General Rating: 3

Introduction

ALBUM REVIEWS:

• This Was
• Stand Up
• Benefit
• Live At Carnegie Hall
• Aqualung
• Thick As A Brick
• Living In The Past
• A Passion Play
• Warchild
• Minstrel In The Gallery
• Too Old To Rock'n'Roll, Too Young To Die
• Songs From The Wood
• Heavy Horses
• Live - Bursting Out
• Stormwatch
• A
• Broadsword And The Beast
• Under Wraps
• A Classic Case
• Crest Of A Knave
• Rock Island
• 20 Years Of Jethro Tull (Selection)
• Catfish Rising
• A Little Light Music
• Nightcap
• Roots To Branches
• J-Tull Dot Com

VIDEOS:

• Slipstream
• 20 Years Of Jethro Tull

This page also hosts comments from the following Certified Commentators:Jeff Blehar, Rich Bunnell, Richard C. Dickison, Ben Greenstein, Nick Karn, David Lyons, Philip Maddox, John McFerrin.

Jethro Tull were once an amazingly good British band that used to suffer from just one single terrible problem - overproductivity. On one hand, their main driving force - Ian Anderson (vocals, flute, harmonica, acoustic guitar, electric guitar, occasional everything) - was extremely talented (close to being a genius, but not a God - hear that ye rabid fans?), prolific, professional musician and composer, absolutely unique in his total fusion of classics, folk, jazz, blues, rock and pop. His songwriting, playing and performing abilities really astonish me. He has created an original image - that of the mad one-legged flute-playing long-bearded satyr - which you may like or you may despise, but you cannot deny the talent, man! You cannot deny the talent!
On the other hand, he was also stubborn, despotic and hateful (at least, towards most of us humans), and his desperate need to release at least one album per year led to the appearance of tons of crap which everybody said was crap, but he thought everybody said it was crap because everybody hated him so much that everybody wanted to say all of his stuff was crap even when it wasn't, so he just kept pouring out more crap, occasionally alternating it with a couple of great tunes. If he'd only wait patiently for these great tunes, hell...! Maybe everything we'd be hearing on the radio right now wouldn't be Led Zep. Then again, who can guess?
All right, let's get serious. As much as I despise hardcore Tull fans - my experience has led me to the sad conviction that Jethro Tull tends to attract the kind of people that were rabid Hitler lovers in their previous incarnation - I have to admit one thing: Jethro Tull are really like no-one else. I can't even really lump the band together with the general prog movement of the early Seventies, because in the early Seventies Jethro Tull weren't really prog; they played a special type of 'folk meets blues and crosses it with medieval stylistics' music which was particularly convenient for everybody because their songs were (a) melodic and catchy, (b) 'intelligent' and (c) relatively understandable and unpretentious. In this way, they managed to hit the big time and I mean REAL big, dragging albums with complex multi-part suites onto the top of the charts and gaining immense critical and commercial success. The fact that both Thick As A Brick and A Passion Play, the band's most complicated opera, had both hit # 1 on the US charts, is probably one of the brightest events in the whole art-rock history.
Things went downhill, however, as Ian Anderson started getting 'seriouser' and began to neglect both point (a), going away from catchiness into the world of complicated boredom, and point (c), inflating his lyrics until they ceased meaning anything and inflating the songs until they sounded positively universalistic and became absolute put-ons. This all culminated in a lengthy string of 1973-1979 albums that are incredibly patchy; I often call them 'one song albums' because most of them revert around (usually) one solid composition that provided the album's main single and, quite often, its very title ('Minstrel In The Gallery', 'Songs From The Wood', 'Heavy Horses', etc.). Of course, hardcore fans usually claim that this was Tull's best period, but you know these hardcore fans - judging an album by its level of complexity is ridiculous. The main problem, like I already said, is that Ian was just over-over-overproductive; while the other prog bands around him were either disbanding or extremely slow on the move, he was able to sustain the formula 'one album per year' all through the decade!
As a result, the band had lost pretty much all of the respect and credit it had gained in the late Sixties/early Seventies. The cirtics now hated Ian, and Ian likewise hated the critics - his petty anger led to him lambasting the poor Pen Workers on pretty much every record he made since Warchild, in some way or other (thanks God he doesn't know about the existence of this site!!). The sales gradually declined, too, and the number of fans gradually decreased. Since the Eighties, most Tull albums are always drifting steadily around the 100-150th position on the charts, and the Tull audience has been stabilized, being limited to 'rabid fans' and a bunch of old nostalgiacs who still frown at the band's newer efforts but are always ready to buy a ticket to go see the old Satyr churn out a 'Locomotive Breath' or a 'New Day Yesterday'. As for the 'newer efforts' themselves, it only got worse - anybody who's not a rabid fan of the band's Seventies catalog should steer clear of their later products. The first half of the Eighties passed under the sign of Electronica - where Ian had some relative successes with surprise albums like Broadsword And The Beast but also complete failures like Under Wraps - and since then the band had degenerated into a third-rate heavy metal outfit with next to no creative skills and nothing but nostalgia to back them up.
Although, truthfully, their latest release is surprisingly good. Unless I was just too tired of endlessly bashing late period Tull albums, of course.
OK, the lineup now. It's very hard to get a good line-up going here, 'cos Ian kept hiring and firing people at his own will, until this became just some sorta maniac thing in the eighties. Just wait and see: the original lineup (1968): besides Ian, there were Mick Abrahams (guitar; quit right after the first album because he wanted to write songs and Ian didn't want him to), Glenn Cornick (base) and Clive Bunker (drums; best drummer they ever had, actually). In 1969 Abrahams replaced by Martin Lancelot Barre (guitar). This fellow is the only one who had the chance to last till now, and deservedly so. He may be one of the finest playing guitarists on earth, and also just an overall nice guy. His guitar forms the perfect counterpoint to Ian's flute.
In 1970 John Evan (keyboards) was recruited for the Benefit sessions, and officially joined the group next year. A fantastic keyboard player: his Bach-like piano was a wonderful acquisition for the band. In 1971 Cornick quit, replaced on base by Jeffrey Hammond-Hammond - the "ultimate" base player, in my opinion, sometimes sounds better than John Entwistle! So the line-up of 1971 was the most professional one - maybe that's why Aqualung sounds so great.
In 1972 Bunker quit, replaced on drums by Barriemore Barlow. This line-up was the longest, still, it lasted only till 1975. Hammond-Hammond quit and was replaced by David Glascock. In 1976 one more member was added - David Palmer (keyboards, all kind of strings, saxophone, etc.). In 1979 disaster struck - Glascock died of an infection, there were other problems, and the band dissolved.
In 1980 Ian got Martin Barre back (smart guy!), grabbed session players Eddie Jobson (keyboards, strings) and Mark Craney (drums) and recruited Dave Pegg on base. The session players stayed for just one album and in 1982 were replaced by Gerry Conway (drums) and Peter John Vettese (keyboards; interesting fella but no John Evan, and he is also responsible for the electronic rubbish on the 80-s albums). Conway was replaced by Doane Perry in 1984. Peter Vettese was dropped soon afterwards, and after that I lost count. Let's see: altogether that comes to... hmmm... eleven line-ups, and there were still more after 1984! OK, cut that out. All you need to remember is that Ian guy, of course, and Martin Barre, and maybe John Evan - after all, he did play like god in the seventies. To the albums, now.
P.S. The page, just like all the larger pages on this site, is split in two parts: the 1968-79 period and the post-1979 period which, one has to admit, represents quite a different band altogether. The second part also has some Tull videos and may come to incorporate Ian's solo records. Access it from the album title links or using the link at the bottom of this page.

General Evaluation:

Listenability: 3/5. Marred by frequent slumps into self-indulgent melody-less fantasy.
Resonance: 3/5. Marred by frequent slumps into self-indulgent melody-less fantasy.
Originality: 4/5. No, that's not just because of the most original use of the flute in history.
Adequacy: 3/5. Marred by frequent slumps into self-indulgent melody-less fantasy.
Overall: 3.25 = * * * on the rating scale. That was concise, wasn't it?

What do YOU think about Jethro Tull? Mail your ideas

Your worthy comments:

Michael Bruun Petersen <[email protected]> (09.09.99)

Hi,
I stumbled upon you record review site today (link from www.procolharum.com), and I must say I like it a lot. Reading about great music is always nice, even if you don't agree with everything the writer has to say.
But I felt that I really had to comment on your Jehtro Tull page. Not the reviews themselves - although I disagree with many of them - but the opening paragraph.
You write: "On the other hand, he was also stubborn, despotic and hateful (at least, towards most of us humans), and his desperate need to release at least one album per year led to the appearance of tons of crap which everybody said was crap, but he thought everybody said it was crap because everybody hated him so much that everybody wanted to say all of his stuff was crap even when it wasn't ..."
What on earth inspired you to write this? I have read and head quite a bit about Tull and Ian Anderson, but I have never ever come across anything resembling this description. That Jethro Tull should be releasing albums every year because Ian (supposedly) hates most people sounds like a very strange idea to me. Can you document this in any way?
[G. S.: I'm sorry, the quoted phrase's meaning is as far away from your interpretation as possible. My fault probably - never put too many clauses in one sentence!]

"...Maybe everything we'd be hearing on the radio right now wouldn't be Led Zep."
You are lucky. Where I live they don't play any Zeppelin on the radio. (and no Tull, but that goes without saying).

"...besides Ian, there were Mick Abrahams (guitar; quit right after the first album because he wanted to write songs and Ian didn't want him to)..."
He wanted to be in a blues band and Ian did not want Tull to be a blues band. Ian won and Mick founded Blodwyn Pig.

"...In 1969 Abrahams replaced by Martin Lancelot Barre (guitar)..."
"Lancelot" isn't really his middle name. Ian made it up. (Perhaps you already know this)

"...In 1971 Cornick quit, replaced on base by Jeffrey Hammond-Hammond - the "ultimate" base player, in my opinion, sometimes sounds better than John Entwistle!..."
The second "Hammond" in his name was also an invention of Ian's.

"...Hammond-Hammond quit and was replaced by David Glascock.."
_John_ Glascock. (a.k.a. John Brittledick :-) [G. S.: wow, this is a bad one - I tend to evade these things, but with million member bands like Tull you can't but get screwed up from time to time].

"...In 1976 one more member was added - David Palmer (keyboards, all kind of strings, saxophone, etc.)..."
He had been associated with the band for several years before he became a full-time member. I don't think he ever played any strings, but he did do the string arrangements.

"...In 1979 disaster struck - Glascock died of an infection, there were other problems, and the band dissolved..."
No, it did not. Stormwatch was recorded while John was sick (Ian plays bass on most of that album). He died shortly after it was released and he was replaced by David Pegg, who played on the Stormwatch tour. Barrie quit after (iirc) the tour.

"...In 1980 Ian got Martin Barre back (smart guy!), grabbed session players Eddie Jobson (keyboards, strings) and Mark Craney (drums) and recruited Dave Pegg on base.."
This was intended to be an Ian Anderson solo album, but the record company would rather have a new Tull record. Thus John Evans and David Palmer were effectively fired.

"..the electronic rubbish on the 80-s albums). Conway was replaced by Doane Perry in 1984..."
And Doane is still here today (1999). By far the longest life-span of any Tull drummer.

"..Peter Vettese was dropped soon afterwards, and after that I lost count..."
Too bad - you were almost done. David Pegg left in 1995 to concentrate on his work with Fairport Convention. He was replaced by Jonathan Noyce. Andrew Giddings (keyboards) joined in 1991.
Stuff about current and former members can be found on the official web-site: http://j-tull.com
Well, that's pretty much it.
[G.S. Thanks for the information, Mike. If you're still wondering why the hell did I not incorporate it earlier, it's just because all of it can be found on http://j-tull.com. ]

Matthew Bush <[email protected]> (28.10.99)

As a Tull fan from almost the beginning I wanted to tell you I thoroughly enjoyed - and often agreed - with your album reviews.
I don't know if you had a chance to see the band live back in the early 70's, but they were absolutely the best I've seen, particularly the 1972 tour when the first half of the show was an hour long rendition of the recently released Thick as a Brick.... Tull was everything that they aren't anymore.... innovative, risk taking, adventurous, hilariously funny, quirky - and absolutely incendiary musically. The best stage performance I've ever seen by a rock band, and I've seen many.
Something you said really hit home with me..... the changes in Martin Barre's playing over the years. Barre was an incredibly fluid and emotional player twenty five to thirty years ago, and somewhere along the way he seemed to lose that "bluesy" feel in favor of the heavy metal riffage. If you compare his playing on Stand Up with anything after about Heavy Horses, it's very sad indeed. There's a real "sameness" to his sound, and it doesn't send the shivers down my spine like it did in the good 'ol days. Too bad Barre didn't release a solo album back when he played with fire.
I saw Tull about a month ago and my wife declared the show "boring". It was more like a Vegas nightclub act, like an Ian and Tull impersonation than a genuine concert. For a guy who professes to despise "Nostalgia", Ian was counting on it to get the crowd going - the same old gags we've seen since when they were spontaneous and funny, around the time of Thick as a Brick
Hey, thanks for listening.

Jamie Anthony <[email protected]> (08.12.99)

I don't at all agree with your philosophy of Jethro Tull. I think the band's peak was around mid-Seventies - you see, progressive music has a lot of energy and is never dull - it's energy comes from constructive melodies and complex brilliance. Tull in the sixties were very much blues-based. Now that's usually a good thing, but Tull can't do blues that well - they were born to be prog! Prog takes time to understand, it can take 10-20 listens before you appreciate a prog album. I think your taste is much more pop-orientated.

<[email protected]> (15.01.2000)

I just have a few comments on your comments about Jethro Tull.
You don't look deep enough into Ian Anderson's writings.
The Passion Play was meant to be something more than an Album. It was to complicated for its time and its time is still to come.
Your review on Crest of a Knave, was just terrible. I think Crest of a Knave was there best album because it showed how they could go to hard rock and still have that Jethro Tull type sound. I think you Should rethink your rating of Jethro Tull

Michael Carroll <[email protected]> (08.02.2000)

Why
Oh Why
Must we be subjected to so many reviews of a band that we obviously have an interest in (otherwise we wouldn't click the little Jethro Tull thingy), by someone who has already decided he JUST DOESN'T LIKE THEM! {Truth} JUST DOESN'T GET THEM!
Why would someone who hates "War Movies" with a passion be assigned to review a crap load of "War Movies"?
Where's the value? What is learned?
Had I realized that Venus and Mars by McCartney received a 9 and a majority of Tull albums receive 7 or less, I would have left this page immediately there after. Instead I went on to read many of these so-called reviews! There's the big YAWN!
It must have been unbearable to write!
So Why!
Thanks
Unenlightened

Hans Lindelöw <[email protected]> (13.02.2000)

Interesting to read your reviews, especially on a group such as Jethro Tull, which I have listened to very much in previous years.I think they are quite good(your review´s), unsentimental and sometimes just to the point.
"I´d better look around me, compose a better song, ´cause that´s the honest measure of my worth".
But Ian Andersson didn´t wrote a better song. Aqualung is one of the best rock-album´s ever.If there is art in rock-music, this is were it is. For me personally it had great significance, those years in the beginning of the 70`s. I was young,I was bleeding, everything was bleeding the spring of 1970. And so I heard this distinct voice crying out the deep and serious question´s of my own generation - to God!
Now, who could answer these questions?
In my case, God did. I really caught up the voice of Jesus Christ, in autumn 1973, on my way to do the military-service in the north part of Sweden.There were my ancestors lived in the forest, were they gathered an prayed, I heard the blessed gospel.
Before that, in the summer, I had visited England with a friend. I so much lived in the music of Jethro Tull, that I shouldn´t be surprised, should any of the musicians drop down just were I was sitting.
But I think Thick as a brick and A passion play became to much of a puzzle . Interesting to see that you appreciated Thick as a brick so much. By then, I had many discussions with my friends on that one, but failed to convince anybody. Rather, they convinced me.
Now, to the latest album, J-Tull Dot.Com which I found here in Stockholm just before Christmas. Really a good one. Not an answer to Aqualung, but really a good one."Wicked window´s", for example.Splendid! A poem in the computer-age. Ian Andersson didn´t compose a better song, which he judged to be the honest measure of his worth. It may be an honest measure, but not the only measure.

Tikhonov Konstantin <[email protected]> (03.03.2000)

In this moment I have no time to write comments about all groups and musicians placed on your web-site and decide to concentrate on my favourite band (and the best band on earth) - Jethro Tull.
Before saying something about 'em, I must say that I don't understand what are you doin' on Russian web-site? You're a American. Well, maybe not native American, but American-oriented man. Only pop-shit-loving Americans may place The Byrds above Jethro Tull and give three stars to The Beach Boys and two to Renaissance. The Monkees above Black Sabbath? Christ, you're must be joking! And where the hell is such rock masters as Uriah Heep, Rainbow or Nazareth? Where's progressive heroes (Van Der Graaf Generator, Rick Wakeman)? What about REAL folk rock (Steeleye Span, Alan Stivell)? I don't say that you must rate them at five stars but man... if you skip this bands... it's a pity... now back to giants.
Below of all unprinted words I think that you don't listen Tull's albums carefully or maybe listen 'em like in old Russian joke (two Jews speaks about music and one said that he don't like The Beatles - they can't sing right, they have an awful Jewish accent and they can't even play on guitar. The second Jew asked his friend where did he listen The Beatles - on radio? No, he said, my neighbour Abraham sing their songs to me). Who sang Tull's songs to you? I know a lot of people don't like Tull, but you're first man from whom I heard that Tull's music is "tons of crap". Boy, you're so lucky to wrote it in thousands miles from me! Where the fuck did you listen to this "crap"? On Stand Up? On Aqualung? On Thick As A Brick? On Minstrel In The Gallery? On Songs From The Wood? On Heavy Horses? On Bursting Out? On Rock Island? On Little Light Music? On Roots To Branches? I'm really curious...
And before you will write some words about the band's history, go to the library and read some books. You line-ups comments is SOMETHING! Jeffrey Hammond-Hammond is "ultimate bass player"? "Sounds better than John Entwistle"? Man, Jeffrey Hammond almost couldn't play on bass guitar until he re-joined Tull in December 1970 (and Ian gave him a lessons). Barriemore Barlow played with Tull from June 1971, not 1972. Jeffrey quit in December 1975 and David Palmer joined in October 1976. Well, enough! Read Michael Petersen's comments and correct the wrongs... or somebody will die from laughing! (Excuse me. If I say that David Palmer joined in 1976 but do not specify that he joined in October 1976 somebody will die of laughing? Do I get that right? - G.S.)

