First Solo Single in 29 Years

Pete Townshend has released “Can’t Outrun the Truth,” a charity single that The Who member created in collaboration with his wife Rachel Fuller under her nom de plume Charlie Pepper.

Marking Townshend’s first proper solo single in 29 years, “Can’t Outrun the Truth” was recorded at his home studio after Fuller composed the song on the piano and channeled her thoughts about the feelings of isolation caused by the pandemic into its lyrics. Then, with her singing days “long over,” Fuller asked Townshend to record the demo.

The final result features Townshend playing lap steel guitar and violin while singing universal lyrics like, “This lockdown is bringing me down/ My mind’s gone underground/ Though I crawl from room to room/ I can’t leave myself behind.” Watch the music video, directed by Michael Nunn and William Trevit, below.

“We’d just moved house and Pete was as happy as Larry up in his studio, working every day, and I put my back out,” Fuller shared in a statement. “I was just climbing the walls, I couldn’t do any creative work and obviously, we couldn’t go anywhere. And I really started to think about how unbelievably difficult this period of time was going to be for so many people.”

All proceeds from vinyl sales and at least 10 pence from every “Can’t Outrun the Truth” download will go to Teenage Cancer Trust, the UK charity Townshend founded with his Who bandmate Roger Daltrey. You can download the track here.

“The Teenage Cancer Trust was created in order to take the money from a series of concerts at the Albert Hall every year and various other things and that had all dropped out,” Townshend explained in a statement. “So, the idea of doing this, which is it’s something that has sprung out of Lockdown about mental illness, but also for this particular charity. If you’ve got a scenario in which somebody in your family or a teenager has got cancer, they’re being treated, Lockdown hits, and you’re not allowed to go and visit them. There’s a poignancy to the whole thing about the song.”

Last October, Daltrey and Townshend brought out Eddie Vedder during an LA benefit for Teen Cancer America, the US version of Teenage Cancer Trust. This summer, The Who will head out on a tour of the UK and Europe; grab your tickets via Viagogo.

Sometime in the near future, The Who fans may finally get to see Daltrey’s long-gestating biopic about late drummer Keith Moon. He recently revealed that he has finished a script, and has “an actor in mind” to play Moon.