Who – Meaty Beaty Big and Bouncy … album review

I bought this album right after I had bought Wholigans and Who’s Next. I wanted to know what their sixties output was like besides My Generation and I Can See For Miles. This compilation album was released in 1971; it wasn’t just a sampler of radio singles; it was a brash declaration of how The Who reached the top and what they broke along the way. Most of these songs did not reach the ears of Americans and Canadians in the 1960s. If Who’s Next was their grand gesture, Meaty Beaty was their rowdy scrapbook. The album is exciting!

In Canada and America, most people know the Who’s Next material and after as well. This album is the roots of the band. They stretched the limits of recording, trying new things in the studio, much like The Beatles did, but with a rawer result.

Rock in the mid to late sixties was changing, and what a diverse set of songs that you hear from that period. This is when Pete Townshend was turning teenage anxiety into rock mini-operas and Keith Moon was trying to demolish every drum kit in London. The title, reportedly referring to the four members themselves, Meaty (Roger), Beaty (Keith), Big (John), and Bouncy (Pete), is cheeky and self-mythologizing. And the tracklist? Nearly perfect. These singles are where Moon started to get his wild drumming reputation. He is everywhere in these songs, especially I Can’t Explain, making them different from other bands.

I have said that my favorite kind of band to watch live is the ones that you think will fall apart with any song they play, but they pull it between the lines without going over the cliff. They did that with these songs in the studio.

You’ve got I Can’t Explain, The Kids Are Alright, and Substitute up front, each one a case study in amphetamine, fueled mod rock. These aren’t songs that build; they explode right from the opening riff. Substitute, in particular, grabs your attention with the loud backing, but also the lyrics. Substitute could be The Who’s best single ever. And then I’m a Boy, Happy Jack, Pictures of Lily, you realize Pete was already leaning into story-song territory years before Tommy became a rock opera.

Magic Bus is a Bo Diddley-beat freakout that somehow makes a song about public transportation sound like a spiritual quest, or My Generation, the track that blew the doors off rock ’n’ roll. If that bass solo doesn’t rattle you, check your pulse. There’s a through-line here: Townshend’s fascination with identity, repression, rebellion, and guilt. These songs are electric in the best sense of the word.

Later Who albums might be deeper (Quadrophenia) or grander (Who’s Next), but this one is the sound of the band becoming The Who. Loud, brash, and already mythic. If you want to learn about The Who…this is a great starting point. 

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Author: Badfinger (Max)

Power Pop fan, Baseball, Beatles, Alternative music, old movies, and tv show fan. Also anything to do with pop culture in the 60s and 70s... I'm also a songwriter, bass and guitar player. Not the slightest bit interested in politics at all.

48 thoughts on “Who – Meaty Beaty Big and Bouncy … album review”

  2. Pingback: Who – Meaty Beaty Big and Bouncy … album review – MobsterTiger

  3. Love the kids on the cover (they’re alright). Great compilation. My vinyl copy got a lot of use. I think Keith Moon’s drumming on “Happy Jack” is extraordinary. Essential.

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    1. Oh yes….this is a great great album that lives in the shadow of Who’s Next…I never thought of this as a greatest hits….especially since most didn’t know most these songs.

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      1. For me it was a collection of the great songs we’d been enjoying through the sixties. Funny how perceptions are different depending on what we heard on the radio and how that impacted us.

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      2. Yes it is… it was brand new to me…with the exception of a few songs.
        Substitute and Pictures of Lily really hit me.

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      4. Yes it is…I guess their American record company didn’t push them here…I think My Generation, I Can See For Miles, and Magic Bus were the only ones played at all here.

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      6. I LOVE this Clive!
        Sorry for the delay I was in a room full of people and I couldn’t listen.

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      7. They were fantastic, weren’t they. They caused quite a storm here back in 2007, but sadly I doubt if any of them are still with us. They released an album so you’ll find more on YouTube. That was a single, made our top thirty.

        No worries, I don’t expect (or always give) instant responses!

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      8. Oh they were fantastic Clive and was very clever. I WILL lcheck them out!
        Yea but I hate when I’m commenting with people and then it takes hours. This weekend we had company. Thank you for being understanding.

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      9. Hope you enjoy what you can find. I just checked and reminded myself of their version of Firestarter, by The Prodigy. A good place to start!

        I just work on the assumption that people have better things to do 🤣

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  6. I don’t where on YouTube I saw something about the Who in the studio, and it focused on Moon, and it hit me, he had to be a great drummer just to keep that band together live, I think as important as Charlie Watts was to the Stones, it starts with him….I was just listening to a bit of Billy Brag, and thought how at times when it’s just Townshend and a guitar how similar they seem…a songwriter at heart despite the flash and smashed guitars, a very solid band.

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    1. Yea it’s weird but as wild of a drummer he was…see the Isle of Wight concert, he kept them together. On top of that Entwistle had to play differently because Moon and that developed his style.
      Yea I could see that about Bragg.

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    1. It is…although Wholigans and Who’s Next turned me into a Who fan…this cemented them to me. I only knew them fully matured as a band…not their beginnings. Yea I love that cover…great idea.

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  10. a pretty good compilation for Who fans to be sure. I actually like several of those quite well including ‘I can see for miles’ , ‘Magic Bus’… probably in my top 4 or 5 songs of theirs, and ‘Substitute’

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    1. Many of them were new to people at the time…like me. But yea some really good singles on here. I never looked at it as a greatest hits…because most were not played in America…it was an eye opening album for me.

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  11. Good review, Max. I predict it will get a lot of google search hits. Surprisingly I know most of the songs on the list. I remember “Substitute” from an 8-track compilation of some kind. Is it possible to do a mix tape with an 8-track? It was on an 8-track that an old bad boyfriend stole out of someone’s car. Whoever’s car he got those tapes from had damned good taste. There was also Jethro Tull in there and I forget all what was on them. Thanks for the spotify playlist also.

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    1. This is the one I was telling you about…it’s their earlier singles that were not played over here as much. A hot 8-Track tape…well at least he had good tastes!
      Not many know these songs.

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      1. Max, I know them from various tapes and compilations and some of them you and/or Hans introduced me to, like Happy Jack and Pictures of Lily. All great songs. I put them into the category of early Rolling Stones.

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  14. This is the one album by the Who I’d choose if I only had only one to choose from. Drop the needle and ‘wham- full on frantic fun till you have to flip it over and start again. So many prime 60s Who songs, ‘Happy Jack’ and ‘I’m a Boy,’ they just sparkle and thunder.

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    1. You are right. The energy level is crazy. The Kids Are Alright is another one. After the intro Mr. Moon kicks it in gear. When you look back at these songs, you can see how important Moon was to this band. Yes the songs are great but his drumming set them apart in a lot of ways.

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  15. I only know the title of that compilation, unlike pretty much all of its tracks. It’s a really great collection of the group’s ’60s output. I saw a great Who tribute band yesterday, who performed some of these songs. They were part of a cool annual “British Invasion Festival” in Atlantic City. I’ll have more about the neat event tomorrow! 🙂

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  16. I always loved this album title. lol. Back in high school a friend had this album and I was only familiar of there later day material 78-82. This record blew my mind as it the guitars were so clean sounding haha. They already had some of there classic rock tracks written by 1970. lol…

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