ALBUM RELEASE NEWS

As the 1980s gave way to the 1990s, legendary British Invasion songwriter, singer, guitarist, and all-around rock icon Pete Townshend of The Who was working hard, reinventing himself as something of a senior statesman clearly not ready to follow the directive of his iconic band’s October 1965 breakout hit single, “My Generation.” In fact, he put out some of the most adventurous music of his career at this time. Two of those releases have just been reissued by Universal Music Recordings (both on October 18, 2024) as new half-speed mastered 180g vinyl editions: June 1989’s The Iron Man: The Musical by Pete Townshend and June 1993’s Psychoderelict: Music Only — the latter making its first appearance on vinyl ever, and as a 2LP set to boot.

Released at the height of the CD era by Atlantic, these two Townshend solo releases are ripe for reconsideration, as there is some mighty fine music within which was sadly overlooked by many back in the day. I never really understood why these albums didn’t strike a more mainstream chord. I mean, with guest artists like John Lee Hooker and Nina Simone in tow, The Iron Man should have received a much bigger and stronger reception, especially considering how the re-invigorated surviving members of The Who (i.e., Townshend, vocalist Roger Daltrey, and bassist John Entwistle) were playing together at that time again to celebrate their 25th anniversary on the Kids Are Alright Tour: 1964-1989 — and they even make an appearance on two of that album’s best tracks (which I’ll get to in a moment).

Anyhow, the DNA for these two vinyl releases is pretty straightforward, as we are pretty confident it is similar to the prior fine Townshend solo reissues in this series. When I reviewed the reissues of September 1977’s Rough Mix and April 1980’s Empty Glass together back on July 14, 2023 (which you can read here), both of those LPs received the Abbey Road Studios half-speed master spa treatment just last year. Said half-speed disc mastering/lacquer-cutting process was helmed by Abbey Road Studios engineer Miles Showell from high-resolution digital sources (which, as we had already previously confirmed, is the methodology that is his preference). The music itself was remastered by longtime Townshend associate Jon Astley, at Close to the Edge.

Likewise, we can educatedly assume that the well-centered, dead-quiet, dark black vinyl pressings were again made at Optimal in Germany. (Both releases come with a “Made in Germany” sticker on their back covers.) The SRP for The Iron Man: The Musical by Pete Townshend 1LP reissue is $39.99, while the 2LP Psychoderelict: Music Only set is $49.99. Both albums come with sleeves that are, unfortunately, not plastic-lined — instead, we get a sleek black sleeve for The Iron Man, and glossy white printed sleeves with photos and lyrics for Psychoderelict, so you’ll likely want to resleeve both accordingly, just as I did.

The following sections comprise my two rundowns of how each album stacks up, and why you may want to score copies of either/both for your collection. Both The Iron Man: The Musical by Pete Townshend and Psychoderelict: Music Only can be ordered from Music Direct, via the respective MD link graphics following each review below.

PETE TOWNSHEND
THE IRON MAN: THE MUSICAL BY PETE TOWNSHEND
180g 1LP (Universal Music Recordings)
MUSIC: 9
SOUND: 9

Effectively an imagined musical soundtrack to a future animated special which had yet to be even thought of, June 1989’s The Iron Man: The Musical by Pete Townshend is a wonderful concept album — an adaptation of a fairytale-like 1968 science fiction story by Ted Hughes — from beginning to end. I will go out on a limb and stand by my belief that it includes some of Townshend’s finest songs, tunes that stand quite well side by side with other classics of his with The Who and his other solo releases.

Honestly, I still do not understand why this album was not more popular back in the day. It rocks madly, and it contains some stunningly beautiful tunes, many of them front-loaded on Side One, including "I Won’t Run Any More” (Track 1), “Dig” (Track 4), and “A Friend Is A Friend” (Track 5). A scorching cover of The Crazy World of Arthur Brown’s classic 1968 psychedelic rock hit “Fire” (which hit No. 1 in the UK, and No. 2 in the U.S.!) credited to The Who (Side Two, Track 5) drives the album towards its ensuing, glorious close — and Roger Daltrey’s vocal on it is just glorious.

Even the somewhat novelty-flavored tracks featuring blues and gospel jazz vocal royalty — “I Eat Heavy Metal,” fronted by John Lee Hooker (Side One, Track 6), and “Fast Food,” starring Nina Simone (Side Two, Track 3) — have a gritty infectiousness with melodious charms. I also love how Townshend’s vocals blend beautifully with guest vocalists Deborah Conway and Chyna on “All Shall Be Well” (Side Two, Track 1), a song that somehow manages to feel Broadway-like while remaining true to Townshend’s own style and vibe.