Tikhonov Konstantin <[email protected]> (18.03.2000)

Don't twist my words, Georgie! I said that your comments are full of mistakes, and I don't like people pretending to observe music (not necessary Tull) and writes absolutely rubbish about the band's history. OK, you're lazy to read about Tull, so take the booklet from 20 Years CD and copy Pete Frame's line-up's tree. (And who would be interested in that besides fanatics like yourself? And I do not twist your words. I wrote 'In 1976 David Palmer was added'. You apparently think that this is a mistake and 'October 1976' is the correct answer. Thank you oh so much Mr Know All; you probably must have your pockets full of coupons won over trivia contests - G. S.)

Becky Alex <[email protected]> (23.07.2000)

You and this McFerrin guy have similar takes on Tull (I've been to his site as well).  Who's the original and who's the copy?  I'll give you the credit for being the original since I see McFerrin has the balls (nay stupidity) to critique an album without listening to it (see a Little Light Music)!  Tull has made outstanding music since day one and continues to do so.  If you don't like it that's cool, but you really should have your facts correct before you go over the top with your negative criticism (see just about every review of a Tull album) (yeah, like the 'fact' that "A Passion Play is Tull at their very best" - am I getting it right? - G. S.).  Other than that your site is very enjoyable and I look forward to reading reviews about some of your highly overrated bands. (If they're so highly overrated, why read about them at all???!! - G. S.)

John McFerrin <[email protected]> (25.07.2000)

1. In the time since, I've managed to acquire LLM, and it proved to be pretty close to what I imagined it would be.
2. I was commenting on the circumstances that would surround said album (ie the logic of why a 'Living in the Past' instrumental would be better received than a 'Locomotive Breath' instrumental) and not so much the album itself.
3. Any 'copying' of George's musical opinions is pure coincidence - I came across Prindle's site first, and it's not as if I've totally copied _his_ musical taste.
4. Compare our Yes sites - the eternal proof that we are _not_, in fact, clones of one another.

Thomas M. Silvestri <[email protected]> (30.09.2000)

First let me say that for a guy who obviously doesn't like Jethro Tull all that much, your comments are astonishingly astute both journalistically and musically. The insight into Barlow's superior technique vs. Bunker's greater energy for example, is the type of thing you'd not only practically have to be a drummer to say, but you'd also have to have heard not only all the later stuff by Tull as well as some of Barlow's rather obscure sessions, like Maddy Prior's Woman in the Wings and that Robert Plant solo LP. (I think it's the one with "Big Log," or the one right after that.) Yeah, sure, I wonder how you overrate Hammond's completely by-the-book playing, but then you rally with great insights about Barre. So on the whole I give the writer a huge thumbs up, especially when so many people with no love for or knowledge of music (but rather a huge addiction to whatever the latest scene or scandal is -- you know, the type of people who'd tell you Eminem is talented and Ian Anderson is not) delight in bashing Tull -- whose J-Tull Dot Com, by the way, was their best album since Under Wraps (see my sure-to-infuriate defense of ...Wraps, which should be up on the site by now courtesy of George).

Paul Stadden <[email protected]> (16.11.2000)

I think that any band that had Black Sabbath's Tony Iommi must be cool. Artsy rock? Except for Pink Floyd, these guys are the best. And Black Sabbath had astable line-up compared to this band.

David Lyons <[email protected]> (16.12.2000)

(To Michael Caroll:) "Question: Why would someone who hates 'War Movies' with a passion be assigned to review a crap load of'War Movies'. Where's the value, what is learned?"
Answer: Erm, hello? Anyone in there? Surely, as the hypothetical war film devotee is, by their very description, enamoured of war films, what genuine value would be gleaned from reading page after page of text telling him nothing new and merely agreeing with everything he already thought? Sure, it's nice to stumble across like-minded fellows you can join in eulogising your favourite band/film/breakfast cereal/alcoholic tipple/brand of medication. But equally, I'm fairly certain you gain more from perusing a well written, considered critique from a viewpoint other than you own? Personally, I'm moderately potty about Pink Floyd, but I read all of George's comments with interest. Most of the criticisms I found difficult to contradict, rather I came to the conlcusions that mathematically planned and executed guitar dentistry and pleasant middle class wailing trip different switches in my mind than George's, the end result being I like them more than he does. It didn't make me want to rant on in capital letters declaiming to all and sundry that THEY ARE WRONG and I AM RIGHT.  
The worst than can befall you from reading negative comments about something you like is that you end up slightly miffed, but with your original views strengthened and reinforced. At least, thats what happens when you can coherently argue a case for your own views, without resorting to shouting.   Personally, I think 3 is a fair rating, although with a little (okay, a boat load of) quality control and a well-timed break up after Bursting Out, they'd have been nothing short of a 5.

Year Of Release: 1968
Record rating = 8
Overall rating = 11

An innovative blues album with some great flutework.
Best song: BEGGAR'S FARM

In the beginning Jethro Tull were just a normal blues band, primarily because prog rock still didn't exist in 1968 - they had yet to invent it (well, actually, it was already in the process of being invented by the Nice, but it was still kinda underground). Well, maybe normal isn't quite the necessary word here. The main distinctive feature of their music from the beginning was Ian Anderson's flute and his masterful and totally original way of using it. Indeed - try to substitute the flute sounds on this album with anything else and you won't be able to distinguish it from a couple dozen professional blues/psycho acts of the time. This applies to some of the lesser tracks on their humble debut: the instrumental 'Cat's Squirrel', for instance, which achieves nothing during its five or more minutes, except boring me to death. Okay, guitarist Mick Abrahams is a talent, there's no denying it, but I'm not looking for talent - I'm looking for genius, and I don't see much genius in this guy, just as well as try as I might, I just can't reveal the hidden charm of this stupid instrumental (Cream covered it on their debut, too! Go figure!) That riff is catchy, but way too repetitive and primitive, and the way the song picks up speed and then dissolves itself several times on its way hurts me deep down inside.
And 'Dharma For One'? It's just a stupid drum solo! Why did ninety percent of the drummers of the era think it was their moral duty to record a drum solo? Yeah, Clive Bunker is an excellent drummer, but only when he's serving as backing musician. Leave the solo stuff to Ginger Baker, please.
To be entirely honest, there are some songs on here which do not go too far even with the help of Ian's instrument. The opening generic blues 'My Sunday Feeling' is quite fine, but the main thing which makes it memorable is its weird 'stuttering', broken rhythm and not the flute. This speaks in favour of the band - they were trying to do something creative to the blues formula from the very beginning - but 'stuttering' is not really sufficient to make a masterpiece out of an ordinary blues tune. It would take one more album to demonstrate the real wonders Tull could work with the blues.
Not so, however, with the absolutely incredible workout on 'Beggar's Farm': the flute totally makes this song, from the raving riff in the intro to the furious solo and to the splendid ending (by the way, early Tull codas are yet another of their trademarks - in the early years, Ian took special care not to let the song just pull to a stop in one-two seconds), not to mention the thoughtful lyrics, typically illustrating Ian's untraditional approach to 'lost love' thematics: 'Oh, you don't fool me/Cos I know what you feel/When you go out I ask you why/And I won't worry when I see you lying down on Beggar's Farm...'
And, of course, nobody should ever forget the cover of Roland Kirk's 'Serenade To A Cuckoo': it would be very convenient to say that it paves the road to the superior 'Bouree' (actually, I already said that elsewhere), but it is just as well a terrific piece of music in its own right. For once, Mick Abrahams contributes a decent jazz guitar solo, and at six minutes' length it's still way too short for me. He was a good guy. Pity he left right after this album. Must have been too freedom-loving. Well, he just had to 'Move On Alone' (his finest composition on the album, if I might make such an ambivalent remark). As for Ian, he is as of yet very careful and somewhat shy about his flute playing, but he's already able of putting out some superb and subtle dynamics by means of the instrument.
What about the easy-to-chew pop hits now? Sorry, generally that's not to be expected from a Tull album, but the closest thing to a pop hit here is the funny harmonica-driven 'Song For Jeffrey' with Ian apparently singing through some kind of gadget so that the vocals are hardly decipherable. (To decode them, use the live version on the Stones' 'Rock And Roll Circus'). For some, this is a major highlight, and it's indeed one of the catchiest ditties the band ever did: the interplay between the bloozy guitar and the poppy harmonica is amazing and promptly digs itself into your memory.
So just concentrate on more blues stuff, and don't you worry about its overabundance - they did it good, and they wouldn't be doing it at all in just a couple of years. Catch it while it's young, especially since they try to do lots of cool things to vary things a bit - unlike, say, contemporary Fleetwood Mac! 'It's Breaking Me Up' is so 'clumsied' up you won't even realize it's blues until you've heard it all way through! And 'Someday The Sun Won't Shine For You' is just a cozy, warm song, despite the menacing lyrics. 'In the morning I'll be leaving/I'll leave your mother too'. Well, well, well...
'This was' how we played then', said Ian. This was good. At any rate, this was a great deal better than this is; and this also was a great stepping stone for the band to create some sort of reputation in among the critical circles - hell, some reviews maintained that Jethro Tull were going to be the next Cream. Of course, that never happened (the critics were dead wrong, as usual), but for the moment it created favourable work conditions for Tull. Inflated Ian's pomp, too, though.

Move on alone 'cos I need your own ideas

Your worthy comments:

Michael Bruun Petersen <[email protected]> (01.10.99)

The summary - "An innovative blues album with some great flutework." - is pretty accurate. And 'Beggars Farm' is indeed the best song here. But the later stuff is so much better that I can't give this one more than a 6.
Rating:6

Tikhonov Konstantin <[email protected]> (03.03.2000)

This Was review is not bad, especially after your introduction. "Cat's Squirrel" is absolutely empty guitar exercises (more than a noise, less than a filler), so why are you be sorry for the departure of Mick Abrahams? Listen to this and think again... I can't agree that drum solo in "Dharma For One" is stupid, it can't compare to the best drum solos I heard in my life (it's Ian Paice's solos, in a matter of fact), but it's nice short solo and nothing more. Of course, Ian Anderson's flute work is simply, maybe too simple, but it was summer of 1968. Wait just a couple of months and you'll be rewarded. And "Song For Jeffrey" is not a closest thing to the pop hit, 'cause if anything climbed the charts in 60's is pop then "Song For Jeffrey" is pop, and "Hey Jude" is pop, and "A Whiter Shade Of Pale" is pop. There's no pop on This Was, it's a jazz or blues or rock, but not pop.
The only thing I really hate on this album is a goddamn 60's standard to record music in one channel and voice in other. Listening this album in headphones is real torture (for me).
To summarise - This Was is good album without any comparisons, very good for any group's debut album (even for Led Zeppelin - they made the best debut album in rock history), and not very good for Jethro Tull's album. The followed masterpieces simply buried This Was in late 60's. Best song? "Beggar's Farm" or "Serenade To A Cuckoo". Rating? Seven.

Philip Maddox <[email protected]> (07.07.2000)

Er... I'd give this a 7. It's good, but it's not nearly as interesting as later Tull stuff. 'Beggar's Farm' is a great song, of course. 'A Song For Jeffrey' is great psycho-blues, too. I love Ian's encoded vocals - they give the song a really weird feel. My favorite, though, is 'Serenade To A Cuckoo'. That song really gives Ian and Mick a chance to shine through on their instruments. It has a great, peaceful jazz feel to it. I love it, and I agree - 6 minutes is indeed too short. However, there's too much generic blues for me to really love this record - 'Some Day The Sun Won't Shine For You', 'It's Breaking Me Up', and 'My Sunday Feeling' are ok, but nothing special. 'Dharma For One' is a drum solo... it's pretty good until the actual drum solo starts. I like 'Cat's Squirrel', though. The biggest problem with it is that Mick is in one speaker, while the rest of the band is in the other. It makes the song hard to listen to in headphones - I would prefer it if it were in mono! But still, it makes me wanna hunt down a Blodwyn Pig album - I wonder how Mick sounded without Ian? Anyway, it's a good album. Just not an amazing one. Pretty impressive for a debut, though.

Paul Stadden <[email protected]> (16.11.2000)

Ok, why does no one ever mention that Tony Iommi was indeed a full member of this band? Sure, it might have lasted two weeks, but was still a line-up. Heck, he even managed to appear with the band at the Rolling Stones Rock N' Roll Circus.

Year Of Release: 1969
Record rating = 10
Overall rating = 13

The hardest, roughest, sincerest and clearest they ever got. And no prog-rock yet!
Best song: BOUREE

As I said, Abrahams quit right after cutting This Was and was replaced by... Martin Barre? Nope, by TONY IOMMI; and that's not a stupid joke. Tony even played a couple of gigs with them, you can even see him on the Stones' Rock And Roll Circus. Imagine what could happen if he'd decide to stay! Jethro Tull embracing heavy metal and Satanism? At least, there would be no Black Sabbath, that's for sure... (Mind you, I'm nor saying that would be a good possibility. I'm trying to be careful in order not to offend any Black Sabbath fan. I just have a bone against evil music, that's all...)
However, history can't be re-written, so we have to digest the fact that Tony didn't really get along with Ian. So Martin Barre came along - forgetting his amplifiers and spilling coffee on his guitars. He also played them - and did it much better than Mick Abrahams and maybe even better than Tony Iommi; at least, in the early days he had some incredible guitar tones, a good knack for mighty riffage and a heavy fuzzy lead attack that could have easily rivalled Jimmy Page's and sometimes even beat it. Before he switched over to generic crappy metal in the late Eighties, that is.
Meanwhile, Ian got some more flute practice, wrote some more songs and finally decided they just had to develop a style - it was 1969, by gum, and if you didn't have a style back then, you pretty much sucked. Those were the days, eh? To that end, there's just one blues number on the entire record, and even so it is an absolute Tull classic. And why? Because of the great 'double-descending' riff which you don't hear that much on a generic blues number. Of course, I'm speaking of 'A New Day Yesterday' - what else could I possibly be speaking about? And you just don't know how I love an original and memorable guitar riff every now and then - helps me more than aspirin. The leap from 'My Sunday Feeling', the 'blues groove' that opens This Was, to 'A New Day Yesterday', the 'blues groove' that opens Stand Up, is indeed astonishing: the band now sounds like a rip-roarin' blues tank, with a skillful mastery of overdubs, a steady twin-guitar-flute attack and Clive Bunker's perfected drumming style.
And the other numbers? Hard to believe it, but they're all absolute rippers. For starters, there's a couple of resplendent ballads in a glossy pop style which Ian has never been able to reproduce again: even though 'Look Into The Sun' and 'Reasons For Waiting' sound rather alike, they are just beautiful oh so beautiful, with some strings popping out now and then in the right moments and Barre's acoustic guitar shining through, with subtle shift of dynamics (watch, for instance, the solemn and tender verses of 'Reasons' seamlessly flow into the ominous, strangely menacing flute refrain, then just as seamlessly flow back into the main guitar melody - that's what perfection is). And the album's main highlight is Anderson's flute arrangement on Bach's 'Bouree', one of the most stunning rock-classic fusions ever. The flute, bass and guitar mingle together to incredible effect on here; the song is thus like an 'elder brother' to 'Serenade For A Cuckoo', but it's a trillion times more effective, catchy and beautiful.
Taken on the album scale, however, it's the hard numbers that really make this record. People might rave on about Aqualung, but it's Stand Up which is doubtlessly their most hard-rockin' album before the infamous metal period in the late '80-s, and they really could play 'hard rock' (as opposed to 'heavy metal') better than almost any of their contemporaries - better than Beck, better than Led Zep! In order to be convinced, just take a listen to the gargantuan coda on 'Nothing Is Easy', with that bitchin' aggressive interplay between Barre's guitar and Ian's flute (another trademark, that one), and to the accelerating drum pattern in the end (the one that goes 'bang - bangbang - bangbangbang - bangbangbangbang', and the 'stone-rolling-down-a-hill' conclusion). Nobody made music that rocked so bleedin' hard in mid-1969! 'Back To The Family' is another fearless rocker with Ian spitting out satirical lines about how he's being neglected in the forkin' suckin' society before the final frantic battlecharge of all the instruments; 'We Used To Know', whose eerie melodical connection with 'Hotel California' has often raised many weird hypotheses, features breath-taking, cathartic wah-wah solos; and 'For A Thousand Mothers' closes the album on another hard note, even though I don't like it quite as much as the other numbers, maybe because of the fact that Ian's vocals are unexpectedly buried down deep in the general chaos.
And finally, I nearly forgot to mention the Indian-flavoured 'Fat Man' with Ian complaining about his gaining weight. It is certainly to be considered the 'groove' of the record: some jolly sitar-imitating lines contribute to the funny atmosphere, while the lines 'Don't want to be a fat man/People would think I'm just good fun/Would rather be a thin man/I'm so glad to go on being one/Too much to carry around with you/No chance of finding a woman who/Will love you in the morning and the nighttime, too' are probably among Ian's best lines of all time. I'll admit right here and now that I do not consider him a great poet (all the prog-rockers liked to think of themselves as tremendous lyricists when in reality they were just overbloated humbugs), but for the time being he was no prog-rocker 'cos prog-rock didn't exist as yet which meant he actually had to take pains to think over his lyrics instead of committing to paper all the nonsense that came into his head.
In fact, this is certainly the best advantage of this album, and the reason I prefer it to Aqualung: this is no prog rock, just a great collection of rock'n'roll songs. Buy it now, if you haven't heard it you've no idea of how great they once were. Hell, Melody Maker nominated them second best of 1969, right after the Beatles but even before the Rolling Stones. I wouldn't go as far, but it's definitely a fabulous album all the same, and certainly the best 'hard-rock' record of the year, if not all time. Prog-rock? Forget it!

