Townshend: Police aren't Classic

Pete Townshend has been grumbling about the suggestion that the Police are part of the pop pantheon:

“The Police are punk. They’re a punk band,” Townshend reportedly said. “They’re not classic rock. You know, you’ve got the Stones and the Who. Classic rock — finished. It’s all over after that … This is just music. It’s not clasic [sic] anything.”

We can see what he's saying - although a pantheon which consists of two is a little small - but the Police punk? Maybe you could argue that their worthwhile work was New Wave, but... punk?

To be honest, since we've always assumed anything that gets called "classic rock" is a shorthand for "overblown, over-rated and over-stayed", we'd say that the Police are spot on Classic Rock.