The Who
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100 free The Who trivia questions with answers — music quiz, new questions added Oct 2026.
The Who gave rock the Marshall stack, the power chord, the rock opera and the smashed guitar, and they did it while barely getting along. Roger Daltrey, Pete Townshend, John Entwistle and Keith Moon came out of Acton and Shepherd's Bush as the Detours, spent a summer as the High Numbers, and then spent fifteen years as the loudest and most volatile live band in the world. These 100 questions cover the whole story. The easy tier sticks to the four members, Tommy, Woodstock and the hits. The middle asks about the Railway Hotel, Shel Talmy, the Smothers Brothers explosion, the Monterey argument with Hendrix, Live at Leeds, the Lifehouse project that became Who's Next, the Quadrophenia film and Kenney Jones. The hard end digs into Doug Sandom, the Australian ban, the Pontiac Silverdome record, the Cincinnati tragedy, the Young Vic experiments, the Tommy film's Oscar nomination, and which Rolling Stone ranking finally got the band on the cover of Time. Every answer is cited to a page we checked and comes with a short explanation, so you learn something even when you miss. Play it solo or print it for a British Invasion night.
30 of 100 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01What is the nickname of Pete Townshend's trademark guitar-playing move?
The windmill
The windmill. Townshend picked up the full-circle arm swing after watching Keith Richards of the Rolling Stones loosen up before a show, and made it his signature.
Q 02When Keith Moon passed out mid-show in 1973, who took his place to finish the set?
A fan from the crowd
A fan from the crowd. Pete Townshend asked whether anyone out there could play the drums, and 19-year-old Scot Halpin came up from the audience and finished the show.
Q 03What were the Who called before they first took that name in early 1964?
The Detours
The Detours. They found another act was already using the name, and after a night of joke suggestions, including the Hair, Daltrey picked the Who the next morning.
Q 04Under what name did the Who briefly record the mod single "Zoot Suit" in 1964?
The High Numbers
The High Numbers. Manager Peter Meaden renamed them to court the mod scene and wrote the lyrics himself, but the single flopped and they went back to being the Who.
Q 05What was the Who's first single, a UK top ten hit in 1965?
I Can't Explain
I Can't Explain. Townshend deliberately wrote it to sound like the Kinks, hoping to catch their producer's ear, and future Led Zeppelin guitarist Jimmy Page played on the B-side.
Q 06Which Who single peaked at No. 2, their highest UK chart position?
My Generation
My Generation. It began as a slow blues before it was sped up, given its famous stutter and opened out for John Entwistle's bass solo.
Q 07The Who's only US top ten single was neither Pinball Wizard nor Behind Blue Eyes; which 1967 song was it?
I Can See for Miles
I Can See for Miles. It peaked at number 9 in America, but Townshend, who was sure it would be a huge hit, was disappointed that it climbed no higher than number 10 at home.
Q 08Townshend first smashed a guitar on stage after accidentally breaking its head on what?
A low ceiling
A low ceiling. When the audience at the Railway Hotel laughed, he smashed the rest of the guitar in anger, and the next week the crowd came back hoping to see it again.
Q 09Which producer, fresh from the Kinks, signed the Who and produced their early singles?
Shel Talmy
Shel Talmy. After the band fell out with him he kept the master tapes, which is why their debut album could not be properly reissued until 2002.
Q 10Which two filmmakers managed the Who through their 1960s peak?
Kit Lambert and Chris Stamp
Kit Lambert and Chris Stamp. They went looking for an unknown band to make a film about and ended up managing it; a 2014 documentary told their own story.
Q 11Which 1965 Who single was so full of feedback that their US label thought the tape was faulty?
Anyway, Anyhow, Anywhere
Anyway, Anyhow, Anywhere. Roger Daltrey recalled the Americans sending it back as a mistake, and the band insisting that the noise was exactly what they wanted, cut loud.
Q 12At Monterey in 1967, Townshend argued with which rival guitarist over who would go on stage first?
Jimi Hendrix
Jimi Hendrix. The Who went on first and smashed their gear, and Hendrix closed his own set by setting his guitar on fire.
Q 13Which pop group did the Who support on their first full US tour in 1967?
Herman's Hermits
Q 21Which activist did Townshend kick off the stage at Woodstock mid-set?