Nothing is easy except mailing your ideas

Your worthy comments:

Michael Bruun Petersen <[email protected]> (01.10.99)

Good review! I would have loved to be around in 1969. The music sounds very fresh today so it must have been quite an experience thirty years ago.
Still, it isn't perfect. I find 'Fat Man' somewhat annoying, and I usually skip 'Reasons for Waiting' and 'Jeffrey goes to Leicester Square' as well. Not that they are bad songs, but the rest are much better. Best song: 'We Used to Know'. Great lyrics, great melody, great solo.
Rating: 8

John McFerrin <[email protected]> (11.10.99)

Wow ... I must say I'm really, really impressed by this album. I mean, damn ... this is a solid, solid, piece of work. It's better than Aqualung, and that says a ton right there.
I dunno ... maybe I should give this the ten after all ... or, I could be a wuss and let this and TAAB share it.

Ben Greenstein <[email protected]> (15.02.2000)

You're absolutely right - this album is fantastic. It's not progressive rock yet (except for "Bouree," which I agree is a higlight), but it's too complex to be blues rock (except for maybe "A New Day Yesterday," which is still incredibly awesome). My favourites are "Back To The Family," "Fat Man," and "Reasons For Waiting." I give it a nine.

Tikhonov Konstantin <[email protected]> (03.03.2000)

Such an excellent album and such a weird review. First, This Was was finished in August 1968 and Mick Abrahams left Tull in November. Actually, Mick was asked to leave - 'cause he doesn't like gigs, tours etc. Second, Tony Iommi couldn't stay in Tull even if he wanted it to death. Ian always rules Tull by iron hand, so I can't imagine that he agreed with somebody's leadership. Tony "played" with Tull when the group was invited to the shooting of "Rock And Roll Circus", and it means "played" 'cause only Ian's vocals on "Song For Jeffrey" was recorded live, the instrumental parts was taped from studio version, so Tony doesn't played with Tull, not a single note.
"A New Day Yesterday" and "Bouree"? Immortal classics. Need I say more?
Now you've done it again! "A couple of resplendent ballads which Ian has never been able to reproduce again"? Wash your ears, buddy! OK, OK, "Look Into The Sun" and "Reasons For Waiting" is nice tunes, but what about "Sossity"? "Wond'ring Aloud"? "Requiem"? "Fire At Midnight"? "Moths"? "Home"? "And Further On"? "Slow Marching Band"? "Said She Was A Dancer"? Jesus, I'll get blisters on my fingers if I'll typed 'em all! By the way, the best Tull's ballad is "Jack-A-Lynn"...
Forget the "infamous metal period in the late 80's" and lets talk about "their most hard-rockin' album". Stand Up have a lot of really hard numbers (the best of them is "For A Thousand Mothers" - excellent coda), guitar and flute duelling to death, but the complete album is closer to blues than to hard. Maybe it was hard for 1969, but it wasn't hard for 1970 - after Deep Purple In Rock, Black Sabbath's first LP and Very 'Eavy, Very 'Umble. And it wasn't hard for Jethro Tull after Aqualung and Minstrel (Minstrel In The Gallery was the heaviest Tull's album up before Rock Island if you don't mention Bursting Out).
Lets make a little break and lets talk about the meaning of words. We said blues, jazz, hard, folk etc., but Tull don't play blues, hard, folk. Ian's vision of rock music is absolutely incomparable, he creates his own music. Tull plays Tull's Music! We talks about Tull's blues, Tull's hard, Tull's folk, man! I said that Stand Up is blues and it's Tull's blues. The one and only album can be describe pure and simple is This Was (and for me it's not real Jethro Tull's album).
Lyrics of "Fat Man" is funny, but only "Nothing Is Easy" lyrics is true Ian Anderson's Lyrics (and definitely not the best). If YOU don't like complex lyrics (Aqualung, Thick As A Brick etc.) - everybody's on their own.
My few words about Stand Up? A first Jethro Ian's masterpiece, one of the best albums from '69 (only Abbey Road stands above). Music, lyrics, technique, sound, cover - everything is fine! Of course, after serious works like Benefit and Aqualung, Stand Up thoughts is somewhat simple, but album is absolutely complete. Best songs (not song) - "A New Day Yesterday" and "Bouree". Rating - 8. Why 8? Hey, there's Thick As A Brick on the horizon!

Philip Maddox <[email protected]> (07.07.2000)

Yeah, I'd have to give this one a 10. There's not a bad song on here, or even a bad moment. The whole record just gets up and goes like This Was could only dream of! I'll go out and say that 'A New Day Yesterday' is the best blues tune I've ever heard - that guitar riff could repeat endlessly in the background for an hour and I wouldn't get bored. 'Bouree' is just as good - it manages to one-up 'Serenade To A Cuckoo' from the last album, which is no easy feat! 'Reasons For Waiting' and 'Look Into The Sun' are great ballads, quite possibly the best Tull ever did (well, among the best - there are a select few others that I like as much). The ascending flute line that opens 'Reasons' is absolutely beautiful. 'Nothing Is Easy' and 'Back To The Family' are fantastic hard rockers, as well. 'We Used To Know' has a blistering wah-wah solo by Barre. 'For A Thousand Mothers' is one of the best album closers ever, too - the combination of that heavy, fast riff and the bitter lyrics. It's perfect. The quick little ditties thrown on ('Fat Man' and 'Jeffrey Goes To Leicester Square') are EXTREMELY catchy and funny. 'Fat Man' can get stuck in my head for days. I don't get how a lot of hardcore Tull fans prefer Benefit to this - I like Benefit a lot, but it ain't perfect. And this almost is. Not as good as Brick, but still, a 10. Easily one of the best albums ever made.

Bob Josef <[email protected]> (25.10.2000)

The heavier rock numbers on this record, I think, are overrated. They seem to get the most attention in the live shows nowadays, which is too bad. Because the other tracks are far more interesting. "Bouree" may be a Bach piece, but it doesn't sound like a prog cover of a classical tune at all. It really is unique in the Tull canon. I think you underrate "Fat Man" -- it really is an ingenious blend of English folk and Indian music. It's too bad it would take 25 years for Ian to return to that sort of motif. And "Look into the Sun" is absolutely gorgeous. Why it never made it to all these Tull anthologies is a big mystery.
An album that takes a chance on being diverse can frequently be poor, but the high quality of these songs prevents that from happening. Not as cohesive as the next three, but maybe cohesiveness is an overrated virtue...

Year Of Release: 1970
Record rating = 7
Overall rating = 10

A rather boring, preachy and over-laden product; much too gloomy for such an early stage, too. Still, it's been worse.
Best song: WITH YOU THERE TO HELP ME

This one was originally an incredible disappointment for me; and while time has slowly improved my feelings, I still feel that Benefit is an anomaly in the normal course of the development of Tull, as it ruptures the perfectly smooth flow of Stand Up into Aqualung. Prog-rock fans usually praise it as the first truly 'serious' album for the band, but they're welcome - I could care less about the standard proggers' ideology ('the more boring it is for the average listener, the more important it is for us the Witty Elitists'). What I actually do see is that Benefit is significantly less sharp and uncompromised than the last album; it's quite dull in many places; it's preachy - Ian's lyrics have finally gone completely 'universalist' and far too ambitious to match the actual music; and it's so full of various gadgets and gimmicks a la early Pink Floyd that some tracks are rendered totally unlistenable, like the miserable 'Play In Time'. If only that song had been conceived a year earlier, it could have been turned into a powerful rockin' machine cause it's essentially based on a really solid riff - but no, the word of the day is 'experiment' and the silly band members prefer to rely on synths and ruin an otherwise perfectly good song. Stupid little guys. The murky synth noises and 'chewn tape effects' on that track make me want to vomit (not surprisingly - quite a few of them do resemble the sound of a guy vomiting, come to think of it).
Seriously, now, I do seem surprised that Benefit is really closer in sound to their late '70-s excesses than to whatever came directly before and after it. The pace of the album is mighty slow, at times lethargic, the energy is seriously toned down (and all that after you've been thunderstruck by wonders like 'Nothing Is Easy' or 'For A Thousand Mothers'), and - this might sound blasphemous, but I stand on it - the songs are actually less complex than the ones on Stand Up: far too often, I get dragged down by the unbearable monotonousness of tracks that prefer to unfurl a single weak musical idea over five or six minutes; the addition of John Evan's keyboards doesn't help that much either (he wasn't an official member of the band yet, by the way). Not to mention that the standard conception of a 'hook', which Ian still seemed to respect on Stand Up, has vanished into thin air: quiet folkish anthems like 'Alive And Well And Living In' or 'For Michael Collins, Jeffrey And Me' do alternate more or less 'silent' and more or less 'explosive' moments, but the chord changes are practically unobservable: this is pure atmosphere, and I did have my fair share of that on the Pink Floyd ballads already.
Likewise, I insist that 'Sossity You're A Woman' is pure atmosphere as well. After the beautiful, wonderfully constructed melodies of the Stand Up ballads, all Ian is able to come up with is this? A bland folkish acoustic shuffle, backed with some moody organ, and that's all? Oh, this is not the worst ballad Ian would ever come up with, but I can't help comparing it with what came before, and as an album closer it tends to always disappoint me. And I feel more or less the same about 'A Time For Everything', a song that recycles the same simplistic musical phrase over and over again (although it does contain an interesting flute/guitar riff that would later be recycled to better effect on 'My God').
You probably already got what I'm hinting at. Benefit is a sadly predictable beginning of what mars Jethro Tull's existence the most - formulaicness. Stand Up was a unique record in that it never had a stable formula, unless the flute counts: the band was dabbling in lots of styles, from blues to Indian music, and was never truly predictable in the bad sense of the word. Benefit, while not a bad record by itself, sows the seeds that would later turn out to be poisonous weeds rather than useful cereals. The formula is here: uninventive, monotonous, repetitive mid-tempo melodies, pretentious universalistic sneering lyrics, an obligatory flute that belongs everywhere even if it doesn't, and a song length that's always a couple minutes bigger than it should be, if not more. Kinda reminds me of Minstrel In The Gallery, even if that would be five years later.
But on to the good news. After all, it was 1970, and it would be a huge surprise if this record did not contain at least a few brilliant songs, sandwiched as it was between two of Tull's best albums. Some of the numbers actually pull off the atmospherics pretty well, especially the two openers. 'With You There To Help Me' is a mind-boggling psychedelic experience, a dark, gloomy, depressing Anthem of the Optimistic Pessimist, climaxing in a 'psycho jam' replete with echoey 'flapping' synth passages, wild laughter and not any less wild guitar solos; it is actually the most energetic number on the whole record, and a memorable one at that. 'Nothing To Say', on the other hand, is quite boring, but it's also quite adequate - the atmosphere of the song is to make one feel completely lost in an inescapable depression, and as Anderson intones 'oh I couldn't bear it so I got nothing to sa-a-a-a-a-y', he almost manages to convince you that he's pretty pissed off at this universe of ours, enough to turn everything he sees into dirt and dung.
A couple of songs are quite riff-heavy - besides 'Nothing To Say' which does feature an interesting riff, there's also 'Son', a one-time favourite of mine with Barre's best guitar parts on the album and some particularly interesting lyrics dedicated to relations between generations. For some reason, fans usually dislike that song, and I can't figure out why - I adore the guitar, and I find it perfectly memorable, if not quite Stand Up quality. And, of course, 'To Cry You A Song' has the most intricate and classy riff on the record; funny, hearing that song always brings Blind Faith's 'Had To Cry Today' on my mind - and not just because of the title, but because it's based on a very similar riff, and the way that riff is constantly buried deep inside the song, steadily making its way into your subconscious, also coincides for both songs. Coincidence? Hardly, seeing as Anderson was quite familiar with Blind Faith members and Tull's style often got compared to that of both Cream and Traffic. Of course, I'm not really blaming Ian, but I just like hitting small details like these...
Finally, 'Inside' is a very good ballad, and perhaps the only worthy 'soft' contender to make it onto Stand Up out of everything on here - the heavenly flute sound is very similar to the style used on 'Reasons For Waiting'.
In all, the amount of good material on Benefit is still enough to make the record worth acquiring, and apart from the synth noises on 'Play In Time', there's nothing particular offensive about the remaining songs. It's not a crime, though, if you prefer to skip it - like I said, I just don't feel the record really fits in in between the two other ones that surround it chronologically.
Special note: there are actually several Benefits floating around, of which I seem to have the original British version. The American one seemed to have cut out 'For Michael Collins' and replaced it with the single 'Teacher'. A very wise move, considering that the former is one of the worst efforts on here and that 'Teacher' is a terrific single, quite in the Stand Up vein... be sure to take a look at the (unfortunately very brief) snatch of it on the 20 Years video...

With you there to help me by mailing your ideas

Your worthy comments:

Michael Bruun Petersen <[email protected]> (01.10.99)

Not as exhuberant and energetic as Stand Up, but every bit as good. 'To Cry You a Song' is probably the best song here, but the beautiful (not dragging and sloppy) 'Sossity ...' deserves to be mentioned as well. The worst track is the boring 'Play in Time'. Not the very nice and moving 'For Michael Collins, Jeffrey and Me'.
Rating: 8

Nick Karn <[email protected]> (19.10.99)

This is one I owe a few more listens, but to me this record seemed like somewhat of a mostly melodyless bore, with uncaptivating lyrics and instrumental work (both the complete opposite of the following album) - Ian Anderson just ramblin' about things and Martin Barre seemed to "barre" himself from contributing too many interesting riffs or performances period here. "To Cry You A Song" is probably the only semi-great number here - at least in my damn opinion - "With You There To Help Me" and "Teacher" are OK too, but the rest just doesn't do it for me. I give it a 5, but you never know... that could possibly change.

John McFerrin <[email protected]> (05.11.99)

Ehgn ... weak. Oh, and the version I got has 'Michael Collins' ... but it has 'TEACHER'!! Why else would I buy this album? I heard this twice on the radio and it instantly became my favorite Tull song of all time. Heck, that twelve note riff may be my favorite riff in all of music!
Anyways ... a 5 normally, but I'll gladly give it a 7 for 'Teacher'

Iain Langer <[email protected]> (23.01.2000)

This is my second-favorite Tull album. Far from the mediocrity some would dismiss it as, I think it is contains some of their most subtle and intricate songs, and is relatively free of the pretention that was about to sink them on later releases. Every single track is restrained and assured, and every track has moments of beauty to transport the true Tull fan somewhere into the ether. (This is really the last time Ian Anderson was able to sound self-assured as a singer WITHOUT sounding sinister.) I do think this is a harder album to get into immediately than something like Aqualung or Stand Up where the songs are oh so much more accessible from the get-go, but after 3-6 listenings, its true rewards should make themselves known. I might also add, that this is the ONLY Tull album that my girlfriend will allow me to play repatedly without complaining. Anderson at his most charming: "With You There to Help Me"; Best Lyric: "Inside"; Best overall songs: "To Cry You a Song", "Nothing to Say", "Play in Time" (and not a note of pretention in any of them). Rating: 10!

Tikhonov Konstantin <[email protected]> (03.03.2000)

Benefit is incredible disappointment? Well, if you can played about 100-150 gigs in year around the world and can write and record a perfect albums like a apple pies - so go ahead! I can agree that Benefit is not such innovated musically like its predecessor, but how can be bad album which contains "With You There To Help Me" and "To Cry You A Song"? So who the asshole? I think its somebody who looks on you from the mirror.
I can understand it, somebody don't like serious lyrics, but I repeat, man, everybody's on their own. I'm fuckin' tired of stupid pop lyrics! I hate brainless songs! Christ! "She didn't come and I'll committing suicide in cement mixer... Be-Bop-Kaluga, she's my baby..." So don't tell me that "Sossity" is drag! What's not a drag? "Hotel California" ("We Used To Know" shameless rip-off, actually) or "Light My Fire"? (Man, I never even mentioned the lyrics of 'Sossity'. He must have got lost in the Gasoline Alley - G.S.)
OK, lets cool yourselves. Lets change the course to the American version of Benefit. D'you like Meet The Beatles? Or US edition of Revolver? Or December's Children? The US Benefit is poor little bastard in the long row of American butchered issues of British LPs (and there will be the completely raped version of Bursting Out). I'm not saying that "Teacher" is bad, but this song is absolutely out of key on the album. Well, Americans likes this song so much, they wants to place it on album, but in the name of Heaven, why not a bonus track? "Alive And Well And Living In" (pretty tune with good lyrics) didn't deserve such roughness.
And in the end: Benefit is good, not such remarkable as Stand Up, but hard and whimsical. In first time Ian said: men, if you want to listen my songs - listen with open minds. This album's fate can be compare to Revolver - for many fans he was overshadowed by next brilliant work. Best songs? "To Cry You A Song" (musically), "Sossity" (lyrically), "With You There To Help Me" (both). Rating? This Was gave 7, Stand Up gave 8... well, 7.

Tikhonov Konstantin <[email protected]> (18.03.2000)

So you don't like the melody of "Sossity"? Am I right? Poor George, I don't even know what to say. "Sossity" is gentle tune with nice acoustic guitar's chords and Ian's biting lyrics. I love it. No other comments required.

