — my Brian Eno side, if you like — and then composing too. For me, I was very, very happy for the first six months of the lockdown.”
Townshend went on to say, “I did three or four months in the studio writing, composing, and working with a couple of artists, because the lockdown wasn't all that extreme at first. Then, just before Christmas, we hit another very extreme lockdown. I think, then, I found it a bit strange, the idea that it was going to be yet another year, really, before the music business found its feet again. And here we are. We still don't know, do we?”
Although more happy than not to be home writing and recording music, Pete Townshend told the BBC there's was an undeniable upside to him and Roger Daltrey taking the Who's show on the road: “Being away from home is a bit tortuous for me. Some people in this business — Roger, for example — loves it. He loves to sing, he loves the adventure of being on the road. . . But for the of both us, what's really special about being on tour — whether we like it or not; and I don't and he does — what you've actually done is provided 45 people backstage with work for six months, you've provided a 45-piece orchestra with work for six months. And in my case, Roger, who hired any brother Simon, has provided my brother Simon with a job.”