I own The Iron Man: The Musical by Pete Townshend both on CD and the original 1989 Atlantic vinyl, and I can attest that the new LP version sounds better in many ways than my originals. By the time of the original 1989 LP release of The Iron Man, vinyl was not exactly a priority for most labels, so my OG copy of it is just ok, and it sounds pretty decent — solid, even. But on the new 180g, Optimal-pressed, Abbey Road Studios half-speed-mastered edition, the vinyl noise floor disappears, leaving the music to shine.

The new vinyl for The Iron Man is well-centered, and it features nice custom labels designed just for this release that look much more appropriate for an album of this stature. The quality of printing on the enclosed, full-size 16-page booklet is also superior to the original. An informative Half Speed Mastering Certificate, penned by Miles Showell himself, is also included. Frankly, the new edition is much better all around.

While finding original vinyl copies of The Iron Man is not exactly difficult — plenty of originals, and Townshend’s 2017 silver vinyl reissue on his own Eel Pie label, can all be found for reasonable prices on Discogs — the new half-speed master LP would probably be the smarter choice to pick up if you are a fan of both the artist and the album, or if you’re coming to the album for the first time. The music sounds tighter here on the new vinyl version of The Iron Man than on my Atlantic pressing, and the overall presentation has been crafted with more love and respect. I rate both the Music as a 9, and the Sound as a 9. [AP editor Mike Mettler adds: I mostly concur — this new edition of The Iron Man is a much better-looking and better-sounding presentation than that of the original LP, and I give it an 8 for Music and an 8 for Sound.]

Oh, about that connection between Townshend’s The Iron Man and the eventual 1999 animated film from Warner Bros. that I alluded to earlier, Brad Bird’s The Iron Giant — which has a 96% approval rating on Rotten Tomatoes! — the interwebs offer some interesting related insight: “A stage version was mounted at the Young Vic Theatre in London in 1993. On the strength of this, Warner Bros. optioned the story for a movie that, with a very different adaptation of the story, became The Iron Giant; Townshend received an executive-producer credit.” Sadly, Townshend’s Iron Man music was not used for that film in any form, instead featuring a score by Michael Kamen. But at least the movie got made, and, owning it and having viewed it more than a few times, I can attest that it is quite wonderful! Regardless of its music not being a part of that film, the new vinyl edition of The Iron Man provides some fine listening for a magical, imagined musical to enjoy on new, 2024-pressed vinyl.

PETE TOWNSHEND
THE IRON MAN: THE MUSICAL BY PETE TOWNSHEND
180g 1LP (Universal Music Recordings)

Side One
1. I Won’t Run Anymore – Pete Townshend With Deborah Conway
2. Over The Top – John Lee Hooker
3. Man Machines – Simon Townshend
4. Dig – The Who
5. A Friend Is A Friend – Pete Townshend
6. I Eat Heavy Metal – John Lee Hooker

Side Two
1. All Shall Be Well – Pete Townshend With Deborah Conway and Chyna
2. Was There Life – Pete Townshend
3. Fast Food – Nina Simone
4. A Fool Says. . . – Pete Townshend
5. Fire – The Who
6. New Life / Reprise – Chyna With Pete Townshend and Nicola Emmanuelle

PETE TOWNSHEND
PSYCHODERELICT: MUSIC ONLY
180g 2LP (Universal Music Recordings)
MUSIC: 8
SOUND: 9

If my experience is any indicator, June 1993’s Psychoderelict was released by Atlantic amidst varying levels of confusion and artistic self-cannibalizing marketing noise back in the day. At the time of Psychoderelict’s release, Townshend’s 1968 opus for The Who, Tommy, was again hot in the news media, this time as a smash hit Broadway production starring future TV star Michael Cerveris. [Mettler adds: I saw that original Broadway run for Tommy, and loved all aspects of it!] In fact, some original releases of Psychoderelict unwisely featured a hype sticker for the new Broadway Tommy on it! Talk about a buzzkill for the new album, diverting focus to the old hit. What were they thinking? (See how it appears on the cover of my original CD, shown below.)

Adding insult to injury, Psychoderelict was initially presented as a musical play with dialogue all throughout the album. This proved to be quite unpopular, so a dialogue-free version was eventually rereleased to the public a few months later. That latter version had initially existed as part of promo-only 2CD set (shown below) that also included censored dialogue for possible use on radio, as there are plenty of expletives in the play. I guess as bumbled as this release’s original marketing seemed to be from a consumer perspective, one has to give Atlantic some level of kudos for keeping a pulse on the marketplace reaction and trying to adjust accordingly as soon as they could.