Philip Maddox <[email protected]> (07.07.2000)

Definitely a step down from Stand Up, but I like it better than This Was. It's very down beat and slow. Kind of dreary, too. There's not much energy here, but I think Ian was trying to create a mood, in which he succeeded. The opening 'With You There To Help Me' is great. I love the way it emphasizes the volume by getting louder and softer at appropriate times. 'Son' is a great rocker, too. And though you think that they're filler, I love 'For Michael Collins' and 'Sossity' to death. 'For Michael Collins' had to grow on me, but I love the chorus on that song and how it blends with the soft acoustic verses. And I've always loved 'Sossity'. It's a very sad, depressing song, and Ian pulls off the intended mood perfectly. Plus, the version of the CD I have has 'Teacher' on it, and that song totally rules! Doesn't fit with the rest of the CD at all, but it still rules. A couple songs aren't as good, though. 'Play In Time' is pretty dumb. 'A Time For Everything?' is better, but still fails to excite. And 'Nothing To Say' is ok, but it never really gets going. I'd give this an 8.
Oh, and here's what I know about the versions - The British album contained the track 'Alive And Well And Living In'. However, after 'Teacher' became a hit, it got grafted in on the American version. I don't really care, though - 'Teacher' is the best song on here and 'Alive' is still on Living In The Past.

Braxton LeCroy <[email protected]> (24.08.2000)

Tull's most underrated album...a gem. "With You There To Help me", "Sossity...", "To Cry You A Song", "A Time For Everything?", "Nothing To Say".....great stuff....a nine.

Ben Greenstein <[email protected]> (15.12.2000)

You're just about right on this one.... although I think that the opening track is one of the more draggy numbers. "Sossity" is pretty lame, too - I don't get how people can stand up for it. Still, there is some great material - "Play In Time" is wierd and cool, "Teacher" is a classic that is on my CD version, "Nothing To Say" has a decent hook, and "To Cry You A Song" just might be the best thing this band ever recorded. I give this a low 7/10.

Year Of Release: 1993
Record rating = 8
Overall rating = 11

While some of the performances here are kinda sloppy, Ian more than makes up for it.
Best song: TO CRY YOU A SONG

This isn't really an independent officially released record, but lemme explain. It was originally constituting Disc 2 of the 25th Anniversary Boxset, released, well, on their 25th anniversary and including quite a few previously unheard live cuts. Arguably, Carnegie Hall is the most interesting part of the boxset as it's the only solid block of performed numbers that dates back to such an early period - since then, we've had Bursting Out and Little Light Music and quite a bit of other stuff, but you know how it goes: the earlier it gets, the more interesting it becomes. So, right now, the album has been released in Russia separately from the other discs, and a good move it was, as I would never shell out my hard-earned pay for a 4CD boxset (and one of these CDs consists entirely of well-known material available on regular studio releases, too). Therefore, it's pretty much impossible to find this anywhere else in the world, and I guess I should just stop my review here and say good-bye to you all.
On the other hand, if you happen to have some spare gold bullion which you're not intent on investing into a packet of Microsoft shares, you might as well grab this little boxset, too, and I'll do my best to seduce you. Because this concert recording is really very nice. You might remember something about it, too, if you own Living In The Past, one side of which consists entirely of two numbers culled from the show; see the Living In The Past review below to find out why both of them suck. Quite unlike the rest of the concert, which is presented to you here in its (near) entirety.
There are no obscure or unknown songs on here: the band trustily plays its cards by drawing on material from Stand Up and Benefit; the two major exceptions are 'A Song For Jeffrey', the only short-time stage favourite from the debut album, and a 'pre-release' version of 'My God' which would surface on Aqualung in just a few months after the show. And I wouldn't want to lie and say that everything works. One thing that's great is the sound quality: you can hear basically everything, or concentrate on any particular instrument you'd wish to, or just groove along to Ian's heavy panting. But sound quality isn't everything; I have a feeling that Martin Barre was in some kind of depression that night. Not that his playing is bad, but every time they start a heavily guitar-based song, he manages to mess it up somehow and make the song incomparable to the studio version. 'Nothing Is Easy', 'My God' and 'We Used To Know' are three songs that require maximum precision, clearness and energy when you play the guitar on them; Martin fails to deliver the goods. The sound seems much too sloppy for my ears, and Barre is no Pete Townshend to allow himself to play sloppily: when he misses a note or gets the wrong tone for his instrument, the effect is murky and cacophonous. Now don't you worry, all three tunes are still very much enjoyable, but it pains me to see the powerful ending of 'Nothing Is Easy' reduced to a distorted, ear-hurting mess simply due to the fact that Martin wouldn't want (or wasn't able?) to play as precisely and fluently as in the studio on that particular night. I also miss the cathartic wah-wah effects on the unexpectedly shortened version of 'We Used To Know'; and after that Barre goes into a seven-minute solo that has its moments (watch out for that great vibrato in the middle), but for the most part is deadly dull. I mean, it's not enough to play these vicious notes, you also have to structure them somehow. And Martin truly didn't care much about structuring them that evening.
Now the biggest surprise for me is that somewhere in the middle of the show Ian turns to his trusty guitarist and says something like: 'Martin, it's your night tonight, Martin'. Because by all means, that night belonged completely to Mr Anderson - the worse his sidekick got, the better Ian looked himself. His vocals are as great as ever - powerful, sneering and gentle at turns - but it's not the vocals, rather the awesome flute playing, that really strikes you on here. The record is an absolute must for all those who respect Ian's handling of the instrument. This is particularly evident on the schizophrenic flute solos in 'My God': the song probably wasn't yet ripe enough to include the funny Russian chorus section, so instead of this you get three or four minutes of Mr Loony Fawn doing his flute racket thing, and man, that's really mind-blowing. He alternates regular 'classical' passages with something which could only be described 'fits of madness', growling, grumbling, roaring, bellowing and even... sneezing along with the flute sounds he makes. Woo-hoo. Don't play this too loud, or you'll end up in an asylum.
Also, the rest of the band holds up together exceedingly well. Clive Bunker amply demonstrates why he was the best drummer Jethro Tull ever had (actually, Barrie Barlow has a more impressive technique, but Clive is tons more energetic), Glenn Cornick contributes his usual jazzy bass lines, and John Evan, by that time already a formal member of the band, adorns even the older numbers with clever organ and piano parts. And, contrary to what you'd expect, they don't extend the numbers for too long: I couldn't complain about the length of anything on here, except for that fishy Barre solo.
Finally, one last praise is that this album somewhat reinstates my faith in Benefit: even 'Sossity You're A Woman' sounds improved on here, with Ian taking on a far more energetic approach, and the short, unadorned version of 'With You There To Help Me' liberates you from the necessity of enduring the final jam of the studio take. And Barre regains enough of his senses to at least play the great riff of 'To Cry You A Song' flawlessly - so far, it's my favourite performance on here.
All in all, the night was not perfect enough to make this album the best live record of Tull; Bursting Out still gets a higher rating. But keep in mind that these are the only live versions of 'My God' and 'Nothing Is Easy' you'll ever be a-findin', and maybe you'll give it a chance.

My God! Where are your ideas?

Your worthy comments:

Tikhonov Konstantin <[email protected]> (03.03.2000)

Oh yeah, Carnegie Hall! Those were the days!
First of all, its a rough, VERY ROUGH concert. Early 70's Tull was full of hot-boiling power, Martin's guitar is roaring like cannons thunder while Ian's screaming flute blows your mind if you sets headphones' volume level too high. If you didn't listen Bursting Out or any bootlegs from 70's, be ready - Tull plays incredible aloud, louder than Cream and Zeppelin! Does somebody say that Martin's guitar technique is Claptonesque (or Townshend-like)? Hey, Martin wipes 'em even if Nail Nose and Slowhand plays together! Only my all-time guitar hero (Ritchie-In-Black) stands above him...
The one thing can't makes me totally happy - the concert doesn't include two songs that appeared on Living In The Past. Well, I'm a proud owner of MFSL 2 gold CD release, but I don't reject a full-length Carnegie version. John's ("By Kind") and Clive's ("Dharma") solos are ones of their bests.
Before conclusions I must say that all on 25th Anniversary Box Set is great - the powerful (and graceful) first part contains a remixed "best-of" material (listen carefully and you'll find the hints), "Cross-Eyed Mary", "Minstrel", "Black Sunday", "Broadsword" sounds harder than on original LPs! I've give this disc to my friends as the best existed introduction to Tull's music. The elegant third part (25th Anniversary world tour's rehearsals) is iron hand in velvet glove, a lost sister of "Little Light Music" ("New Day Yesterday" and "My God" are stunning). Jesus, why did they film only a little piece in 25th Anniversary Video? It would be a greatest Tull's video! The last part's full of live gems - like Martin's guitar jam in "Wind Up" or half-acoustic version of "Beggar's Farm". Man, why d'you say that Carnegie Hall is the best part of box set? They're all the best!
Of course, in Russia you can buy a lot of fucked editions of Tull's albums about a buck for each, but did you try to compare 'em with originals? (FYI: a 'fucked' edition sounds exactly the same as the original it's copied of. That's the essence of digital audio: a zero is always a zero, a one is always a one. Gold CDs can be different because there are different remasters, though - G.S.) And I don't mention gold or Japanese CD. Yes, its costs MUCH more, but a sound... Don't be greed, spend a sixty bucks and buy box set before it will be share the fate of 20 Years 3CD-release. I almost forget the excellent booklet!
So coming back to Carnegie Hall. Wonderful performance and sound (Ian's personal remix). Best parts of the concert are acoustic medley ("Sossity" guitar chords is beautiful) and final "We Used To Know" / Martin's weeping guitar solo / "For A Thousand Mothers". Rating - 7 (for this concert and 8 for whole box set).

Tikhonov Konstantin <[email protected]> (18.03.2000)

Theoretically, yes. Practically... it's a roulette. Technological process, George, technological process of original and pirate CDs is not the same. Bootleggers makes it faster (time is money), so some CDs sounds almost completely the same, some is not. For example, Led Zeppelin's pirate CDs sounds terrible. And pirates often shortens songs to put more tracks on single CD. Rainbow's "Gates Of Babylon" lasts 6:49 on the original CD, but some Russian fool cut off the violin in the end of the song, so the pirate version's timing is 6:24. "Rainbow Eyes" lost a few bits and was shortened from 7:12 to 6:51. I didn't hear Tull's pirate CDs 'cause I don't want to touch their disgusting inlays (printed on the used toilet paper), so I cannot affirm that they are not the same, but even if they are the same, buying it is disrespect to musicians and their work in my humble opinion. I'm not a rich man even for low Russian standards but I have my proud. Have you, George? (You don't have a 'proud', Konstantin: you have fanatism, and that's a little different. I'm not a Tull fanatic - I have other bands to pay tribute as well. The Monkees, for instance - G. S.).

Philip Maddox <[email protected]> (07.07.2000)

I'll second that 8. This CD really rocks. It's not as good as Bursting Out, but it's definitely better than A Little Light Music. I love the original version of 'My God' included here, complete with original lyrics! The record company made Ian change 'em, but here they are, unedited. The guitar riff is amazing, and a flute solo from Ian is always something special - he really goes nuts on the thing! He's the only player who didn't merely embellish rock music with a flute - he MADE rock music with a flute. Amazingly impressive. The live version of 'A Song For Jeffrey' rules, too. I love that harmonica solo in there. The 'Sossity'/'Reasons' medley here is stunning, too. I heard 'Sossity' here first, so that may be why I love the song so much. Martin's playing is a little sloppy throughout - 'Nothing Is Easy' isn't as good as it CAN be, and the length guitar solo doesn't really go anywhere. But still, I love the way the guitar solo turns into 'For A Thousand Mothers', which I love more than words can express. It's worth picking up (though the box set is probably best for diehards - the stuff is all pretty good, but it's too much for a casual fan to sit through. Plus, disc 1 is just slightly changed remixes).

Year Of Release: 1971
Record rating = 9
Overall rating = 12

A must for every prog lover. But I bet you all know it already.
Best song: LOCOMOTIVE BREATH

American audiences needn't be introduced to this album - as far as I know, lots of its songs are constantly recycled on the radio, and overall, if Jethro Tull are to be associated with anything by anybody, it's probably the menacing heavy riff which opens the title track. The biggest ever commercial whopper for Tull, it is that good indeed - even though the same American audiences were slow on the move to really appreciate Stand Up. Anyway, for aspeaking out loud, it's tons better than Benefit, and a true all-time classic. I may easily say that there's not a single bad song on the album - for the very last time in the entire Tull career (barring the one song albums, of course, one of which is all good and the other... ahem... well, read on, oh gentle listener).
Maybe it has something to do with a radical change in line-up - this is where both John Evan and Jeffrey Hammond-Hammond stand up to the blackboard (well, Evan did play some keybs on Benefit, but that doesn't count - he wasn't even a legitimate band member). Maybe Anderson was desperately looking for FM radio hits. Maybe he just had a good day. I don't know. What I know is that this is the last Tull record which is listenable at first listen and memorable at first memory (forgive me my silly analogies). Actually, it is something of a bridge between the lovely early blues-psycho days and the later murky overblown pompous fantasy days. This is the first of Anderson's multiple concept albums, but the concept is still rather just a basis for the songs than vice versa. The plot is as follows: Man created God and God created Aqualungs. Or was it the opposite? Oh, never mind. It's all written in a parody on John's Gospel placed on the album cover. In other words, it's a stupid, self-indulgent concept that bashes organized religion and sometimes borders on bashing the very essence of religion - especially on tracks like 'My God', although Anderson always takes care so as not to cross the thin borderline completely. That's not to say that the lyrics are bad: the underlying ideas and principles are very simple, but this is Anderson at his most poetic and involving, and his imagery has never been stronger, considering that on here he's still able to uphold the balance between form and content - since Thick As A Brick and particularly later on, his lyrics would go off the deep end completely.
Let us not forget the immaculate melodies, though. The radio classics include the multi-part title track, highlighted by the above-mentioned cool riff, very expressive singing that ranges from a special Anderson-style 'vomit-inducing sneer' to passionate and heartfelt, and a mad, ecstatic, rise-to-a-shattering-climax guitar solo courtesy of Martin Barre; 'Cross-Eyed Mary' with its gorgeous crescendo in the flute-dominated introduction and Anderson's bitter condemnation of the middle class society; and especially my favourite - the bad luck anthem 'Locomotive Breath'. Have you ever heard a riff imitating the slow progress of a train? Then you haven't heard 'Locomotive Breath', a song perfect from the first notes of the John Evan Bach-imitating piano introduction to the majestic fade out with Ian singing that 'there's no way to slow down'. If it ain't my favourite song by Jethro Tull, that's just because it isn't on my turntable at the present moment. Yes, I admit it's rather naive for a person who's gone through the entire Tull catalog to announce that his favourite song by the band is the one radio standard that's most popular among the beer-drinkin' crowds, but what can I do if the song's pure and clear genius? Forgive me, lovers of Tull. At least I don't abuse beer.
But even if you don't hear the other tracks on the radio every five minutes, that doesn't mean they aren't worth of radioplay. 'Hymn 43' may not be great, but, once again, the riff is an absolute classic (and this is where you'll find the famous line about how 'if Jesus saves, he'd better save himself...', so much hated by orthodoxal church abiders who intentionally neglect that the second half of the phrase goes '...from the gory glory seekers who use his name in death'). Barre and Jeffrey Hammond-Hammond chug along on the track like mad, transforming it into a true hard rock masterpiece. The plaintive, desperate 'Up To Me' is based on a cool repetitive flute line, 'Mother Goose' is just a funny tune (having nothing to do with the notorious rhymes), and the lengthiest track on here - the conceptual climax of 'My God' - also manages to keep the listener's attention, going off from rifffests onto bits of Bach onto bits of Russian folk music (not that Anderson knew very well how to handle Russian folk music, but at least he made an entertaining try). Plus there are several short acoustic links which all the Tull-haters try to accentuate by saying all kinds of things about how they suck and so on, but I personally don't see any trouble with them: Anderson is a decent classical guitar player, and anyway all the three are shorter than two minutes. No need to worry, Tull-haters!
'Wind-Up' is the only song I could live without on here, but maybe it's just because it's placed at the end. I've always thought that the best songs on any album should be placed in the beginning (so as not to let down the listener from the very start) and in the end (so as not to leave the feeling of being bored and deceived). As you see, Ian rarely fulfills the second part of the statement. But it's not bad either way.
It's still a little bit weaker than Stand Up, in my opinion, which is why the rating is a wee bit lower; the acoustic links and 'Wind-Up' and some instrumental bits on 'My God' and... well, little nasty tidbits now and there, couldn't really grab 'em by the scruff o' the neck cause they're so tiny. But "near-immaculate classic" would be a suitable definition, too, and an album where many of the more reserved Tull lovers set a fat point. However, with all due respect, we'll try and go dig a little deeper to see that Anderson's talents were not yet exhausted. By no means no.

Up to me to post up your ideas

Your worthy comments:

Mike DeFabio <[email protected]> (24.08.99)

A little too pretentious, but as you say, the songs are good. I don't really care what Ian Anderson thinks about organized religion. What I care about is the fact that these songs are phat! Get it!
Eight!

Marco Ursi <[email protected]> (31.08.99)

I've spent the last few months easing my way into prog-rock. As of right now, this is my favourite prog album, probably cause it rocks. When I first put it on, I was astounded by the amazing title track. What a riff! After about a week of non-stop listening to the first song, I decided to let the rest of the CD play through. And I was very pleased. Ian Anderson can certainly play that flute! The thing I like about this album and Tull in general better than Yes and ELP and the other prog-rockers is that the music is pretty easy to get into (although I haven't heard anything later than Thick as a Brick). An easy 9 for Aqualung, probably a 10 for "best-of" artist, in my books.

