Did you ever see the faces of children? They get so excited[1]This is the track that opens Side B of The Who’s best-selling, 1969 double-album Tommy: a song-cycle about a deaf, blind, and mute child who becomes a “Pinball Wizard,” breaks his … Continue reading
Waking up on Christmas morning hours before the winter sun’s ignited
They believe in dreams[2]So do we, to be fair: “Behold, I have dreamed a dream; or, in other words, I have seen a vision.” -1 Nephi 8:2; not to mention Joel 2:28, cited by the Angle Moroni to the boy Joseph Smith … Continue reading and all they mean, including heaven’s generosity[3]Which, again, we are supposed to believe in too–and if The Who imply that this is a childish sentiment to hold, well, are we not supposed to become as little children anyways?
Peeping round the door to see what parcels are for free in curiosity
And Tommy doesn’t know what day it is
He doesn’t know who Jesus was or what praying is
How can he be saved
From the eternal grave?[4]The chorus here gets to the crux of the matter: if taking upon yourself the name of Christ is essential for salvation, but so many people have never had the opportunity to even hear His … Continue reading
Surrounded by his friends he sits
So silently and unaware of everything
Playing Poxy Pin Ball,[5]Foreshadowing Tommy’s transformation into the legendary “Pinball Wizard” on disc 2.
Picks his nose and smiles and pokes his tongue at everything
I believe in love but how can men
Who’ve never seen light be enlightened?
Only if he’s cured will his spirit’s future level ever heighten[6]But then, are not all in need of curing? Is that not the purpose of the Atonement per Alma 7:12–to not only cure us of our sins, but of all our pains? Is that not how any of will ever see our … Continue reading
And Tommy doesn’t know what day it is
He doesn’t know who Jesus was or what praying is
How can he be saved
From the eternal grave?
Tommy, can you hear me?[7]“My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me” -John 10:16
Tommy, can you hear me?
Tommy, can you hear me?
Tommy, can you hear me?
Tommy, can you hear me?
Can you hear me?
How can he be saved?
See me, feel me[8]“if ye have felt to sing the song of redeeming love, I would ask, can ye feel so now?” -Alma 5:26
Touch me, heal me[9]“lest they see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and understand with their heart, and convert, and be healed” -Isaiah 6:10; 2 Nephi 16:10
See me, feel me
Touch me, heal me[10]This leitmotif, by the way, also gets repeated in the album’s turning point “Go To The Mirror, Boy“–when Tommy finally smashes the mirror and breaks free from his … Continue reading
Tommy, can you hear me?
Tommy, can you hear me?
Tommy, can you hear me?
Tommy, can you hear me?
Tommy, can you hear me?
Can you, can you, can you hear me?
How can he be saved?
Did you ever see the faces of children? They get so excited
Waking up on Christmas morning hours before the winter sun has ignited
They believe in dreams and all they mean, including heavens generosity
Peeping round the door to see what parcels are for free in curiosity
And Tommy doesn’t know what day it is
He doesn’t know who Jesus was or what praying is
How can he be saved
From the eternal grave?[11]Merry Christmas season, btw
References
| ↑1 | This is the track that opens Side B of The Who’s best-selling, 1969 double-album Tommy: a song-cycle about a deaf, blind, and mute child who becomes a “Pinball Wizard,” breaks his psychosomatic curse, then gets turned into a sort of Messiah figure by the album’s end. It was definitely the pretentious-concept-album that kicked off a thousand other pretentious-concept-albums during the “Classic Rock” period–though Tommy at least has just enough of a tongue-in-cheek sensibility to not take itself too seriously. They were as big an influence on the Punk Rockers as the Prog Rockers, in other words. |
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| ↑2 | So do we, to be fair: “Behold, I have dreamed a dream; or, in other words, I have seen a vision.” -1 Nephi 8:2; not to mention Joel 2:28, cited by the Angle Moroni to the boy Joseph Smith directly, “And it shall come to pass afterward, that I will pour out my spirit upon all flesh; and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, your old men shall dream dreams, your young men shall see visions.” |
