Rick Guest/Interscope RecordsThe Who was forced to postpone its planned 2020 tour dates when the COVID-19 pandemic struck, and while the rock legends already have rescheduled their U.K. concerts for next March, they’ve yet to announce when they’ll be playing their U.S. shows.
Singer Roger Daltrey tells ABC Audio that the band initially planned to move the concerts to September of this year, but he now reports that, depending on the course the coronavirus takes, the U.S. shows likely will happen immediately after the U.K. trek, in April 2021.
“If there’s a vaccine for this thing, that will happen, I’m sure,” he says.
Asked whether The Who plans to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the band’s classic 1971 album Who’s Next, during the 2021 trek, Daltrey tells ABC Audio, “We’re still [not finished with] the show we’re doing, with the orchestra, which is a magnificent show.”
He adds, “We were hoping to play some of the newer tracks off the latest album [2019’s WHO] as additions to it.”
Daltrey also reveals that he and band mate Pete Townshend are considering lining some intimate acoustic concerts like the series of club gigs The Who played this past February in the London area.
“[That] was great fun, because it was just about, where we could chat to the audience, have a laugh, tell a few stories,” the 76-year-old Rock & Roll Hall of Famer explains. “Pete and I had such a good time. So maybe we’ll be back doing that on Broadway, like Bruce Springsteen [did].”
Meanwhile, Roger reveals that although Townshend has been writing new songs, he isn’t sure if The Who will make another album. He notes that WHO, the band’s acclaimed 2019 studio effort, sold so few copies that “it cost me money to do it.”
By Matt Friedlander
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