Rock ‘N’ Roll Vault, 1965: The Who Fire Roger Daltrey After a Violent Tambourine Attack—“It Would Have Blinded Me”

Rock ‘n’ roll is already high-energy and aggressive, but when you add amphetamines to the mix, things can get especially heated and out of control—something The Who learned the hard way after a disastrous fight broke out among the band, resulting in Roger Daltrey being fired.

As history would show, of course, this dismissal was only temporary. And anyway, we’d have to assume Daltrey was just happy he didn’t walk away from the fight blinded.

Roger Daltrey Flushed the Band’s Stash Down the Toilet

Strenuous touring schedules, the inherent aggression of rock ‘n’ roll, cabin fever from being stuck with the same people for months on end, and a healthy dose of drugs and alcohol: put it all together, and it’s a recipe for disaster. And indeed, The Who was concocting their own version of this recipe during a European tour in 1965. Pete Townshend, John Entwhistle, and Keith Moon were all sinking further into amphetamine addiction. Vocalist Roger Daltrey abstained to prevent his vocal cords from drying out, which meant he was in charge of keeping the band together. Easier said than done, naturally.

“It was a brilliant band of musicians,” Daltrey told The Coda Collection in 2022. “But when they got on amphetamines, the music just turned to a load of crap. The songs were too fast, and when rock gets too fast, it’s not rooted. The singer never sees the band; all he ever does is feel. And when that happens, you really feel it. You have to go with it because you can’t fight it. But you know, because you can’t phrase it properly. It’s clumsy.”

Frustrated at the band’s performance, Daltrey flushed the rest of the band’s amphetamine stash down the toilet. He wanted to prove a point, which he technically did. But he also invoked a potentially disastrous fight.

A Violent Fight Broke Out Amongst The Who in 1965

After The Who vocalist Roger Daltrey flushed the band’s drugs down the toilet, drummer Keith Moon came after his bandmate with a tambourine. “Now, that sounds like being hit by the Salvation Army,” Daltrey admitted in 2022. “But it wasn’t quite like that. He came at me with the bells of the tambourine, slashing. If he caught me in the face or across the eyes, it would have blinded me. It was not funny. I did lay into him, and I laid into him quite heavy. But I think he deserved it, to be honest with you.”

Despite Moon coming after Daltrey with a tambourine, it was Daltrey who ended up getting sacked from the band. As history would show, this didn’t last long. “After a few weeks of them doing shows without me and audiences dropping off quite rapidly, they asked to have a meeting with me to come back,” Daltrey recalled. “I was adamant that I would only go back if they came to the agreement that they wouldn’t take drugs before a show. What they did in their own time was their business. I was neither for it or against it.”

Daltrey eventually returned to the group, and The Who continued to dominate the rock scene with career-defining hits like “Won’t Get Fooled Again”, “Baba O’Riley”, and “Who Are You”. No tambourine injuries were reported, either.

Photo by The Visualeyes Archive/Redferns