“Long Live Rock” by The Who

Pete Townshend wrote "Long Live Rock" as a wry salute to rock's own mythology, and the Who first cut it in 1972 for Rock Is Dead—Long Live Rock!, a planned album and TV special about the band's own history. That project got shelved and later mutated into Quadrophenia, so the track sat in the can until the Odds & Sods rarities collection dug it out in 1974. It finally went out as a single in 1979.

It's a rowdy, grinning hard rocker about a night at the Rainbow Theatre in Finsbury Park, produced by the band with Glyn Johns as associate producer and Cy Langston engineering. Before the Who's take ever surfaced, Billy Fury had sung a version in the 1973 film That'll Be the Day, the picture that gave Keith Moon his acting debut. Townshend still called his own band's recording the definitive one.

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