10 Best Hard Rock Bands Of The 1970's
7. The Who
With all of the great rock music to come out of the 60's, it would have probably been easy to write off the Who as just another band in their early days. As the band matured from the Mod scene that they had grown up in, they grew some of the greatest seasoned pros of rock.
The songwriting of Pete Townshend had already yielded some of rock's greatest epic tales like "A Quick One" and the narrative of the album Tommy, but it wasn't until the 70's that the band found a groove that was much harder than what they had done before. With Who's Next, the band's use of distorted guitars and synthesizers gave their songs a much more epic scope. After their live release Live at Leeds, the band had finally hit on a bludgeoning sonic assault, with a guitar and bass tone that fit perfectly with the madman stylings of drummer Keith Moon.
As the band went on to even more epic territory with Quadrophenia, the band had brilliantly taken the hard rock of their later years and combined it with the emotional weight of their operatic works. As the 60's entered the rearview, the Who went from a remarkable band to one of rock's true giants.