Roger Daltrey
Roger Harry Daltrey was born on March 1, 1944. Harry... how fitting. He was the oldest with two younger sisters. As a child, he was quite intelligent and placed at the top of his class. His mother was hopeful that he would focus his studies and continue on to the University. Roger would hear of no such thing. He called himself the rebel of the school. "Whatever they said do, I didn't do. I was totally anti-everything. I was a right bastard, a right hard nut. I just totally closed the doors to ever wanting to know what they had to teach me. Rock & roll was the only thing I wanted to get into."
The Detours was Roger's first band. Together they played small social gatherings and preformed top 10 songs for miniscule pay. At the time, Roger was playing lead guitar along with a good bass playing friend... John Entwistle. John suggested that Roger invite one of his good friends into the band as well. This friend being none other then Pete Townshend, who would play rhythem guitar for the Detours along with Doug Sandom on drums and Colin Dawson singing lead vocals. The line up would change later on when Roger switched to lead singer and Pete to lead guitar. Standing only 5'1" at the time, he was referred to affectionately (or derisively) as the "little singer". Despite his petite stature, Roger was combative, a fighter. "Daltrey got his way or you got 'a bunch of fives'."
In 1964, after a while as the Detours, and later, the High Numbers, a name change was in order. Pete suggested "The Hair" (Nice touch, Pete.) but Richard Barnes, Pete's roommate, suggested "The Who". The following morning, Roger made the decision for all of them. Long Live The Who! A few months later, when their drummer, Doug Sandom, left the band, Keith Moon showed up wearing all ginger. He smashed the kit to pieces and the Who loved him! With John's thunderous bass riffs, Keith's explosive dumming, and Pete's ideas and imagination, Roger would become a man of action and hard work... and later, the primal scream emitting, long haired, fringe wearing face... er, chest... of the Who.
After cutting a record deal, and forcing them to start composing their own material. Pete began his role as the chief song writer for the band, which caused Roger's dominance to diminish. The next single they released, "Anyway, Anyhow, Anywhere" was co-written with Pete and Roger, which was to be one of very few songs written by Roger.
Just as the windmill is to the Pete, Roger began his own belligerence on stage. He would swing his microphone in large arcs, sending it wizzing all around stage and over audience member's heads. The hostility didn't end there. Backstage, Roger would voice his discontent about the band's preformance. One one event, in the middle of a tour, he got in an argument with Keith, stole his pills and flushed them down the toilet. Keith protested, but Roger flattened him with a single punch. In 1965, incidences of such caused the Who to kick Roger out of the band. In a matter of days, Roger returned, swallowed his pride, and promised to end such angsty outbursts. "I thought if I lost the band I was dead. If I didn't stick with The Who, I would be a sheet metal worker for the rest of my life." Lucky for him, the apology was accepted and the Who were back and as good as ever.
The Who's career progressed into a slew of albums and concert preformances, and the destructive nature of the band was not confined to just Pete and Keith. During a series of concerts for the new single "Pictures of Lily", Roger broke 18 microphones. At a concert a few months later, Roger twirls around at the conclusion of the set and knocks over the microphone stands.

As more albums were released, Roger contributed a few songs of his own, such as "Early Morning Cold Taxi". Sell Out was released, featuring pictures of all four members on the front and back covers. Roger was chest deep in Heinz Baked Beans, from which Roger contracted pneumonia.
The release of Townshend's rock opera, Tommy, in 1969 had Roger singing almost all of the songs. Roger's face would become that of the deaf, dumb and blind pinball wizard by association. Later on, this would become even more true when the rock opera would be made into a motion picture, with Roger in the lead roll as Tommy himself. "It was though I was just singing Who songs until the second time we played it onstage, and then, I realized that I was becoming something else." And so he did. Roger became a different person. His unrulely hair would reach it's peak, hanging to Roger's shoulders. The chest came tearing into the scene with a terrific "RWAR!" almost as loud as Roger's primal scream when Roger began wearing open fringe vests. Roger had become a pop star. With this look, the Who took on Woodstock... "the worst gig we ever played."
Roger's definative Rock and Roll scream became the focal point on yet another album. When the band played "We Won't Get Fooled Again", after a synthesizer passage, Roger would unleash the voice to convey the angry cynicism in an emotional and sympathetic way with the scream followed by the line "...meet the new boss, same as the old boss." From Tommy, things would only get better for Roger. With the Who's release of the Who's Next album, Roger became the premier Rock and Roll singer of his time.
Quadrophenia hit the stores and the stage in 1973. Roger, not singing as many of the songs on the album as he had in the past, such as Tommy for example, was singing about 13 songs. His most notable preformances being on "5.15", "The Real Me", "The Punk and the Godfather", and on live preformances, Roger would recieve a standing ovation for "Love, Reign O'er Me". Backstage, things were different. During rehursal for one of the concerts during the Quadrophenia tour, Pete and Roger got into a name-calling episode and Pete took a swing at Roger with guitar and fists. Roger flattened Pete with one blow, just as he had done before.
Roger started his solo career in 1973 when he also started to appear in various films such as Tommy and McVicar and Lisztomania. While continuing to record albums with the Who, Roger proceeded to release two more solo albums. In 1978, the death of the Who's drummer and friend broke the hearts of millions. As a tribute, Roger's released his fourth solo album in 1985, appropriatly titled Under A Raging Moon and featuring the song "Under A Raging Moon".
In 1994, for Roger's 50th birthday, the "Daltrey sings Townshend" concert was held at Cargnegie Hall with a symphony orchestra and special guests, including Pete Townshend and John Entwsitle. Roger preformed a slew of Pete's songs. Daltrey enjoyed himself at the concert so that he launched a tour that lost nearly a million dollars. Need I say more?
It was Roger's persistance and driving force that kept the Who moving in the face paced race toward success, an accomplishment that they reached triumphantly. During the failure birthday concert, Townshend commented "My songs are about fear and it takes a man like Daltrey to sing about fear." Roger had become the voic and chest... er, face of Rock and Roll, and his permenant commitment to a band who changed music history.
Rock singer, actor and father... Roger fathered four children. His oldest son from his first marriage, and two daughters, Rosie and Willow, and a son, Jamie, from his second marriage. Willow's name appeared on Roger's album Under A Raging Moon on the song entitled "Everything A Heart Could Ever Want (Willow)" which refers to the older days and her reminding him of his past career and the songs he used to sing. Back to the earlier days of his career. And what a career it was...
The voice and chest... er, face of Rock and Roll...

Rwar!