Michael Bruun Petersen <[email protected]> (01.10.99)

This album really does live up to the hype. Lots of great songs and no bad ones. Highlights include the guitar solo in 'Aqualung' (one minute of pure brilliance), the intro to 'Locomotive Breath' and the three short acoustic numbers. There are a few minor flaws though. 'Mother Goose' and 'Up to Me' which both seem a bit out-of-place and silly.
And if you don't share Ian's views on organised religion you might find the lyrics of the second half annoying. But I do so I don't.
Best song: 'Locomotive Breath'
Rating: 10. There are a number of both earlier and later songs that are better than anything on this one. But they haven't (yet) made a better album so this should get the highest rating. (but it has to share the honour with one later album, though)

Nick Karn <[email protected]> (19.10.99)

Definitely agree with the 9. The concept is just a little bit unfocused but incredibly profound and shocking for 1971. A real mind-altering experience here, and one of those albums the kids "shouldn't have been listening to" around that time, along with Led Zeppelin, Queen, Black Sabbath and David Cassidy records. The title track I just can't say enough about - an absolute masterpiece of an opening song, a multi-part progressive ride with that thundering riff and opening, 'sitting on a park bench' lines, the acoustic parts and slower section. It's got it all! The rest of the album never quite matches it, but there's still some convincing great riffing - "Hymn 43" and "Locomotive Breath", and also the expert Ian Anderson flute playing of "Cross Eyed Mary" and the groovy and relaxing "Up To Me". An excellent all around effort.

Valentin Katz <[email protected]> (09.12.99)

From beginning to end this albums is the ultimate experiment of commingling hard rock music with progressive musical ideology and the result is absolute brilliance. From the opening 'Aqualung' riff, the to the extended cd with 'Bouree' (Ian's take on a Bach classic). When finished, you take a deep breath and proclaim, "Damn!, that was good". And after that you're just speechless. 'My God' is the best song on here followed closely by 'Aqualung'. You and all your reviewers are complaining that you don't care what Ian thinks of God and organized religion, well fuck you!, no one cares what you think either! Album deserves a higher overall rating. Classics like this one always do

Iain Langer <[email protected]> (22.01.2000)

Of course this is Tull's masterpiece. Although the previous album Benefit is underappreciated in my opinion, there is no denying that Aqualung was a monumental leap forward. Only "To Cry You a Song" on Benefit supplies any clue to this direction for the band. The songs on Aqualung are unfailingly gorgeous and unfailingly gripping. The melodicism of Benefit is still apparent, but has grown some balls. This album can be soaringly beautiful and deeply profound all the the same moment. Standout songs are "Locomotive Breath"(brutal yet beautiful) "Aqualung" (what can I say) "Wind Up" (deeply autobiographical yet majestic and somehow a universal statement about rebellion against dogma) and the lovely acoustic "Wond'ring Aloud". At one time in my life, this was my favorite album to listen to stoned, and amazingly enough it's still a pretty damn good choice.
I should add (if it isnt obvious from my comments) that Aqualung merits a 10!

Tikhonov Konstantin <[email protected]> (03.03.2000)

When we says Tull we means Aqualung, when we says Aqualung we means Tull (Russian folk joke).
We came to second Jethro Ian's masterpiece, definitely best-known Tull's album. I'm tired of your screwing reviews, so lets skip it. There's so much said and wrote about Aqualung, and I'll try to say something different (its hard, but I'll try anyway). The title song have a superb solo, Martin plays with extraordinary enthusiasm and did you know that Jimmy Page was in studio when Martin played the final cut? By the way, I also heard that "Stairway To Heaven" acoustic guitar intro was Ian's outtake from "Aqualung" rehearsals (in reality that acoustic line was stolen from 'Taurus' by Spirit, released in 1968 - G. S.). If anybody will see Page somehow - ask him please! In one article (I don't remember the title) "Aqualung" was named the most danceable progressive song in rock history. Well, maybe, but can you imagine that somebody will dance and sing "you poor old sod" or "flowers blooms like madness in the spring"? Next song is Ian's fantastic flute work followed by pretty acoustic "Cheap Day" and bitter "Mother Goose". "Wond'ring Aloud" is pretty too, but long pre-version "Wond'ring Again" is even better (and its lyrics is awesome). "Up To Me" is drunken workers hymn (in my personal opinion). Middle part of "My God" (wise song) often named as improvisation onto Russian folk music, but if you trust me (I'm a Russian, so you can), I says that I can't hear nothing Russian in it. "Hymn 43" has very angry lyrics too and "Slipstream" is last acoustic gem on the album. "Locomotive Breath" is another all-time Tull's hit (no one concert will be complete without it) and I suspects that John Evan's piano intro was inspired by Sergei Rachmaninov. "Wind Up" is just fantastic, if you'll listen it carefully (music and lyrics both) you'll want to listen the whole album from beginning to the end. The only thing I'm wishing to death - "Lick Your Fingers Clean" could be the incredible coda. Oh Ian, why did you omit this classic from the LP? I have gold CD and I have remastered version only 'cause it contains "Fingers"!
A few notes about CD releases of Aqualung. The sound quality of the album is somewhat disappointment... if we began to discuss the sound quality, I must say that the best-recorded early Tull's album is Stand Up (quality rating 4 of 5), then came Benefit (3,5) and This Was is in the bottom (2,5 - too much background tape's noise plus a goddamn 60's standard to record music in one channel and voice in other so listening this album in headphones is real torture for me). In this scale Aqualung will give maximum 3 'cause it sounds very dry (if you understand what I mean). Tull's first three CDs was released in one box for EMI Centenary with improved sound quality in original sleeves, so if you'll find it - take it without thinking... Back to Aqualung: I've listened 5 different versions of CD releases and the worst was the first American issue (awful remix), next came the British release, the 1996 remastered edition (sounds much better) and two best releases is Japan issue and DCC gold CD version (both out-of-print now, but try to find 'em - you will not disappoint).
And finally... if you're Tull's fan - you have this album in your collection. My personal favourites are two first and two last masterpieces. Rating - 9 (its definitely had 10 if Ian added "Lick Your Fingers Clean"... but he didn't).

Tikhonov Konstantin <[email protected]> (18.03.2000)

I heard Spirit a long, long time ago, so I can't confirm it. I simply don't remember.

Ben Greenstein <[email protected]> (02.06.2000)

Just a wee bit overrated, not as much as Brick, though - in retrospect, I would give that one a really low seven. This one gets a very high eight - lower than expected because a lot of the songs aren't incredibly fantastic ("Wind Up" and pretty much all of the ballads). However, for every slightly lame number there's a song like "Aqualung," "Hymn 43," "Locomotive Breath," and "Cross-Eyed Mary," which are all well written and justifiably radio classics. As for the contreversy (which may not really exist) on "Mother Goose," I don't think it's at all out of place. Just because it's different from the other songs doesn't mean it breaks the overall mood or flow of the album - on the contrary, it makes for a lot more diversity. I dig it - but keep in mind that I also think that A Passion Play is one of the greatest albums ever.

Rich Bunnell <[email protected]> (06.06.2000)

The first time I heard this album, I was blown away, then the second time....eh.....then the third and subsequent times I've really enjoyed it. I really don't care about the lyrics, as usual, but most of these songs are really good. "Locomotive Breath" is the best (great driving rhythm on that one), and nearly as good are "Hymn 43," "Wind Up," and "Cross-Eyed Mary." I like the title track too, but stupid compilation album commercials have made it so that I recognize nothing from the song but the opening riff and then can never remember how the rest of the song goes. It's a shame, because it's a really good song. The only things I don't like on the album are the little acoustic breaks, and though "My God" is a cool tune, I think it's a bit too impenetrable for me to enjoy completely. I'd give the album a high eight.

Philip Maddox <[email protected]> (07.07.2000)

There's nothing new to say about this - tons of radio standards and an extremely famous concept. The songs are really great throughout - 'Aqualung', 'Cross Eyed Mary', 'Hymn 43', and 'Locomotive Breath' are among the most overplayed songs in history, but they're all great. I especially love the bass in 'Cross Eyed Mary' during the 3rd verse - now THAT'S a bass line! My favorite cut on here has to be 'My God', though. The way the gentle acoustic riff turns heavy, then jazzy, then disappears during a weird chant session, then comes back. It's one of the finest songs in the Jethro Tull catalogue, and if you ask me, ever recorded. The short acoustic links are very pretty, and the folky 'Mother Goose' is catchy and funny. This album's actually pretty diverse - most of the radio standards are hard rockers, so people assume this is a hard rock record, which it really ain't. I'd give this a high, high 9. And if you buy this, under NO circumstances buy the original CD release - it chops off the last verse of 'Wind Up' and the opening guitar bit of 'Aqualung'. It's hard to find, as it was soon fixed, but it still crops up in used bins now and then. Oh, and the new version has bonus tracks, 4 of which are repeats from the 20 Years Of Tull box set, 1 is an alternate version of 'Wind Up' that sounds exactly the same, and 1 is a length interview with Ian. It seems like they just wanted to cram bonus tracks on, but didn't want to make it extensive like in the Who catalogue. Oh well.

John McFerrin <[email protected]> (21.07.2000)

I'm still not totally sure why you're somewhat down on 'Wind Up'. Is it just the fact that it's at album's end? Or is it because it follows 'Locomotive Breath' and thus seems somewhat anti-climactic?
Well, anti-climactic or not, I still like this song a ton. I _love_ that riff in the middle section of the song, and even if the song starts off somewhat slowly, it's still a fairly solid melody. Interesting lyrics too (I find it strange that I am extremely religious and yet rarely cringe in the slightest when listening to this song, or this album as a whole).
Anyways - a 13. But whatever.

Bob Josef <[email protected]> (16.09.2000)

No one had ever written a set of songs challenging organized religion and chronicling the plight of homeless derelicts before, which is a major reason the album got so much attention in the USA, even though the previous two (I'm not that familiar with This Was) were just as solid, if not as hard rocking. It's hard for American fans to separate the album from they hype, if you were there at the time. It does have an almost perfect balance between acoustic and electric numbers, rare for any album, although nowadays the acoustic numbers don't get nearly as much attention.
Ian sounds awfully angry and world weary for a lad of 24 or so. It's amusing to contrast this with his 1995 solo album Divinities, which consists of 12 instrumental pieces devoted to the concept of comparative religions! Maybe age does temper cynicism...

Year Of Release: 1972
Record rating = 10
Overall rating = 13

Simply put, this is the album that epithomizes all the best sides of prog-rock.
Best song: three guesses?

1972 was, without a doubt, The year of prog-rock: the year when prog had finally conquered its rightful niche and ruled supreme in the minds of the critics and among the musical preferences of the rock-oriented public. Having consolidated its positions, having provided most of the groundbreaking ideas in the previous two or three years, but never wishing to reside in peace upon their laurels, mature proggers went on forward to conquer new heights - to blow their resplendent bubbles further and further, pumping out mastodontic epics and endless suites with no seeming end to the process. The world was not yet beginning to see prog-rock as its worst enemy, and it's no surprise that many people still regard many of 1972's anthemic prog albums as all-time masterpieces. Just see here: Yes's Fragile and Close To The Edge, Genesis's Foxtrot, ELP's Trilogy, Gentle Giant's Octopus, King Crimson's Islands all came out in 1972 (well, Islands appeared in Dec. 1971, but I think I can still judge it as a 1972 album)! And all of these albums are something and anything (despite my preference of, say, Fragile and Foxtrot over most others).
But, more than anything, it was this incredible album that said it all about prog-rock. Blowing away all competition, Ian had occupied the entire album with only one song on this album (well, 'Thick As A Brick', naturally) - quite an innovative move at the time, since, while sidelong compositions were slowly becoming the norm of day, nobody had yet dreamed of dividing one single tune over two sides of one record. And it is divided: you might not have noticed it, but the second side of the record begins with the fading in of the winter winds and the thump-thump-thump melody that end the first side, so the continuity is never really broken. Not to mention, of course, the bits of melodies and themes that keep being resurrected; this also adds to the impression of the record all being one lengthy suite as opposed to a bunch of unconnected songs.
So what is Thick As A Brick all about, actually? Essentially, it is a masterful epic poem (and a hoot: Ian credited the lyrics to a certain Gerald Bostock, a fictitious 8-year old kid who won a prize for it but was disqualified after numerous protests from the audiences. I wonder who got the royalties?) that is destined to serve as some kind of 'Bible According To Ian Anderson'; only if Aqualung was its clumsy Old Testament, Thick As A Brick is definitely the New One (followed by the Apocalypse of Passion Play, by the way), with a far more complex concept and more fully thought-out lyrics. It was even provided with a really bombastic album cover, disguised as the "St Cleve Chronicle" newspaper with about twenty pages of partly fictititious, partly real news material, that among other things told in details the story of the poor Gerald Bostock. As for the actual lyrics, they mostly continue Ian's society-bashing line, only this time around they are more subtle and far less straightforward, mixed with vague medieval imagery and a potload of romantic and psychedelic visions that are hard to decipher, but still, ten times less hard than whatever followed on A Passion Play. Most of these lyrics are really cute - passages like 'See there! A son is born and we pronounce him fit to fight/There are black heads on his shoulders, and he pees himself in the night/We'll make a man of him, put him to a trade/Teach him to play Monopoly and how to sing in the rain' are obviously inspired.
But then again, I don't really give a damn about the concept - it suffices for me to know that it does have some actual meaning. I just enjoy the music. Again, that's what prog rock was all about, wasn't it? Meaningless lyrics and bombastic melodies.
Speaking of the music, this album could have easily worked at a short-song level, as well: it's easy to pluck out a lot of separate sections and listen to each one separately (although, unfortunately, the CD does not index them as different). While all the sections are linked to each other with short, sparing instrumental passages, they are quite different by themselves and never become boring. It's like a true encyclopaedia of various musical genres: these beautiful, ultra-catchy melodies range from quiet acoustic folkish shuffles (the sly, charming introduction section) to painfully complex but gorgeous ballads ('do you believe in the day?'), organ-driven fast'n'furious rockers ('see there! a son is born...'), Elizabethan 'pedestrian' war marches ('I've come down from the upper class...'), nice guitar/keyboard shuffles ('so where the hell was Biggles?'), nursery rhymes ('you curl your toes in fun...'), Zappa-type noises (beginning of Side 2), and many more passages that avoid direct definition. Zillions of instruments, clever use of sound effects (the Benefit legacy is fading away), crystal clear production - wow!
Yes, I admit it might be hard to get into, you simplicity-loving music addicts, but I got into it at about the third listen, and I still can't dig that Lizard thing by King Crimson! Can you? Just goes to show that some "prog" is "proggier" than other... Even the instrumental breaks and links are often breathtaking: listen, for instance, to Martin Barre's insane solo in between the two verses of 'the poet and the painter...' - the triumph of minimalistic technique over soulless class at its most evident. No wonder the public was so eager to send this sucker to No. 1: never again did any band achieve such a perfect, never breaking balance between the complex/serious/intellectual and the catchy/accessible/radio-friendly. Thick As A Brick is one of those rare records that can function equally well as great party music and a deeply personal, intimate experience. It's hardly danceable, of course (although you can certainly march a lot to it), but that's about the only general flaw, and not a deeply lamented one.
Anyway, where was I? As you can see, I hold the opinion that this record presents us with a hodgepodge of wonderful musical ideas which the Tullers couldn't keep up any further than that. Indeed, this is the last record to feature some uncompromisedly great Tull music throughout all of its duration, and in that respect it is totally idiosyncratic, whatever that may mean in the case. If not for a couple more reprises than necessary and the ugly avantgarde noise section on the beginning of Side Two that nearly ruins all the previously amassed "cathartic energy", this would be one of the easiest tens I've ever given out - as it is, a very, very solid nine, and one of the Top Five albums of 1972, together with such masterpieces as Ziggy Stardust, Exile On Main St., Foxtrot, and... and... whatever. [Fill in your preference.]
P.S. What the hell? Deflating this record one point for three minutes of stupid Zappa noises? A ten and a deserved one. I still do prefer Stand Up as my favourite Tull listen, but that's more due to its immaculate consistency.

Thick as a brick, are ye? All the same, mail your ideas

Your worthy comments:

Mike DeFabio <[email protected]> (24.08.99)

I can't stand Lizard either.
This is a great album. My personal favorite Jethro Tull album. It wouldn't have worked at short song level, though. I'm glad they just made one big song. You seem to have said everything worth saying about it so I'll be brief.
TEN!

John McFerrin <[email protected]> (31.08.99)

Ah, yes. I love this album, I really do. It's bombastic, sure, but it is SO catchy. Everything flows in and out of itself phenomenally well, whether it be Ian's psycho flute playing or that wierd organ tone or Barre's guitar, it's just perfect. Of course, that's part of the reason the next bunch of albums are so shaky; this was an extremely dangerous project for him, as he was straddling the line between catchy, memorable songs (which he did well) and overly bombastic, venomous, and unmemorable attempts at prog (which he didn't do so well). With this album, Ian inflated his songwriting and arranging balloon as far as it could possibly go, and alas (predictably, too) it exploded (Passion Play etc.)
Oh well, so much for being profound. For now, I give this a whopping 10, but as soon as the reissue of Stand Up comes out in a couple of weeks, I'm gonna get that and see how it is.