Abbie Hoffman
Abbie Hoffman. The Yippie leader seized a microphone between songs to protest the jailing of activist John Sinclair, and Townshend ordered him off 'my stage' in no uncertain terms.
Q 22Which line in "Baba O'Riley" was inspired by the litter after the 1969 Isle of Wight Festival?
Teenage wasteland
The roadies helped clear the rubbish-covered field after what Townshend called a great concert.
Q 23Live at Leeds was taped on Valentine's Day 1970; in which city was the back-up show recorded the next night?
Hull
Hull. Its tapes turned out to be missing the bass guitar on several songs, so the Leeds show became the album, and the Hull show stayed unreleased for 40 years.
Herman's Hermits. The headliners were a straightforward pop act, yet the tour is remembered for Keith Moon's 21st birthday party, which wrecked a Holiday Inn in Flint, Michigan.
Q 14What did Moon load into his drum kit on The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour in 1967?
Explosives
Explosives. A bribed stagehand packed in about ten times the intended charge, and the blast singed Townshend's hair, left his ear ringing and threw Moon off his riser.
Q 15The Who Sell Out parodied what, between its songs?
Pirate radio
Pirate radio. The album links its songs with station jingles and spoof adverts, a salute to the offshore stations that Britain had outlawed in August 1967.
Q 16By Pete Townshend's account, which country's prime minister told the Who never to return after a 1968 tour?
Australia
Australia. An incident on a flight to Sydney got the band briefly arrested and sent out of the country, and the Who did not play there again until 2004.
Q 17The 1969 rock opera Tommy tells the story of a boy who is what?
Deaf, dumb and blind
Deaf, dumb and blind. Tommy shuts down after a childhood trauma, becomes a pinball champion by feel alone, and ends the story hailed as a kind of messiah.
Q 18Why did Townshend write "Pinball Wizard"?
To win over a critic who loved the game
To win over a critic who loved the game. Nik Cohn had been lukewarm about Tommy, so Townshend made the boy a pinball champion, and later called the song the clumsiest thing he'd written.
Q 19Which spiritual teacher, followed by Townshend from the late 1960s, shaped the story of Tommy?
Meher Baba
Meher Baba. Townshend also planned to feed the guru's vital statistics into a synthesiser to make music; the idea fell through, but the title Baba O'Riley still honours him.
Q 20What lit up the finale of the Who's set at Woodstock?
The sunrise
The sunrise. Delays pushed their Saturday-night slot back to 5 am, and the sun came up as they reached See Me, Feel Me; John Entwistle said God was their lighting man.
Q 24The Who were the first rock act to play which New York venue during the Tommy tour?
Metropolitan Opera House
Metropolitan Opera House. At the two shows there in June 1970, Townshend announced the last Tommy ever, a farewell the band went on to repeat more than once.
Q 25What was the name of the abandoned multimedia project whose songs became Who's Next?
Lifehouse
Lifehouse. Townshend's science-fiction follow-up to Tommy proved so hard to explain to anyone else that he had a nervous breakdown and shelved it, salvaging its songs.
Q 26Which producer took over the Who's Next sessions after the first New York recordings were abandoned?
Glyn Johns
Glyn Johns. He decided it was better to re-record the album from scratch in London than rescue the New York tapes, and was credited as its associate producer.
Q 27Which Who title track was inspired by a night that ended with Townshend asleep in a Soho doorway?
Who Are You
Who Are You. After a bruising business meeting and a drinking session with two of the Sex Pistols, he was woken by a policeman who let him go home if he could walk.
Q 28Which London club gave the Who the Tuesday-night residency that made their name in late 1964?
The Marquee Club
The Marquee Club. The 16-week run was soon selling out the Soho venue, and after English Heritage refused Keith Moon a blue plaque, a charity put one up on its old site in 2009.
Q 29Quadrophenia is about a mod named what?
Jimmy
Jimmy. Townshend gave him a four-way split personality, one side for each member of the Who, which is where the album's title comes from.
Q 30Who directed the 1975 Tommy film?
Ken Russell
Ken Russell. Townshend admired his earlier films, and Russell's extravagant version earned Oscar nominations for Ann-Margret and for Townshend's score.