| ↑3 | Which, again, we are supposed to believe in too–and if The Who imply that this is a childish sentiment to hold, well, are we not supposed to become as little children anyways? |
| ↑4 | The chorus here gets to the crux of the matter: if taking upon yourself the name of Christ is essential for salvation, but so many people have never had the opportunity to even hear His name–whether because they died before He was born, or grew up in an isolated tribe, or are a blind-deaf-dumb-mute, or what have you–then how can heaven truly be considered generous if its blessings are so arbitrary? Joseph Smith solved those theological questions, of course, via Baptisms for the Dead, vicarious temple ordinances, missionary work in the Spirit World, D&C 138, and so forth. Yet there’s an even larger issue at play here: how can we believe in heaven’s generosity when there is so much sickness and death in the world–wars, rumors of wars, genocides, holocausts, rape, child molestation, murder, poverty, cancer, and a million other flagrant injustices that an omnipotent Heavenly Father suffers to exist? As Malachi complained, “And now we call the proud happy; yea, they that work wickedness are set up; yea, they that tempt God are even delivered.” And as Joseph Smith himself was finally driven to exclaim, “O God, where art thou? And where is the pavilion that covereth thy hiding place? How long shall thy hand be stayed, and thine eye, yea thy pure eye, behold from the eternal heavens the wrongs of thy people and of thy servants, and thine ear be penetrated with their cries? Yea, O Lord, how long shall they suffer these wrongs and unlawful oppressions, before thine heart shall be softened toward them, and thy bowels be moved with compassion toward them?” In Malachi’s case, the answer came as, “Then they that feared the Lord spake often one to another: and the Lord hearkened, and heard it, and a book of remembrance was written before him for them that feared the Lord, and that thought upon his name. And they shall be mine, saith the Lord of hosts, in that day when I make up my jewels; and I will spare them, as a man spareth his own son that serveth him.” In Joseph Smith’s, the answer came as, “My son, peace be unto thy soul; thine adversity and thine afflictions shall be but a small moment; And then, if thou endure it well, God shall exalt thee on high; thou shalt triumph over all thy foes.” These are scriptures that we quote to each other a lot; but it’s one thing to recite them, it’s another to really feel them, to actually believe them, deep down in your gut, while you’re in the middle of it. |
| ↑5 | Foreshadowing Tommy’s transformation into the legendary “Pinball Wizard” on disc 2. |
| ↑6 | But then, are not all in need of curing? Is that not the purpose of the Atonement per Alma 7:12–to not only cure us of our sins, but of all our pains? Is that not how any of will ever see our spirit’s future heighten? |
| ↑7 | “My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me” -John 10:16 |
| ↑8 | “if ye have felt to sing the song of redeeming love, I would ask, can ye feel so now?” -Alma 5:26 |
| ↑9 | “lest they see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and understand with their heart, and convert, and be healed” -Isaiah 6:10; 2 Nephi 16:10 |
| ↑10 | This leitmotif, by the way, also gets repeated in the album’s turning point “Go To The Mirror, Boy“–when Tommy finally smashes the mirror and breaks free from his mental-block–and in the album’s finale “We’re Not Gonna Take It,” when his disciples turn on him (just as they had turned on Christ Himself, come to think of it). Yet even as his followers leave him en masse, Tommy’s exalted views are still celebrated and affirmed (e.g. “Following you, I climb the mountain/I get excitement at your feet/Right behind you, I see the millions/On you, I see the glory/From you, I get opinions/From you, I get the story” repeated into the fade-out–and implicitly, into eternity.) For many are called, but few are chosen.
Given the importance of this leitmotif to the album’s total narrative, “Christmas” feels like one of the linchpins of the LP. |
| ↑11 | Merry Christmas season, btw |