Michael Bruun Petersen <[email protected]> (01.10.99)

This review reflects my own views very accurately indeed. If it wasn't for the annoying noises that ruin the first five minutes of the second half I would give it a ten.
The 25-th anniversary edition contains a full version of the newspaper that came with the original LP. And the sound quality is better as well.
Best part: "Do you believe in the day? Do you? Believe in the day!"
Rating: 9

Tikhonov Konstantin <[email protected]> (03.03.2000)

Hurrah!!! He did it!!! Now we have the third Jethro Ian's masterpiece and it's ABSOLUTELY CLASSIC, THE BEST ROCK ALBUM I'VE HEARD IN ALL MY LIFE!!!
Oh Lord, thank you for my friend Mike who gave me Walkman and the tape with Aqualung and Thick As A Brick and thanks Mike for rewinding the tape to B-side! Man, it was ten years ago and I still get chills when I'm listening the Martin's blitzing passages and Ian's breathtaking flute! It was completely stunning ("forty minutes of full musical orgasm", as I said a few hours later) and if somebody pushed me with cries "Man, the end of the world is coming!", what d'you think I've answered? I don't fuckin' care! I didn't fuckin' care then and I don't fuckin' care today!
Pass the emotions and speaks about the album itself. Its awesome right from the cover. D'you read the whole newspaper (1997 remastered edition includes full version - thank God again)? What a wonderful mystification... and its still go on (Gerald Bostock's authors credits appeared on all latest releases). Can you compare this sleeve with any other sleeve of any rock album? I can't. And all other things are brilliant - from sound (hats off to Robin Black) to technique (they did the whole album in three takes!), Ian's music and lyrics are genius, the arrangement is... hell, I don't know such colourful words to describe all my feelings! Anything I love in rock music is here!
A couple of remarks about editions. The original CD version sounded good, remastered version is nice (and also contains the unforgettable live version from Madison Square Garden), but the gold release's sound is astonishing! There are a few Tull's CD released on DCC and MFSL and Thick As A Brick and Stand Up are the hardest to find. It will cost you a hell lot of money (around 50-100 greens in Russia, I don't know the price in the rest of the world) but I have gold Thick and I don't regret, not a single cent! By the way, all other gold releases are out-of-print too but still available in standard price. Run and buy it!
Hey, my supper's ready, so I need to finish! As I said its absolutely classic, my all-time favourite Tull's album, and only three other albums can stand closer (but anyway behind!). (If you're interesting, its Rick's King Arthur, Ritchie's Live In Germany and Roger's Pros And Cons.) From 1972 this album stands above all rock music like Everest above the hills, and after two thousands of listened CDs (2120 to this day, I count 'em carefully) I still can't find the better example of progressive rock (or art rock, or classic rock) - name it as you wish but it's still the best! My favourite part is... maybe last ten minutes - Ian's saga shines on and musicians are full of incredible enthusiasm. Rating? You think its 10? No!!! 100!!! That's good enough...

Ben Greenstein <[email protected]> (06.03.2000)

You know, I hate to sound like I'm trying to be the "sole voice of dissent" or anything, but I am NOT blown away by this album. The same guitar/organ interplay gets really tedious, really fast, and most of the melodies strike me as second rate. Sure, side one begins and ends with some of the most beautuiful music I've ever heard, but that "see there a son is born" section ends too quickly (it's like one verse long) and the instrumental passages are just unmelodic noodling. I far prefer the follow-up - it's got lots of memorable, catchy sections (despite what everyone says) and the instrumentation is far more diverse and interesting. Still, Brick isn't bad, just overrated. A perfectly average eight.

Richard C. Dickison <[email protected]> (29.03.2000)

I just have to say again, how can anything as long and drawn out as one of Tikhonov Konstantin's reviews be considered a good thing?
This one left me cold,Thick As A Brick I mean, the reviews just annoy me, but there are two parts I like in there so I can't throw it out.
I just edit it for my own listening pleasure, sort of like the scroll bar when I see Tikhonov's berating George for not telling us how many moles Ian had on his left butt cheek. Who cares, you obsessive f*** (oops sorry George)!

Rich Bunnell <[email protected]> (14.06.2000)

The reason that this album is so good isn't because of Ian Anderson's "epic vision" or some crap like that. It's because Ian took the Tull sound and condensed it into its most enjoyable, melodic form and stretched it out over the course of an entire album. Most of the best parts are on the first half, mainly because the second half is weighed down by some rambling sections. I can't understand why some people find this "overlong" or "hard to listen to"-- it's just like any other Tull album, only the songs aren't separated by track numbers and everything's more well-written than usual. The best section of the song, of course, is the opening six minutes, but it's all pretty good. Overall, I'd give it a 9.

Philip Maddox <[email protected]> (07.07.2000)

As much as I hate to agree with Konstantin, this is my favorite album of all time, which means that I give it a 10, of course. I bought this record on the way to a Rod Stewart concert of all places (which, by the way, sucked). I got it home, put it in my CD player, and my (musical) life has never been the same. This record was an epiphany, an awakening that "Hey, there's more to music than Green Day!". And I got into prog and art rock and psychedelic rock and all kinds of stuff. And it was all thanks to this record.
I didn't really know what to expect, as all I had heard was the first 3 minutes and didn't know how a band could fill up 45 minutes of space on one song. But they sure showed me! This album is absolutely packed with rich musical and lyrical ideas. From beautiful acoustic pieces to hard rock to mystical chants to war marches, this album has a little of everything that is right with rock music. My personal favorite bit is right at the end of side 1 when the flute and the xylophone ascend together and then it breaks into the weird rhythm of the "Where the hell was Biggles?" bit. Breathtaking music. This is what all prog rock should sound like - it's complex and beautiful without being overbearing.
I hate to prattle on, but I really do love this album and recommend that you pick it up at your local retailer. And Rolling Stone magazine gave it one star. What more could you want?

Braxton LeCroy <[email protected]> (24.08.2000)

Ditto on your TAAB review.

Thomas M. Silvestri <[email protected]> (30.09.2000)

This goes out not only to George but also Mike DeFabio -- what's wrong with Lizard? It has some of Fripp's most melodic songs ("Lady of the Dancing Water"), Sinfield's most brilliant lyrics ("Happy Family" -- best song ever about the Beatles -- "Indoor Games"), great quirky-Brit vocals by Gordon Haskell, probably Mel Collins' best work ever, just about the only Jon Anderson vocal track I can stand, and some truly inspired free-jazz passages. If you listen to the break on "Indoor Games" side by side with the would-be Zappa/Beefheart-esque segment on side two of Thick as a Brick, the first sounds about as close as any white British guys are going to get to, say, Herbie Hancock, Freddie Hubbard, Ron Carter, and Tony Williams screwing around late one night circa 1966, while the second just sounds like a bunch of white British guys screwing around. If you haven't listened to Lizard since before Crimson became the Fripp-a la Talking Heads-full-on weirdness show, give it another try!

Paul Stadden <[email protected]> (16.11.2000)

Ok, now you can consider King Crimson's Islands as a 1972 album even though it came out in December 1971, but since Black Sabbath released Sabbath Bloody Sabbath in December 1973, they "neglected to release an album" in 1974? [Okay, I give. I give. In this case, Black Sabbatrh neglected to release an album in 1973. I give. Now sue me - G.S.] Ok, enough of that. To the album at hand. I have to admit, that you're right that this is progressive perfection, but for me, it gets a little odd. Such as in Pink Floyd, The Wall and Dark Side of the Moon are just a little too odd. I love Animals because the songs on there are real and individual, not just part of a collective whole. This Was is definitely my favorite Tull album. A Song For Fred is simply the best.

Year Of Release: 1972
Record rating = 9
Overall rating = 12

Oh, I love these early singles. All you haters of overblown prog, get it. It might change your opinion.
Best song: LIVING IN THE PAST

(Hope you don't mind that previous mail-your-ideas line. I try to follow my concept, see, and if it sometimes looks offensive, don't forget that it's undertaken in the name of the Idea).
You might actually not believe it, but for a short while the Tullers were not just another bunch of pretentious prog rock giants - they were a terrific singles band as well! In fact, I cannot think of any other prog rock band that could boast more than, say, a couple of successful singles that happened to be so by some accident. This is just to say how great a guy Ian Anderson once really was - before he turned into a psychic loonie and, afterwards, into a washed-up old geezer, that is. Legend has it that 'Living In The Past' was, in fact, specially designed by Ian as a potential hit single, written overnight in some American hotel. Which it was. No wonder that if that man was once so talented that he could toss off excellent singles material as firecrackers, he was bound to eventually come to the conclusion that singles material was beyond him. Vanity, all is vanity.
Living In The Past isn't a new studio album, but not exactly a 'greatest hits' either. Some of the tracks are indeed redundant ('Inside', 'Locomotive Breath', 'A Song For Jeffrey', all taken from concurrent studio albums), but most of them are just A- and B-sides of singles from 1968-71 that didn't make it onto the original albums, so you might just as well count this a new album. As far as I know, there were some editions of the band's early LP's with tracks from Living In The Past spliced on as bonuses, so if you see 'em in used bins, grab 'em. If you don't, don't hesitate to spend your money on this piece o' diamond, especially since it's a double LP that made it onto a single CD with a little bit of editing.
The only thing that slightly mars this otherwise immaculate collection of Ian's flashes of genius is a sideworth of live material from the band's Carnegie Hall show in November 1970, the main bulk of which I have previously discussed in the corresponding review. These are actually just two tracks: 'By Kind Permission' is a lengthy piano improvisation by John Evan (yeah, he's a virtuoso all right, but one might ask the natural question: why not go and listen to the 'original' sound - say, to Johann Sebastian Bach, for a change?), and it seems to me that the track is actually cobbled together from several different excerpts; for instance, the rave-up coda to the song is actually taken from their rendition of 'With You There To Help Me', while the main part belongs somewhere else (I don't know where). The 'cobblings' aren't even limited to musical pieces: Ian's onstage banter is also mixed and edited in such a way that he's represented as a complete psycho, whereas there was really nothing that 'psycho' about it on stage. Minor example: the phrase 'she's really turned on by the television and vice versa', which seems completely out of place here, is actually taken from a short ramble about Ian's mother, as can be evidenced on the 'untampered' tapes of the show... Oh, never mind. And the second track is 'Dharma For One', a lengthy re-arrangement of the original found on This Was, with unnecessary lyrics, dated vocal harmonies (the cheesiest moment comes on when the entire band starts shouting 'dharma dharma dharma') and a double-length drum solo. In some cases Ian's stage banter really gets somewhat trippy, even downright fascinating on lines like 'I'd better not open this now because it might contain contraband, we'll give it to John to supplement his camels', but, apart from that, the actual music will get you bored by the second minute. Oh, well, at least this is some more officially released live material from Tull's golden years.
Yeah, but what about those singles? Now this is where the whole fun starts. The material from 1968 is still luvvingly experimental and shy ('Love Story' is just a fast blues-rock number, cute and authentic, but feeble if compared to 'A New Day Yesterday'; 'Christmas Song' is mostly distinguished by Ian's ironic 'Hey Santa, pass us that bottle will ya?' at the end). But the 1969 numbers rank among the best works of Tull and, indeed, the best creations of prog rock ever: the title track is a dang classic, with its twisting and twirling melody wrapped in Ian's beautiful flute, and the lyrics are pretty anthemic, too. 'Oh, be forgiving, let's go living in the past'. That's what Ian's been doing ever since, indeed (not that it always helped, mind you). It's good danceable fun, radio-friendly to the extreme but never losing the slightest bit of artistic integrity in the process. 'Driving Song' is another classy blues leftover (face it, the guys could have blown Fleetwood Mac away - they are fully competent in the blues department but manage not to make their blues sound generic in the least), and 'Sweet Dream' is absolutely terrifying, with its almost Beethoven-like sound onslaught: brash, pompous fanfares, scary electric guitar, and a deep, spooky delivery from Ian. Whoever would want to see Ian 'in your sweet dream' after hearing this proto-goth sendup? No wonder Ian impersonated Count Dracula in a later video of this song (which you can see incorporated in Slipstream). Oh yeah, there's also the weird mystic mantra 'Singing All Day'. Get it!
The later singles might not be that breathtaking, possibly because Ian prefers exploring the same ideas and styles over and over - the stylistic monotonousness begins to get a wee bit on one's nerves when similar songs start to pour out in larger and larger quantities. Worse, some of the melodic elements are recycled - openly, like 'Wond'ring Aloud', which is an alternate version of the shorter 'Wond'ring Again' from Aqualung (although, judging from the title, it's the Aqualung number which is the real alternate version), or discreetly, like the final phrase in the chorus of 'Life Is A Long Song', which is actually taken from the same 'Wond'ring Again'. An imminent evil when your style is so narrow.
Still, 'Witch's Promise' is a fantastic ode to romanticism, with flutes galore and lush medieval sentimentalism all over the place; and most of the others are either just heart-warming and friendly (the cheerful, optimistic 'Life's A Long Song', the gentle and loving 'Nursie'), or display great musicianship (the instrumental 'For Later').
All in all, none of the selected tracks ('cept for the live stuff, of course) are bad, and most of them are high above 'good'. No lengthy jams, no endless solos, no mind-boggling lyrics, no boring chord progressions: what else can be desired? Let's go 'living in the past', pal!

Singing all day? Take some time to mail your ideas!

Your worthy comments:

Michael Bruun Petersen <[email protected]> (01.10.99)

The title track is vastly overrated. It's on every damn live album, greatest hit collection and box set. I hate it I hate it I hate it.
Most of the rest is pretty good. But the bad live stuff and the fact that some of the tracks are taken directly from previous albums does spoil things a bit. Still, it's well worth buying if you like early Tull.
A lot more (and much better) stuff from the Carnegie Hall concert can be found on the 25 Years of Jethro Tull box set.

Tikhonov Konstantin <[email protected]> (03.03.2000)

Is Living In The Past a compilation or an original album? I think it's something in between. The album includes unreleased and single-only-released material, but the absence of concept makes it just a good collection, very good for all early-Tull's fans. Here you can listen almost all influences of Tull's music - medieval tunes ("Christmas Song"), hard rock ("Sweet Dream"), jazz ("Living In The Past"), blues ("Driving Song"), naive love romanticism ("Witch's Promise"), bitter social sarcasm ("Wond'ring Aloud"). And don't forget the excellent live side from Carnegie Hall! John's jazz improvisations over Beethoven's and Rachmaninov's themes are pure gold and Clive's highly-energetic drum solo (with group's rather funny background) puts "Dharma For One" between album's highlights.
What about the editions? UK and US issues (LP and CD both) contains different material (on CDs some numbers was omitted), so skip 'em all and take the 2CD MFSL gold release. Its including the complete LP version plus additional material from all existed releases with lush booklet (full of fantastic photos and original sleeve notes) and I don't even speak about the sound. In my personal opinion, addition of four early numbers from 1968-69 ("Aeroplane", "Sunshine Day", "One For John Gee" and "17") will make this album completely perfect. Well, Ian have promised the remastered version in 2000, so maybe he'll add 'em like a bonus tracks. Lets keep the fingers crossed.
And the famous last words: for early-Tull's lovers its a nice choice, probably the best of all, 'cause its contains "Song For Jeffrey", "Bouree", "Alive And Well And Living In" and "Locomotive Breath" as good examples of all four studio albums. Best tracks? With the exception of previously released albums' material its "Christmas Song" (the grandma of further folk exercises), "Living In The Past" (Ian said they played this masterpiece around a thousand times and I says its still not enough!), "Sweet Dream" (Tull's first true hard rock), all live stuff from Carnegie Hall and "Wond'ring Again" (it should be on "Aqualung"!). Rating - 7 (its a compilation, d'you agree?).

Tikhonov Konstantin <[email protected]> (18.03.2000)

I think I must change my rating. Probably I was in bad mood during last listening, but I recorded this album on tape for my friend last night and it was wonderful. My new rating is 8.

Philip Maddox <[email protected]> (07.07.2000)

Pretty much absolute agreement from me - these singles are amazingly good! My favorites are 'Living In The Past' and 'Witch's Promise', both of which are absolutely stunning - I especially like the 5/4 time in 'Living'. That one's a classic of classics. The thing is, none of the other material is bad - it's hard to knock 'Life Is A Long Song', 'Nursie', 'Sweet Dream', 'Christmas Song', 'Alive And Well And Living In', or basically any track on here. The CD does have a couple of problems though. The first is minor - a couple of cuts ('A Song For Jeffrey', 'Hymn 43', 'Inside') are taken directly from older Tull albums. Actually, 3 songs get cut off the CD - 'Locomotive Breath', 'Bouree', and 'Teacher' - but who cares? They were all on older albums anyway. The biggest problem here is the carnegie hall stuff. I kinda like the first few minutes of 'Dharma For One', but once the drum solo starts, I get bored. And I don't get the point of 'By Kind Permission Of'. They should have just taken a track from the concert as opposed to cutting them up and pasting them together. Yeah, we know John's good, but he'd sound better in a better context. Plus, there were a few singles and b-sides that didn't make this album - most notably '17', the b-side of 'Sweet Dream', 'One For John Gee', the b-side to 'A Song For Jeffrey', and Tull's first single, 'Sunshine Day' with 'Aeroplane'. They should've been on here instead of 'By Kind Permission Of'. Why weren't they included? Who knows? I give this a 9 regardless - those singles cannot be topped. And here's a weird factoid - on the original vinyl, there's a song call 'From Later'. On the CD, they called it 'For Later'. Which one is the misprint? I'm not sure.

Rich Bunnell <[email protected]> (30.07.2000)

The two long-winded live thingies aren't too good, and three of the songs are repeats, and two of the songs are short one-minute fillerish songs not unlike the ones on Aqualung. That leaves thirteen songs. And they're all ace!! Well, none of them stand out, but that's what makes everything so good-- nothing makes everything else look like crap. In fact, I'm glad "Teacher" isn't on here, because it's better than everything on this collection, and it would somehow cause me to rate it lower. The best songs are "Life Is A Long Song," the title track, and "Sweet Dream." I can't really describe any of them because they all pretty much follow the generic Tull sound, i.e. peppy acoustic guitars and flutes. Luckily, the melodies are topnotch enough to make this fact really easy to overlook. Plus, the collection chronologically is a nice breather between the two long-winded "epic" albums. 8/10

Year Of Release: 1973
Record rating = 6
Overall rating = 9

A terribly overblown concept album with the concept bigger than the music.
Best song: errr... there's only one, actually, and it's not the best.

