Baba O’Riley: The Who Anthem Everyone Calls by the Wrong Name

By Dan Cohen · Published 2026-06-27

Baba O’Riley, the towering opener of The Who’s 1971 album Who’s Next, is one of rock’s most misidentified songs. Most casual fans know it by the name of its soaring refrain — and assume that’s the title. It isn’t. The real title honors two of Pete Townshend’s influences: the spiritual teacher Meher Baba and the minimalist composer Terry Riley, fused into one name almost no one connects to the song.

A synthesizer ahead of its time

That unusual title points to the song’s real ambition. Its hypnotic, pulsing opening was generated by a synthesizer at a time when such sounds were barely part of rock at all — Townshend was experimenting with feeding data and patterns into the machine to create that endlessly cycling figure. It made the song sound like the future arriving, and it still does.

An anthem from an abandoned dream

It was originally conceived for Lifehouse, an ambitious, ultimately abandoned rock-opera project of Townshend’s. From the wreckage of that overreaching idea came one of the most beloved anthems in the band’s catalog — a song about a generation’s disillusionment that has, ironically, soundtracked decades of communal celebration. Sometimes the grandest failed visions leave the best pieces behind.

What it measures like

On our measurements it’s a building, high-energy anthem — from its hypnotic synth intro to a driving, intense full-band climax. Full profile on its song page.

Baba O’Riley opens The Who’s 1971 album Who’s Next; the title’s origin (Meher Baba and Terry Riley) and its roots in the abandoned Lifehouse project are matters of public record. No lyrics are reproduced.