08/24/2026
Ann-Margret with Woodstock performer Roger Daltrey of ‘The Who’.
Roger’s face says it all. He is absolutely gobsmacked just by being in close proximity to Ann-Margret, who may be the sexiest person to have ever existed. 🧡
The Who were act number 13 on day two of the Festival performing on Sunday morning, August 17, 1969 from 5:30–6:35 AM.
The Who Band Members at Woodstock:
Roger Daltrey: vocals
Pete Townshend: guitars, vocals
John Entwistle: bass
Keith Moon: drums
The Who Woodstock Setlist:
Heaven and Hell
I Can't Explain
It's a Boy
1921
Amazing Journey
Sparks
Eyesight to the Blind
Christmas
The Acid Queen
Pinball Wizard
Do Yo Think It's Alright?
Fiddle About
There's a Doctor
Go to the Mirror
Smash the Mirror
I'm Free
Tommy's Holiday Camp
We're Not Gonna Take It/ See Me Feel Me
Summertime Blues
Shakin' All Over
My Generation/Naked Eye
By 1969, The Who had become superstars; night after night they played most of their new album “Tommy” to adoring crowds who elevated the group to the status of Rock Gods. As such, they were a no-brainer for the Woodstock lineup, though it took an all-night negotiation session with Woodstock production manager John Morris and Premiere Talent promoter Frank Barcelona to convince Pete Townshend to consent to have The Who appear at the festival.
By the time The Who took the stage at 5:30 a.m., the Woodstock crowd was nearing the point of exhaustion, most of their energies depleted by Sly & The Family Stone’s ferocious set. One person who seemed quite awake was New York Yippee/troublemaker Abbie Hoffman, who had come to Yasgur’s Farm with the goal of co-opting the festival for the promotion of his radical viewpoint. Abbie was quickly caught up in the medical emergency on hand at Woodstock and spent all of Friday and Saturday assisting on-site medical personnel. By Sunday morning, Abbie felt the need for a bit of relaxation and decided to pop a tab or two of L*D (history does not record exactly what color tab he chose to ingest). By mid-morning, he was tripping quite heavily and was apparently in need of getting his political rocks off. He took to the stage in the break between acts, loudly suggesting that the focus of the festival should be “freeing John Sinclair from prison.” Sinclair, a radical activist (and manager of the Detroit band The MC5), had recently been given a ten-year jail sentence for possession of two ma*****na joints, and activists everywhere were incensed. Abbie was led off quickly, and was standing at the side of the stage when The Who began their set.
The members of The Who were not in a good mood. They had arrived on Saturday afternoon, and promptly spent the next twelve hours flat-out tripping against their will due to a contaminated backstage water and coffee supply. As they took to the stage, guitarist Pete Townshend took the opportunity to kick Michael Wadleigh, who was laying on the stage getting ready to begin filming the group, in the camera with his Doc Marten boots while Wadleigh was preoccupied with lining up a shot. This was a clear warning to the camera operators to get off the stage, and for the most part the band was able to proceed without further interference.
With the stage cleared, the band roared into their opening number “Heaven And Hell,” written by bassist John Entwistle. It was unreleased at the time but would crop up as a B-side the following year. This was followed by the band’s first single, the 1965 British hit “I Can’t Explain.” From here, the band went into their revolutionary and wildly popular rock opera, Tommy, which hit its stride fairly quickly with a devastating version of the instrumental “Sparks,” and continued apace through a rendition of the group’s current hit single, “Pinball Wizard.” Keith Moon was his usual wild man on the drums, John Entwistle played his bass almost like a lead guitar, Pete Townshend leaped, windmilled, played his guitar behind his head, and gave the audience a great show, and Roger Daltrey strutted, screamed, and performed every song with every bit of his energy. Their performance was a highlight of the 1970 Woodstock documentary and soundtrack album, and The Who further solidified their reputation as phenomenal live performers.
In the break following “Pinball Wizard,” the inevitable happened. Abbie Hoffman rushed out onto the stage, grabbed Pete Townshend’s microphone and screamed “I think this is A PILE OF S**T while John Sinclair rots in prison!” Furious, Townshend cut him off with a bayonet-like thrust of his guitar’s headstock into the back of the Yippee’s head. Stunned, Hoffman jumped from the stage and, as legend would have it, ran all the way back to New York City. Contrary to the peace-and-love ethos of Woodstock, this bit of onstage violence was cheered by the crowd.
With Townshend’s Gibson SG now noticeably out-of-tune, the group thundered through a brief “Do You Think It’s Alright?” before Pete announced to the side-stage onlookers that he would kill the next person to walk across the stage. The sun reportedly began to rise during “I’m Free” and provided a stunning visual accompaniment to a brutal version of the Tommy finale “We’re Not Gonna Take It.” Muscular covers of Eddie Cochran’s “Summertime Blues” and Johnny Kidd And The Pirates’ “Shakin’ All Over” (both of which would be issued the following year on The Who’s Live At Leeds album) rounded out the main set.
Inevitably, the band was asked back for an encore, and surprisingly (given all that had gone down) complied. For this, they chose their 1965 anthem, “My Generation,” prior to which Pete sarcastically informed the crowd “we knew we were gonna come back and do it.” “My Generation” culminated in a brief pass through the riff of Townshend’s “Naked Eye,” which would eventually be released on the 1974 album Odds And Sods. Pete closed the show out by bashing his SG into the stage and tossing the broken instrument into the crowd. Chip Monck’s closing “ladies and gentlemen, The Who,” was rather eerie, intoned against a blast of bass guitar feedback.
📷 Ann-Margret with Woodstock performer Roger Daltrey of ‘The Who’.
In the 1975 film adaptation of The Who's rock opera Tommy, Ann-Margret played Nora Walker (later Nora Walker Hobbs), the tortured and guilt-ridden mother of the title character. Her acclaimed performance earned her a Golden Globe Award and an Academy Award nomination.