Pleased with the critical and commercial success of his previous megaproject, Ian tried to milk the Thick As A Brick line even further. I don't think it will be an exaggeration to call A Passion Play his most bombastic project ever: it took a lot of gall, ambition, and pretense (not to mention, of course, hard work and trained musicianship) to fulfill it. And yet, in every possible sense imaginable, it was a failure - a deep nosedive after the previous album. Well, except one sense, of course: the album reached number one in the States, just like its predecessor. Still, it was their last number one there, which already means something. The critics hated it, and even if their hate was overblown, as usual (and had indeed a lot to do with the "I don't get it, therefore it's crap" postulate), this time it was at least justified. A Passion Play was the album that did Tull in for the world: from now on, rock music listeners became segregated into the lesser, but fanatically dedicated, hardcore Tull camp, and the major part that refused to listen to the band any longer. This is where Anderson bit off more than he could chew, and from now on, except for a few surprisingly accessible records, the Jethro Tull legacy is definitely an acquired taste.
Some historical facts. The basic parts of the album were laid down in France where the group was hiding during their one and only tax exile (to the band's honour, this was a nod to tradition - everybody was doing that at the time - rather than a sign of greed, and they never repeated that again). Either Ian's social conscience was bothering him so much or he was just in an overall bad mood, but he suddenly burned all the recorded tapes (although later they magically resurfaced on Nightcap) and returned to England, where some of them were re-recorded again, some new material was added in a hurry and this bastard was thrown out on the racks. A pity, as the scrapped 'Chateau D'Isaster' project, while basically featuring the same musical ideas as the final product, was superior in every way - but we'll eventually get to that. In due time.
So what's the problem with A Passion Play? Well, for starters, it lacks melodies - a thing mostly unheard of Jethro Tull before but which would, sadly enough, become a standard for later releases. Not entirely, of course; repeated listenings bring out certain parts that are intelligently written and well-performed. But much too often, the band just stands on the spot and doesn't seem to go anywhere - bland acoustic strummings following highly disorganized chord sequences, pedestrian jamming, uninspired noise... all of these things crop up way, way too often.
The instrumentation is pretty diverse, of course, maybe even more diverse than on Thick As A Brick, with more reliance on synthesizers; also, Ian must have probably been listening to a lot of Van Der Graaf Generator lately, so he brought in some saxes and played them himself. But no, he isn't a terrific sax player at all - the saxophone parts are so indistinctive that I even failed to notice the very presence of the instrument until a dozen listens. The flute does stand out, though. But who the hell needs tricky instrumentation if it has no point at all? Not me. And to top it all, there ain't a single outstanding guitar solo on the album - where the hell is Martin? Come to think of it, there ain't a single guitar solo on the album at all.
Next point. I have to deal with the album's concept. It is, roughly speaking, a little nutty. A Passion Play takes us away from the lovingly British interplay between the medieval and the modern on the previous album and plunges us into esoteric deeps of Anderson's "metaphysical vision". Many people praise the concept and pile bucketloads of shit on anybody who has the nerve to open his mouth and say 'isn't it a bit too much?' Well, never mind, I'll go ahead and say: the concept of A Passion Play is a big put-on. Yes, it does represent a young man who's died and gone to hell, and it supposedly deals with problems of life, death, regeneration, life in the other world, etc., etc. But in ninety percent of the cases, the lyrics are completely meaningless - when Ian takes up the usual cliches like 'icy Lucifer', he hasn't got the least idea of what to do with them. The general message is non-existent, and the poetic imagery gets lost and bogged down with its own pretentions. Yes, Ian is a well-read guy, and in parts, A Passion Play had definitely been inspired by Dante's 'Inferno'; but so what? Anybody with at least a little bit of intelligence can string up words in a better way. I'll just leave it with this: while I've indeed witnessed many hardcore Tull fans praising the album for "seriousness" and "deepness", never have I been able to meet somebody who could actually point out what the hell Ian was actually trying to say here. It all comes down to the old self-deception - 'this album is great oh so great, I don't know why it's great but it's just so great that its greatness is unexplainable'. Bullshit.
Worse, there is not a single bit of humour or lightweightness - everything's deadly serious to the extreme, not giving you a moment of relaxation. Except at the beginning of the second side, of course, where the steady flow of the suite is suddenly interrupted by a weird 'neo-humourist' story of 'The Hare Who Lost His Spectacles', narrated in a traditional British theatrical type of pronunciation by Jeffrey Hammond-Hammond. The story is good clean fun and makes me laugh every time I hear it, but it has absolutely nothing to do with the rest of the album. It was apparently thrown in for good measure, just to provide a bit of relief for the listener (thank you so much Mr Anderson, for taking pity on the poor audience), but where the light funny bits on Thick As A Brick were cleverly and subtly interpolated in between the more serious parts, here it's not just the seams that are visible - the entire patch is sewn very badly.
And, of course, the monotonousness of the record kills me, simply annihilates me. Thick As A Brick had everything, from war marches to ballads to rockers; here, it's just the same acoustic noodling/sax+guitar jamming going on and on and on, always at the same tempo, more or less in the same key, never speeding up, never slowing down; this album could definitely never have worked on a short-song level.
That said, like I already mentioned, repeated listenings (and I did listen to it at least a couple dozen times - specially oriented for people that say "you need to listen some more") do bring out some good melodies in certain places, which become especially obvious after listening to the Chateau D'Isaster tapes on the first part of Nightcap. Sections like 'Lover of the black and white - it's your first night' and the 'Overseer over you' parts are quite powerful, with bold riffage and complex, yet strangely involving time signatures; Tull really never played in that way before and never would after. A few other parts are catchy, too, but I won't go into details. The big problem is, my CD edition only has one track in all, and it's a real pain in the butt to have to wait through all the filler to get to the good sections, which irritates me even further.
Of course, you'll have to love this album if you actually want to qualify as hardcore Tuller. This and Minstrel In The Gallery are, like, the ultimate tests: if you stand 'em, welcome to the elitist club of Anderson worshippers. I mean, if the reviewer refuses to join it, it's no reason to follow suite, isn't it? Who knows, you might enjoy A Passion Play even more than some of the commenting gentlemen below. But this is a highly acquired taste; objectively, A Passion Play is the first album that adds absolutely nothing new to the Tull legacy. I mean, you wouldn't want to argue that Ian's saxophone is a major and crucial innovation for the band, now would you?

The passion play has begun. Hurry up and mail your ideas

Your worthy comments:

Michael Bruun Petersen <[email protected]> (01.10.99)

As good as Thick as a Brick. Lots of good melodies. And nice organ and sax stuff. But it is a much darker and more serious album both musically and lyrically. So it was a good idea to have some "comic relief" in the middle. And 'The Story of the Hare who Lost His Spectacles' (narrated by Jeffrey Hammond I'm pretty sure) is quite clever and amusing. But it gets very annoying after the first few times you hear it. And as it isn't given a seperate track on the cd there is no way to skip it automatically.
Best part: All of the second half after the story. The best fifteen minutes of Tull ever.
Rating: 9

Ben Greenstein <[email protected]> (15.02.2000)

I don't agree. This is easily one of the finest "prog" albums I've heard thus far. Keep in mind, though, that I haven't yet heard Brick in it's entirity, only claimed to, so I don't really have anything to measure this up against. It's dark, though, and has a seemingly endless supply of cool melodies and tricks with guitars (dual channel type stuff, you know?), and so is really intriguing to listen to. The "Lover Of The Black And White" section, I'll agree, is the best, but both the "title track" like part and the closing section. I would rather be able to skip to certain parts, but I don't really dislike any of it, so why bother? A nine. Or a ten. I'm not sure.
[Special author note: I'm not exactly sure as to what Ben calls an 'endless supply of cool melodies' here. Maybe in the same way as Frank Zappa's Yellow Shark has got an endless supply of cool melodies for some? Bits and snatches of unstructured, rambling chord changes do not equal melodies in my book.]

Edward M. Lufrano <[email protected]> (23.02.2000)

This was Ian Anderson's masterpiece. A most original and ground-breaking work. As a group Tull has never been tighter. This is Rock Music's version of Dante's Divine Comedy. As grand, ambitious and moving. The problem is: like any form of high art it has to be studied. You can't listen to it once through and condemn it simply because you are unwilling to put in some effort. I was at the 1973 Madison Square garden performance of this opus and I can honestly say that I have never before or after experienced a show that has moved me so deeply and profoundly. Oh! and by the way - It is Jeffrey Hammond-Hammond who narrates 'The Hare Who Lost His Spectacles'.

Tikhonov Konstantin <[email protected]> (03.03.2000)

Well, Passion Play... one of the hardest-to-observe Tull's albums...
Coming back to your reviews - Chateau D'Isaster sessions was stopped 'cause the technical conditions of recorded tapes were unbelievable awful. The band had not much time before the next American tour so Passion Play was completely recorded in three weeks. The result was... not everyone enjoyed it.
But for me A Passion Play is a very good album and its definitely not deserved the hysterical critics in English rock press. Oh what a fools! I hate tight-minded idiots whom pissed on something only 'cause they didn't understand it! Buy yourselves an additional brains, morons!
And what 'bout you? You said Passion Play lacks of melodies... go to the doctor and clean your ears of geese feathers, pal! D'you try to listen "In The Foot Of Our Stairs"? "Overseer Overture"? "Flight From Lucifer"? "Magus Perde"? Side two of the LP is the masterpiece comparable with Thick As A Brick.
Yes, Tull's music is more straight-forward and aggressive, but the only thing fades away of Brick legacy is Ian's sense of humour. Play is a serious work (except, of course, "The Story Of The Hare"), so its still a work of natural born master. And Ian's saxophone is awesome!
The remastered release will come in 2000 (probably), but I recommend the MFSL release with complete artwork (theatrical programme not appears in standard CD issue) and marked tracks (they were named for US radio). You'll easily find your favourite part.
So if you're asking me, boys and girls, I says that Passion Play is good album and you need to listen it very carefully. If you can dig it (I give you my word) you'll be rewarded! In other side, if you can't... you'll hate it. My personal preferences is the beginning of the second part of the story - "In The Foot Of Our Stairs" and "Overseer Overture". Rating? Eight.

R. David Hayward <[email protected]> (30.04.2000)

Knowing that A Passion Play is the flashpoint for dissention even among the most rabid of Tull fans, I bought it expecting to agree with the general opinion that it is a pile of pretentious wank. After one listen, I was pleasantly surprised. After a few more, I had to admit that it ranks alongside Thick as a Brick as a true masterpiece. That being said, I can see why so many people fail to appreciate it. A single 45-minute track, a theme of death and rebirth, complex and highly allusive lyrics, even more complex music veering abruptly from one style to the next, and a seemingly incongruous fable in the middle don't exactly add up to an easily accesible work. Even the wit that worked to lighten Thick as a Brick is absent. However, A Passion Play is very rewarding and eminently listenable, working well both as a fresh and pleasant musical piece (even if a bit abstract at times), and as a serious artistic statement. The thought that immediately struck me, reflecting on this album, was "this is what 'The Wasteland' would be like if TS Eliot had been a musician." A Passion Play is, I think, very much like that poem; both are long, complex, very serious, and easy to get lost in. It is for precisely these reasons that both are controversial and often under-appreciated by both the general public and the artistic "establishment". Personally, though, I find it terribly exciting to come across such a thoughtful and reflective work (how often do subtle allusions to Dante and Milton crop up in contemporary rock music?) packaged in one of Ian Anderson's most sublime musical compositions.

Philip Maddox <[email protected]> (07.07.2000)

Very few people hold the middle ground on this album - it's usually considered either a masterpiece or complete crap. I don't think it's a masterpiece (it's just an attempt to follow-up Thick As A Brick, and it's just not as good), but it sure ain't crap, either. I'd give it an 8. Side 2 is what really does it for me - I think that entire half is absolutely brilliant, especially the "Well meaning fool/Pick up thy bed and rise" section. I really love it. Side 1 isn't as good, though - it's not bad, and it's well played, but it just isn't as resonant as the stuff on side 2. The "Lover of the black and white" part is great, and I love the main theme (that appeared again has 'Tiger Toon' on Nightcap), though nothing is really bad. I would give it a 9, but I'm docking it a point for one reason - the ending totally blows! At the end of Brick, there was a sense of resolution and climax. Here, the record just shuts down, Ian sing the "Into the ever Passion Play" line one more time, and everything fades out. What's that about? Maybe it's because the main "song" is A Passion Play isn't as good as the main one in Brick, but it really leaves me hanging. Oh, and I actually like the lyrics here - they make all kinda of weird allusions and stuff. Some of them are just weird, though - my favorite is "The Ice Cream Lady wet her drawers/To see you in the Passion Play". What??? Oh well. My copy of this is actually divided into tracks, so I can skip around however I choose! Hooray!

Rich Bunnell <[email protected]> (26.08.2000)

Underrated by critics, overrated by fans, you know the drill. This album isn't nearly as consistent as Thick As A Brick largely because in attempting to branch out musically to escape the one-style trappings of that record, Ian hit on a lot of rambling, incoherent musical passages which really don't work. Plus, too many of the parts of the album start out catchy and promising but either end too soon or turn into something much more annoying. There are still a lot of fun, classic Tull passages though, in spite of what this album's critics say, such as the rocking last few minutes before the soft section that closes the album [yeah, is that the one where each verse begins with a strained 'ughghgh', as if Ian is lugging heavy furniture around? Sure is funny! - G. S.], the first eight minutes or so of the album, and "The Hare Who Lost His Spectacles," though I can't understand the story enough to find anything funny about it besides the hilarious vocal delivery. I'd grant this one a low seven.

Bob Josef <[email protected]> (05.10.2000)

In my little comment on The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway, I mentioned that every prog band released an album where ambition outran musical talent and sense. And I neglected to mention Tull's contribution to the hall of infamy, this ridiculous release.
Evidently, Ian decided that Thick as a Brick was much too accessible. Well, if his intent was to befuddle the listeners, he succeeded. The lyrics are even more dense than Thick, but at least there you got clever and funny lines. Here you get just randomness. If you're going to have pretentious nonsense lyrics, OK, but then you've got to accompany them with catchy melodies to at least keep the listener intrigued. Here, there's lots of forgettable sludge (no matter how many times I listen to the live Passion Play excerpts on the 25th Anniversary box set, I can't remember a damn thing about them), discordant noises (especially from the shrill saxes) and even lousy playing, a first for Tull. Ian may be a talented multi-instrumentalist, but we're lucky he dropped sax from the repertoire after this album. And John evidently just discovered the Moog synth, because his playing sounds very clumsy. It's no surprise they had to add David Palmer as a second keyboardist later.
And let me get one thing off my chest: it really bugs me that some of the same people who bash Graeme Edge's little bits of poetry on Moody Blues albums rave about how great the stupid time-waster called "The Hare Who Lost His Spectacles" is. The biggest embarrassment in Tull's history -- and what does is have to do with ANYTHING? Ugh.
It befuddles me how this album got to #1 -- I've never heard any of it on the radio. It certainly doesn't lend itself to radio airplay. The fan base built by Aqualung and Thick as a Brick must have been incredibly strong in 1973, but time has proven that Emperor Ian had no clothes with this one. The only excuse for this being such a dud is that they only had three weeks to write and record it -- it took Yes five months to come up with their monstrosity (Tales). This is the real "Chateau D'isaster" -- the excepts from the scrapped project on the 20th Anniversary box set indicate that it was vastly superior.
There are a few impressive moments here and there (the "Under the cold sun, freezing" part is kinda cool), but although I haven't heard every single Tull album, I know enough to say that this HAS to be their worst -- and I own a copy of Under Wraps (now ducking to avoid flying objects hurled at me from rabid Tullers).

Year Of Release: 1974
Record rating = 7
Overall rating = 10

Concept again, but the songs are shorter and catchier and why not give it a try? It's moody.
Best song: BUNGLE IN THE JUNGLE

