The Who‘s chief songwriter, Pete Townshend, revealed he is sitting on a massive archive of unfinished music and is “quite interested” in using artificial intelligence to see what it can make of his discarded ideas.
Appearing on the November 12 episode of “The Late Show With Stephen Colbert,” Townshend was asked about the legendary vault of music he has reportedly amassed over his 60-year career. Townshend confirmed the archive’s existence and its intimidating scale.
“Yeah, I’ve got about three hundred and fifty, four hundred and fifty pieces of music,” he told host Stephen Colbert. “Now, a lot of it is probably terrible. I’ve managed to wade through about half of it.”
When pressed on what he plans to do with this treasure trove of demos and incomplete tracks, Townshend admitted he was stumped by the sheer volume. He then suggested that AI platforms could be the key to unlocking their potential.
“I don’t know what to do with it. I’m also quite interested in A.I.,” Townshend explained. “I’m quite interested in getting some of my old songs that didn’t quite work because I didn’t get them right first time round and put them up on to Suno [a generative A.I. platform] or something, some A.I. music machine and seeing what it can make of it. It might be some hits.”
This is not the first time the iconic guitarist behind rock operas like Tommy and Quadrophenia has expressed curiosity about AI’s creative potential. In a March 2025 interview with The Times, he mused: “If I told A.I., ‘Write a load of Pete Townshend songs like he used to in 1973,’ a lot of Who fans would be really pleased.”
While Townshend acknowledges the “very, very dark side” of the internet and AI, he has remained optimistic about its use as a tool. In November 2023, he told the “Broken Record” podcast that he believes AI “will help in all kinds of ways that will surprise us when they happen.”
