Speedy Keen

b. John Keen, 29 March 1945, Ealing, London, England, d. March 2002. A former member of several struggling beat groups, Keen garnered considerable acclaim for his composition ‘Armenia City In The Sky’, which opened the Who’s third album, The Who Sell Out. The band’s guitarist, Pete Townshend, nurtured this emergent talent and helped assemble Thunderclap Newman, which scored an international hit with Keen’s portentous ‘Something In The Air’. The artist’s first solo album, Previous Convictions, continued the promise of his early work, but a second selection, Y’Know Wot I Mean?, although of interest, was less incisive. An affinity with malcontents resurfaced during the punk era when Keen produced several sessions for the influential Heartbreakers, following which he kept a much lower profile.