Itself something of a quasi-autobiographical reflection, Psychoderelict included references back to earlier Townshend projects, such as the at-that-time still-unfinished and complex Tommy sequel, Lifehouse. (Sidenote: Technically, Lifehouse was morphed into August 1971’s whittled-down but immensely successful Who’s Next, on MCA. Lifehouse was eventually completed and presented as a radio play that aired on the BBC, and later issued as part of February 2000’s 6CD Lifehouse Chronicles box set on Eel Pie, and again later in 2002 on DVD as Pete Townshend – Music From Lifehouse.)

Echoing Frank Zappa’s principle of “conceptual continuity,” there are even musical moments on Psychoderelict culled from Townsend’s demos for the classic Who’s Next opening track “Baba O’Riley,” including variants on that iconic synthesizer sequence. (See “Meher Baba M4 (Signal Box),” Disc One, Side One, Track 4, for starters.)

Anyhow, some 30ish years have passed since all those initial missteps, and now is a perfect time to reassess the Psychoderelict: Music Only 2LP set for what it is — a fine collection of Pete Townshend music! As noted earlier, this new, half-speed-mastered, first-time-ever vinyl edition features the dialogue-free version of the album (and the sleeve also contains Showell’s Half Speed Mastering Certificate). Key Psychoderelict: Music Only tracks for this writer include the terrific album-opening rocker “English Boy” (Disc One, Side One, Track 1, which is also reprised at the end of Disc Two, Side Four, Track 3) and the brilliant “Don’t Try to Make Me Real” (Disc Two, Side Three, Track 2). Both tunes feel as strong as the hits on the aforementioned Empty Glass. “Fake It” (Disc Two, Side Four, Track 2) should have been a hit, with its infectious swinging groove and hooky melody, but I don’t think the song ever got much of a promotional push in that manner.

Probably the only tune I genuinely don’t like is one that was not written by Townshend — the curiously out-of-place “Flame” (Disc Two, Side Three, Track 4), which feels oddly enough more like the kind of song one might expect to hear in a generic modern-day Broadway musical. Go figure. (Final sidenote: If you want to piece the whole Psychoderelict story together, you can look to track down an original 1993 CD [the cover of which is shown below] to hear the overdubbed dialogue. A DVD was later issued in 2006 of Townshend’s semi-staged concert presentation of the album as Pete Townshend Live in New York Featuring Psychoderelict. The audio from that performance was issued in 2003 on CD via his own site, titled Pete Townshend Live > BAM 1993.)

Overall, Psychoderelict: Music Only is generally a really good, if imperfect album. I’m very happy with having it on vinyl for numerous reasons beyond the sound quality improvements. As to my ratings, I give it an 8 for the Music, and a 9 for the Sound. [Mettler adds: Thank goodness for the dialogue-less decision for the Psychoderelict: Music Only 2LP set! Me, I give an 8.5 for the Music, and an 8.5 for the Sound.]

Notably, a factor I’ve noted in some past reviews with regards to CD-era recordings making the jump to the vinyl realm is worth recapping here. I have found that long-form recordings that were formally relegated to a single CD listening experience — typically a long, 15-20 song playlist — tend to be more enjoyable when broken up into four sides of a 2LP set.

Somehow, breaking out the music into album sides results in mini-suites of music (if you will) that makes for a more powerful and focused listening experience. The music is presented in more easily digestible nuggets. I’ll even argue that, just having that moment of pause — i.e., where you have to stop the contiguous listening experience in order to flip the record over — is really important for giving your mind a moment to breathe and take in what you just heard. Effectively, each time you put on a new side, you’re hearing the start of a new sequence of music that creates its own universe.

To that point, I think Psychoderelict: Music Only benefits greatly from its new 2LP formatting, as its 15 songs clock in at a little over 63 minutes. Whether you’ve never heard any of Pete Townshend’s Psychoderelict project before, or simply want to revisit this music with fresh ears, the new 2LP half-speed Abbey Road Studios remaster edition of Psychoderelict: Music Only is definitely worthy of your attention.

Mark Smotroff is an avid vinyl collector who has also worked in marketing communications for decades. He has reviewed music for AudiophileReview.com, among others, and you can see more of his impressive C.V. at LinkedIn.

PETE TOWNSHEND
PSYCHODERELICT: MUSIC ONLY
180g 2LP (Universal Music Recordings)

Disc One, Side One
1. English Boy
2. Meher Baba M3
3. Let’s Get Pretentious
4. Meher Baba M4 (Signal Box)
5. Early Morning Dreams

Disc One, Side Two
1. I Want That Thing
2. Outlive The Dinosaur
3. Now And Then

Disc Two, Side Three
1. I Am Afraid
2. Don’t Try To Make Me Real
3. Predictable
4. Flame

Disc Two, Side Four
1. Meher Baba M5 (Vivaldi)
2. Fake It
3. English Boy (Reprise)