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The Who has returned to the road. Roger Daltrey and Pete Townshend are kicking off a 17-date North American tour in the U.S. and Canada this summer, after playing a string of dates last year in the U.K. and Europe.

For Townshend, 80, touring at this point in his life can be lonesome work, but he’s also appreciative. “It can be lonely,” he told the Seattle Times. “I’ve thought, ‘Well, this is my job, I’m happy to have the work, but I prefer to be doing something else.’ And then I think, ‘Well, I’m 80 years old. Why shouldn’t I revel in it? Why shouldn’t I celebrate?”

Townshend recognizes that, 53 years after The Who released their first album, the band has come to represent a whole lot more than a four-piece rock act from London’s East End. “It’s a brand rather than a band,” he added. “Roger and I have a duty to the music, to the history. The Who still, of course, sells records — the Moon and Entwistle families have become millionaires. But there’s also something more, really: the art, the creative work, is when we perform it. We’re celebrating. We’re a Who tribute band.”

The 80-year-old guitarist’s words refer to late drummer Keith Moon and bassist John Entwistle. On one level, The Who, as a current working group, is about continuing to honor that music, but as Townshend points out, there’s another layer. “It does whet an appetite to think about how we should bow out in our personal lives,” he continued. “What do we do with our families and our friends and everything else at this age. We’re lucky to be alive. I’m looking forward to playing. Roger likes to throw wild cards out sometimes in the set, and we have learned and rehearsed a few songs we don’t always play.”

The Who has a long history with North America, of course. “We’ve always had some great times here and in Canada,” Townshend said. “Every tour is like going back to school, as far as I’m concerned. You make new friends, but you leave old friends behind. I always think that when we come to the United States, it’s like a family get-together. We know there’s an audience, and it’s quite thrilling to get up on stage and still be here and still be able to do what we do.”

Roger Daltrey: ‘This Is the Last Tour’

For Daltrey, 80, the latest tour has been similarly rewarding and, at times, exhausting. He gave fans an update on his health and their plans after the summer run while performing with Townshend during a Teenage Cancer Trust benefit show in London at the start of the year.

“We always seem to have a better time when we get to America or Canada,” he told the audience. “Fortunately, I still have my voice, because then I’ll have a full Tommy. Deaf, dumb, and blind kid.” Tommy was the name of the 1969 rock opera that centered on a deaf, dumb, and blind boy.

“I’m going to be honest with you,” Daltrey said. “If you want to know why we’ve just got to do this summer tour and not any more, we’ve just had two years where we’ve not played. We’ve just got to a point in our lives where the pressure of not being able to rehearse and tour properly is too much, as well as the physical challenge of it, so this is it. We’re going to give you our absolute best every night.”

Daltrey was even more explicit in an interview with The Times earlier this month, in which he weighed in on the idea of what a final Who tour would look like and how the band would continue to fit into their lives. “I’m saying it now because I want it to sink in with you: This is certainly the last time you will see us on tour. It’s grueling,” he said. “I thought we’d be able to do it longer, but unfortunately,y I just don’t have the stamina to keep on the road.”

He reflected on the experience of performing Who music night after night, especially when the band was in its peak touring cycle. “When I was singing Who songs for three hours a night, six nights a week, I was working harder than most footballers,” he added.

Asked whether one-off shows would be a possibility in the future, Daltrey wasn’t certain. “As to whether we’ll play [one-off] concerts again, I don’t know. The Who to me is very perplexing,” he said. There’s an open-endedness to the future, but also, at the same time, a sense that a chapter of The Who is definitively ending.

On a more positive note, Daltrey did mention that he felt good vocally, responding to fans who had wondered if he would still be able to perform at his usual level. “My voice is still as good as ever,” he said.

We just get to do what we love, when most people in the world get to do the jobs they love and then have to throw them away. I’m lucky to be in that situation, aren’t I? And in the same way that being able to tour the world is my reward for working and paying taxes for so long, being part of The Who is my reward for being a music-loving rock ‘n’ roller for 60 years. We’re lucky to be alive.