Track Listing

1. Slip Kid
2. However Much I Booze
3. Squeeze Box
4. Dreaming From The Waist
5. Imagine A Man
6. Success Story
7. They Are All In Love
8. Blue Red And Grey
9. How Many Friends
10. In A Hand Or A Face
11. Squeeze Box
12. Behind Blue Eyes
13. Dreaming From The Waist

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #3751 in Music
• Released on: 1998-02-02
• Number of discs: 1
• Format: Original recording remastered
• Running time: 50 minutes

Amazon.co.uk Review
This 1975 collection excels in large part due to its modest goal. It's the Who's singer-songwriter record. Without the ostensible shield his "rock operas" provided, Pete Townshend's personal demons strut about nakedly. Not a pretty sight, but an involving spectacle nevertheless. "They Are All in Love" and "How Many Friends" are forgotten Who songs, but they've aged beautifully. John Entwistle's "Success Story" sequences nicely with the rest of the album. And "However Much I Booze", "Dreaming from the Waist", and "In a Hand or a Face" are great decade-early exercises in mid-life self-pity. There are only three bonus tracks here--live versions of "Squeeze Box", "Dreaming from the Waist", and the earlier "Behind Blue Eyes"--but By Numbers is such a cohesive collection that they're less welcome extras than annoying distractions. Still, By Numbers now stands as one of the linchpins in a great band's catalogue. --Steven Stolder

From Amazon.com
This 1975 collection excels in large part due to its modest goal. It's the Who's singer-songwriter record. Without the ostensible shield his "rock operas" provided, Pete Townshend's personal demons strut about nakedly. Not a pretty sight, but an involving spectacle nevertheless. "They Are All in Love" and "How Many Friends" are forgotten Who songs, but they've aged beautifully. John Entwistle's "Success Story" sequences nicely with the rest of the album. And "However Much I Booze," "Dreaming from the Waist," and "In a Hand or a Face" are great decade-early exercises in mid-life self-pity. There are only three bonus tracks here--live versions of "Squeeze Box," "Dreaming from the Waist," and the earlier "Behind Blue Eyes"--but By Numbers is such a cohesive collection that they're less welcome extras than annoying distractions. Still, By Numbers now stands as one of the linchpins in a great band's catalog. --Steven Stolder

Customer Reviews

Horrible
Maybe I am just biased towards the early Who stuff. My favourite albums by this band are My Generation, The Who Sell Out, A Quick One and Who's Next. I find Tommy overblown and seedy and as for Quadronphenia I find it just ugly music expressing horrible sentiments in the worst overblown way. On top of all that the "concept" is based on a misconception about split mind and split personality, i.e. the album would have been better titled Multiple Personality Syndrome.

Anyway back to this album. I bought this for my brother's birthday when it came out and really wanted it to be good, it had a brilliant cover, it was going to be brilliant, it wasn't, it still isn't and I cannot understand the 5 star reviews here.

It is not because I don't want bands to keep on going, I watched the current Who (Who's Left?)on television at Glastonbury, or wherever it was, full of anticipation and was disappointed again. The sad fact is that after Who's Next they just got crap.

If you like Bon Jovi and all those faceless American stadium bands then you probably will like this but it hasn't got anything to do with the band who were part of that great English triumvirate along with The Small Faces and The Kinks in the 1960s.

Gem
I first bought this album in 1984 on vinyl and I knew nothing about it. If you only buy one Who album then buy this one (well, maybe this or Who's Next). It's the best example of Townsend as a song-writer without drifting into his occasional bouts of pomposity. "How many friends" "Blue, Red and Grey" Slip Kid" are real nuggets. I think this album falls into that "just before punk" limbo sometimes and gets overlooked which is a shame. Buy this album, it's a bargain and you won't be disappointed.

Who's Better Than The Who? Who exactly!
I can't complement this LP highly enough. Its one of The Who's hidden gems. Many of the songs here have an autobiographical feeling to them. Townshends' lyrics are very sensitive and sung with such strength and character by both Daltrey and Townshend himself. Highlights? Slip Kid, However Much I Booze, the timeless Squeeze Box but the very best track for me personally is Blue Red & Grey. Its a beautiful track sung by Townshend accompanied only by the ukulele.
This is probably the last great Who LP. I pondered over buying it for a long time and I don't know why I waited so long to purchase it.
Well worth purchasing, you won't regret adding this to your collection!