Vintage Who concerts coming to DVD

The Who have announced through their official website (thewho.com) that two legendary shows from the London Coliseum from December 14th, 1969 and Kilburn State Gaumont from December 15th, 1977 will be released for the first time as separate DVDs "before September."

A few excerpts of the London show, which features a complete performance of Tommy, has appeared in the Who's documentaries The Kids Are Alright, 30 Years Of Maximum R&B, and the recent Amazing Journey: The Story Of The Who.

The Kilburn show, which was Keith Moon's second-to-last performance ever, was a private fan club show filmed exclusively for The Kids Are Alright. Except from the audio from John Entwistle's "My Wife" and the recent snippet of the live premiere of "Who Are You" shown in Amazing Journey, the show has remained unreleased due to Pete Townshend and Entwistle being admittedly drunk, Moon being in horrible physical shape, and the band being generally underehearsed in what was their first concert in 14 months.

Dougal Butler, who began working for the Who as a roadie in 1967, became Keith Moon's personal assistant in 1971. He quit working for Moon in 1976 to help out on the band's retrospective The Kids Are Alright. Butler says that when he saw the shape that Moon was in prior to the Kilburn show, he was shocked and saddened: [ Click to listen if you have a backstage pass] "It was just the start of filming for The Kids Are Alright, and he's put on so much weight. I mean he's ballooned up like I've never seen him before. I mean, they had to do quite a few retakes on that -- and he was totally gone. Absolutely lost his whole pattern of drumming as well. And it was very sad to see. Sad situation."

The two concerts follow the recent archival release of the Who's December 8th, 1979 concert at Chicago's International Amphitheater, which was made available as part of the Amazing Journey: The Story Of The Who DVD sold exclusively through Best Buy stores.
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