The Who expand The Who By Numbers into a five disc box set

The Who are marking the 50th anniversary of The Who By Numbers with a five disc box set built around a remastered version of the 1975 album. Rolling Stone reported that the package carries 92 unreleased audio tracks in total, and it is listed on the release calendar.

The set gathers Pete Townshend's original demos, alternate versions of the songs, and studio jams from the tracking sessions at Ramport and Shepperton. Among the unreleased material is an early mix of "Imagine a Man" with Townshend on lead vocal, a part Roger Daltrey sings on the finished album.

Two complete concerts come with it. A June 12, 1976 show at Vetch Field in Swansea, Wales appears on audio, and a December 6, 1975 performance at Metropolitan Stadium in Pontiac, Michigan appears on video, shot on two-inch tape and never released before. That Pontiac show drew 76,896 people, a record for indoor rock concert attendance at the time.

The album itself was a turn inward after Tommy, Who's Next and Quadrophenia, with Townshend writing about his own life rather than invented characters. "The Who By Numbers is a tricky album to talk about," he writes in the new liner notes, calling it the only Who record where he allowed songs that personal to be used.

Daltrey is warmer about it, saying songs like "Imagine A Man", "How Many Friends" and "However Much I Booze" expose the band's vulnerabilities. Most of them were hard to play in the arenas the band were filling by then, and several were dropped from the set after a few attempts.

A Blu-ray adds a Townshend-supervised Atmos mix, a 5.1 mix and a new 2026 stereo mix, and the package includes a 100-page book. The rock band have been inactive since their Song Is Over farewell run ended in October 2025, though Daltrey is touring solo, as covered in his A Great Night Out opener in Mesa, and archive projects like the Queen Budapest concert film are having a similar moment.