Well, there you are. Even if Ian had always said he didn't give a damn about critical opinion, he must have still felt uncomfortable about the bashing-out of A Passion Play. Because on his next release he's finally increased the number of tracks to a whole ten. And I don't want to say the previous two albums' main flaw was the lengthiness. Nope; I've always said things like Thick As A Brick and stuff were just your ordinary song collections with the only difference that the pauses between tracks have been switched for non-breaking instrumental links. But I've also come to realize pauses between songs are really vital. Absolutely necessary, in fact. For three reasons: first of all, you can always run off to the bathroom without having to push the PAUSE button; second, you can always spend all the time you want there without having to rush back and resume playing before your CD player automatically disables the pause; and third, you don't have to fast forward the actual track with cusses and obscenities only to find out you don't really remember what exact minute you were listening to.
Seriously now. These ten songs really show that, unfortunately, the main problem with A Passion Play wasn't the bad abuse of 'conceptuality' and self-indulgence. The main problem was that Ian's songwriting talents have slowly begun to wane. By now he's slowly steering into the direction of his own fantasies and dreams which actually brought about his total commercial downfall in a couple years. Artistic, too. I'm not going to pretend I'm a big fan of Mr Ian Anderson's fantasy world. Like one Peter Gabriel said, 'I know what I like, and I like what I know'. I couldn't agree more. It's not that I'd like Ian's music to sound commercial or anything - I'm just trying to say that somewhere on the way Ian had apparently lost the Major Artist's Filter that would allow him to sort out the mediocrities and leave in only the "pure gold". Just look at the band's creativity, for Chrissake - out of all the notorious prog rock acts, Jethro Tull were the only band that stuck to a strict one-album-per-year schedule all throughout the Seventies. Not to mention all those rarities that were released afterwards on anniversary boxsets and suchlike. With such a flood of productivity - all due to Ian's complete rejection of the Filter - it was inevitable that the band would soon be drowning in a sea of pretention and questionable fantasies, and its devoted following reduced from millions all over the world to a small, compact groups of people who had the luck (or the misfortune) to possess a mind similar or equal to that of Ian's.
Well, thank your lucky stars that there's still a lot to cheer about on Warchild; unlike whatever followed it, it can be said to be at least a slight rebound into the world of "pre-Passion Play". Like I said, it's certainly conceptual, and the nature of the concept is quite clear: as usual, Ian goes ridiculizing society and mocking at the establishment with some really clever lyrics, adding certain obscure anti-war references and, well, intriguing imagery that will leave one completely satisfied. In fact, if anything has taken a turn for the better since Play, it's the lyrics: Ian has obviously turned away from Yes-like poetic spontaneous nonsense and made up some really interesting, er, 'texts'. Check 'em out even if you don't have the album, they're quite deserving.
As for the music, about half of the album is really really good (quite a good percentage for post-1972 Tull). The title track leads off the record with some subtle majesty (the refrain 'Warchild/Dance the days and dance the nights away' is especially memorable). It has a strange atmosphere, never found on any Tull record both before and after - something in the Spanish style, I'd bet, but I'm not too sure. 'Sealion' has a great melody, too - I confess I somewhat prefer the 'alternate' version found on Nightcap (with silly lyrics by Jeffrey Hammond-Hammond that have a lot to do with real sealions, but nothing with social critique), but that doesn't mean the song's riff on here ain't just as powerful and engaging.
'Only Solitaire' is a nice acoustic shuffle (although you won't like it if you didn't like the ones on Aqualung) with lyrics aimed at Ian's critics - it might be his most venomous condemnation of the entire breed in one go, certainly having a lot to do with their despisal of Passion Play. The funny fact is that while Ian's description of the "artist" according to the view of the "critics" ("Brain-storming habit-forming battle-warning weary winsome actor spewing spineless chilling lines... court-jesting, never-resting --- he must be very cunning to assume an air of dignity and bless us all with his oratory prowess, his lame-brained antics and his jumping in the air...") is supposed to be ironic, it is also painfully close to the truth, and shows us that Ian did take himself with a certain sense of humour, much unlike his rabid, dedicated following that spends its life licking the man's toes.
As for the best cuts on the record, these should probably be the radio hits 'Skating Away On The Thin Ice Of A New Day' (one of Ian's most charming and optimistic acoustic ditties) and the raving-up scary rocker 'Bungle In The Jungle'. That last one even managed to chart - probably the last time any Tull single caught such a chance. Not for nothing, though - the song is really quite catchy, catchier than anything done by the band in that particular epoch, and with a distinct commercial sound, too.
Commercial? What do you mean by 'commercial', Mr Reviewer?
Oh, that's right. By 'commercial' I mean 'sounding just unlike that typical middle/late Seventies Tull'. Nothing else. Not that he sold out for one more single or anything like that. Not at all. Nope. Nada. It's just a very tight, compact and rhythmic song built on 'traditional' values, and it's the last time you're gonna hear such a song from Jethro Tull. So go out and get it. And it starts with actual jungle noises - tigers, elephants and all those other snakes. Cool.
I see I've just said a lot of good things about the album. So, just for a change, I'd like to shift my remarks and say that this album sucks. No kidding. And it's because about half of the material is either painfully unbearable or simply mediocre to the point of shrugging one's shoulders. The five-minutes-thirty-seconds epic 'Back Door Angels', for example, at its best just bores me to half-death and at its worst makes me want to throttle both Ian and Martin Barre (who keeps playing his highly professional, but absolutely dispensable solos to the point of real suffocation - I hate those endless pauses when it seems like the band is finally stopping and then they pick it up again). Likewise with the closing 'Third Hoorah' (an uninspired reprise of the title track, albeit in a martial dance-style) and 'Two Fingers', an insipid reworking of the former ass-kicking rocker 'Lick Your Fingers Clean'. Likewise with the stupid 'Queen And Country' which is actually a banal pop song with the most trivial and straightforward, obnoxious melody in the world disguised as some intelligent prog rock. Leave that style to Uriah Heep, Ian. I dig the clever orchestration on the song, but it hardly matches the song's nursery structure. It ain't even funny. And have I yet mentioned 'Ladies'? Now here's where medieval stylistics clearly gets the best of Ian: he's so engaged in making the song sound all romantic and courtsy that he forgets to render it melodic.
Yeah, I know they're all professionals and that the level of performance is amazing and terrifying, but I'd like to get some memorable melodies, too. All these songs mentioned in the last paragraph are serious embarrassments, that's what they are. They just stick around and do nothing, just fill the space on the record. The lyrics are good, but maybe Ian would do better to publish a little book of poetry instead? Don't you like my idea?
Even so, it's only a mild taster of the truly wild things to come...

Only solitaire? Let's make it multiple. Mail your ideas

Your worthy comments:

Michael Bruun Petersen <[email protected]> (01.10.99)

Probably their weakest album from the 70s. But still there is much that is good. 'Skating Away ...' and 'Only Solitary' are masterpieces. Really.
And don't let George fool you - 'Queen and Country is also very good. 'Two Fingers' (one of the supposedly "painfully unbearable" songs) is a reworked version of the Aqualung outtake 'Lick your Fingers Clean'. The original version later appeared on the 20 Years of Jethro Tull collection. (in Georges review of that one the song is described as a "fantastic rocker". Go figure :-)
[Special author note: hey! I resent that irony! True, I haven't paid attention to the similarity of the lyrics, but the two melodies have simply nothing to do with each other! The original rocked, the reworked version drags. So much for the reworked version. Go and see for yourselves.]

Tikhonov Konstantin <[email protected]> (03.03.2000)

War Child is good, but not strong...
In a matter of fact, Child (unfinished film's soundtrack) is second part (or even reworking) of some Passion Play ideas ("Skating Away" and "Solitaire" was prepared for abandoned France version), but concept of Child is much more accessible and music is less whimsical than on Thick and Play.
Your review sucks as always, so lets crossover it right to the album itself. This is the first Tull's album with stronger folk elements, some songs based on medieval Elizabethan marches ("Queen And Country" and "The Third Hoorah" are the best examples). "War Child" is good too, and if "Back Door Angels" bores you to half-death, I'm really sorry that's only to half. "Sea Lion" has best lyrics at the whole album, and I must confess... I don't think "Skating Away" is great (I know, almost everybody loves it, but I don't). Yes, lyrics is wise as only Ian's lyrics can be, but the song still can't catch me. "Bungle In The Jungle" is 100 percent hit with excellent effects and final "Two Fingers" is a reworking of "Lick Your Fingers Clean" (I prefer the original, but longer version is strong and powerful too).
Deaf critics named this change of course as Tull's turning point to more commercial albums. But did Ian want to catch a success? I don't think so. I suspects he didn't even try 'cause if he wanted it, Minstrel never appeared (but he did, thanks Lord).
Editions? Remaster is not exist (at least), but gold release is here (and it's damn good!).
Well, I think I said enough. Indeed, War Child is not the best Tull's album, but he's not bad as their early 80's efforts either. Best song - "Bungle In The Jungle" (yes, I know it's not original). Rating - 7.

Philip Maddox <[email protected]> (07.07.2000)

This record was pieced together, and it shows. It's good, but it could have been better. There are a few classics here, especially 'Skating Away', which is an amazingly great pseudo-folk song. I really like 'The Third Hoorah' too, though - I actually think it improves on the title track. It's got all those cool sounding harpsichords and bagpipes, and it creates a really happy, jovial atmosphere. In fact, it's my second favorite song on here. I like 'Two Fingers' too, but it isn't as good as the original ('Lick Your Fingers Clean'). The title track is vaguely majestic sounding, and 'Sealion' is really weird, but still good. My main complaint with this album is tracks 2-4. 'Queen And Country' goes nowhere, 'Ladies' is really boring, and 'Back Door Angels' sounds sort of like 'Black Satin Dancer', except while I like the latter, 'Back Door Angels' just drags and drags until the counting at the end segues into 'Sealion', which is good. Oh, and as for 'Bungle In The Jungle', I don't think it's bad, but I don't think it's great - it's simply an average-good song. I'd give this a 7, too. A low one, though - I think it's the worst Tull album of the seventies.

Rich Bunnell <[email protected]> (28.08.2000)

Sorry to be the sole voice of praise, but...uh....why does everyone hate this album? I'd think that a full album of extremely solid melodies and no truly bad songs ("Back-Door Angels" kind of drags) would be given more praise than I've seen given towards this particular collection, but to each his own. It's not my favorite Tull album because nothing besides the two singles really stands out ("Bungle In The Jungle" is so freaking catchy!! Dumb lyrics cannot hinder this song), but the songs which you guys are apparently finding awful, hideous melodies in, like "Queen and Country" and "The Third Horrah," I find no different from other Tull songs and actually quite catchy and charming. Underrated as far as I'm concerned, and a definite 8 for me. If this is the worst Tull of the seventies, as some have said, then bring on Minstrel and Too Old To Rock, baby.

Year Of Release: 1975
Record rating = 5
Overall rating = 8

Please Sir Minstrel, play a really entertaining song and don't bore me to sleep...
Best song: MINSTREL IN THE GALLERY

This album, in my humble opinion, marks the beginning of a lengthy series of what I'd call 'one-song' albums: these records were usually written around one central thematic track which also turned out to be the best on the record and normally became the title one. While other progressive and art bands were usually either creatively dead by 1975, falling apart, or at least creatively stagnant, gathering their forces to put out a decent record every two or three years or so, Jethro Tull, and Ian in particular, seemed intent on proving the world that their formula was well-oiled and running. Thus, gamble follows after gamble: leaving out the substance of his work, Ian makes sure to preserve the form, and this eventually led to Tull's vanishing from the market as a commercial force, replaced by Tull as a panoptic cult group with a small audience of hardcore fans.
Not that I have anything against panoptic cult groups. The problem is, Minstrel In The Gallery (a fan favourite, mind you) is an abysmal album and simply doesn't stand the test of time as well as anything before it - yes, including even A Passion Play. While Ian's 'despotism' in the band actually dates to as back as 1969, it is on Minstrel that the equation "Jethro Tull = Ian Anderson" becomes most obvious. First, it is far more introspective; Ian still addresses some social issues, but for the most part everything is filtered through his own personal feelings, and quite a few of the songs are dedicated to his recent divorce. Second, it is far more downbeat than usual: Anderson's acoustic noodling occupies almost half of the record's fourty-five minutes, and the only other prominent instruments are the ones we're already well-used to, namely, Ian's flute and Martin's electric. Occasionally, John Evan shows up on piano and some nice (or not so nice) David Palmer-arranged orchestration appears on the fringes, but in general, the album is very sparsely arranged in comparison with the lush-produced records of yore. Essentially, there's not a single half-original musical idea to be found on here. I can certainly enjoy the general spirit of the record, because I more or less like the sounds of the acoustic guitar and the flute; but there's simply no reason for me to put on Minstrel when I need to enjoy some well-played acoustic guitar or some well-blown flute, because both Aqualung and Thick As A Brick will do that trick better and have lots of other stuff, too.
At least, hearing the same well-played acoustic guitar and the same well-blown flute for the fifth or sixth time in a row can be tolerable if they actually represent well-written melodies. Unfortunately, such is not the case. Bits and pieces of this album are all right - and could represent a good base for something better; but the album was recorded very quickly, and even the best songs on here are diluted with tons of uninspired, derivative guitar/flute wanking. The best track is by far the title one, starting as a moderate acoustic shuffle and then becoming a huge unstoppable electric groove based on an interesting riff with Elizabethan connotations (sic). It really hits hard and probably features Ian at his best as a 'social critic' - the funniest thing is, the minstrel actually 'sees his own face in everyone'.
But then, trouble arrives as none of the songs on the first side seem to match the title track's musical message. None of this music is offensive at all, yet it is all form, no substance. Only minor snatches of substance. 'Cold Wind To Valhalla' is Anderson's first exploration of Viking thematics that would later return in a far more mature and impressive form in Broadsword And The Beast; here, only the chorus is relatively memorable, with a funny '...cold wind to Valhal-LAAAAAA!' ending to it. 'Black Satin Dancer' has a good middle part, with a majestic dirgey riff from Barre and perhaps the most moving guitar solo on record; but you'll have to dig that part from under the opening section, which is just standard acoustic noodling, and you'll have forgotten all about it by the time of the closing section, which is just standard electric/flute interplay we already know so well. And 'Requiem' is an entirely forgettable ballad with not the least sign of a vocal melody - I don't know about the lyrics, but I could certainly have penned a more interesting melody in minutes (any melody would do, because Ian's acoustic strumming on 'Requiem' reminds me of somebody mindlessly tuning his guitar).
The second side opens with the equally forgettable acoustic/electric ballad 'One White Duck' and then proceeds to mock the listener with the sixteen-minute long saga of the London life, 'Baker St Muse'. The lyrics - as usual - rule, with all kinds of haunting imagery, but perhaps at this point it would be better for Ian to switch on to writing poetry books, don't you think? The only moment of catchiness and inventiveness in the whole suite is the main theme, with a nice violin line underpinning Ian as he sings 'didn't make her... dzinnnng... with the Baker Street Ruse...', etc. And what else do you get? Same thing everywhere - rambling acoustic noodling plus pointless, messy electric jamming a la Grand Funk Railroad or somebody. So the only moment of comical relief is when we hear Ian finishing the song, putting down his guitar and trying to leave the studio humming 'I'm just a Baker Street Muse...', only to find out that the door's been locked, so he cries out 'I can't get out!' in frustration. How very symbolic.
For me (and almost any person I've met on the Web who don't consider themselves to be Tull diehards), it is absolutely clear that by now, Ian was simply running out of steam as a progressive hero. He could certainly still turn out a decent melody (as would be proved by the next album), but he simply didn't want to do it, apparently thinking that his fans would eat anything as long as it featured the main 'Tull ingredients'. That's why so many people eagerly deceive themselves into thinking of Minstrel as the band's pinnacle: it takes a lot of care to preserve the traditional form of progressive Tull. And I certainly do not have the least doubt that Ian was quite serious and earnest while penning these tunes (well, while penning the lyrics - all of these 'melodies' could have been written in fifteen minutes). But alas, that was "too much positive thinking": those who'd wish to take a deeper look at Tull could easily see that the actual music behind all this form is laughable. And if you're just giving me atmosphere, Ian, why repeat the same things in such a blatant and boring way?
P.S. Did I say the title track was the best thing on here? Silly me! The best song is, undoubtedly, the album-closing fourty-second 'Grace' with the best lyrics of Ian's entire career: 'Hello sun. Hello bird. Hello my lady. Hello breakfast. May I buy you again tomorrow?'

Grace be upon ye if ye only mail your ideas

Your worthy comments:

Michael Bruun Petersen <[email protected]> (01.10.99)

Down beat and introspective. And not very catchy at first. But boy has this album grown on me. And no, I am not deceiving myself. What an awfully patronising thing to suggest. This is my favourite Tull album. Every track is great. With the possible exception of 'One White Duck'.
Rating: 10

Iain Langer <[email protected]> (22.01.2000)

The title song (and opener) is not so much the centerpiece of this album, as the lead-in to its true nexus, which is the 16-minute suite entitled "Baker St. Muse". "Muse" is a culmination of themes introduced in the title song, and is Tull's most crisply expressive, most autobiographical, and most purely British statement of art and intent since the "My God" side of Aqualung.

Tikhonov Konstantin <[email protected]> (03.03.2000)

I can't believe my own eyes! Somebody wake me! Minstrel had 5?! Man, you really need to go to the psychiatrist!
Further readings of your reviews is growing my suspicions... you didn't listen Tull's music at all! Yes, somebody don't like Passion Play, I can understand it (thinking is hard work, not for everyone), but Minstrel is definitely best Tull's album after Thick As A Brick. Buddy, Chris Welch from Melody Maker is not your kin?
Of course, Minstrel is sad, angry, depressive, "too introspective" (Ian's own words), and from the introduction of title song to the last acoustic guitar's chords of "Grace" it's perfect masterpiece. The "Minstrel" itself is incredible hard (I imagine like Ritchie and Ronnie James are nervously smoking while listening Martin's brain-wracking guitar passages and Barrie's wild drumming) and Ian's lyrics is his best poetic creation. "Cold Wind To Valhalla" have nice Wagner's influences, flute on "Black Satin Dancer" rocks gentle and aggressive simultaneously, and "Requiem" is Ian's last farewell to his first marriage, one of pretty acoustic gems only Mr. Anderson could perform. Next came "One White Duck" (the less remarkable song on the album, but good anyway) and the epic "Baker Street Muse", 16 minutes of pure classic Jethro Tull (don't forget David Palmer's string quartet) closing by the "nice little tune" "Grace".
It's real tragedy, but the gold issue never been released. I prayed for it (Lord, only you know how much I prayed) but MFSL bankrupted and I heard that DCC will not release gold CDs further. Lets wait the remaster (or maybe Japanese).
So, it was fourth Jethro Ian's masterpiece, one of Tull's creative peaks (Ian said that the album is closer to his own solo work, but I think he's wrong... Yeah, I'm so dare!). Critics' fury blown once again, but as one wise man said - the dogs is barking but caravan's riding. Best songs are "Minstrel", "Requiem" and "Baker Street", rating - 9.
Oh, I almost forget! On the sleeve of Original Masters gold edition "Minstrel" authors' credits was given to Ian and Martin. I've checked all other editions where "Minstrel" appears - only Ian's name features (and Minstrel CD have no authors' credits at all). Does anybody know what it's mean? What?! You still haven't this album? Run to the musical store! Leave the computer! RUN!!!

Ben Greenstein <[email protected]> (02.06.2000)

I wouldn't give it a five, because I think even the title track is drivel. It's amazing that this is the same band as on those early albums - there are no melodies here, no instrumental diversity, just a lot of boring, bland, "Jethro Tull" brandname music. A four, on a good day. What an awful self-parody!

Philip Maddox <[email protected]> (07.07.2000)

Hey, I fell under this album's charm quite easily! It was one of the earliest Tull albums I got, and I really dug it my first time through. I still like it quite a bit. The title track is great, as all 3 parts of it are great (my favorite bit is probably still the acoustic part, but it's a close call). But here's where I differ - I think the rest of these songs are good, too! 'Cold Wind To Valhalla' has the strangest feel about it - it really has a rustic, Viking feel to it. 'Requiem' and 'One White Duck' are quite decent ballads - 'Requiem' is forgettable, but still nice, and 'One White Duck' is gorgeous. Plus, I really love 'Black Satin Dancer'. That dark riff that comes in after Ian stops singing at the beginning simply rules, and the solos really help accent it. Plus, the opening vocal melody is tops, too. I think 'Baker Street Muse' is really good as well. The opening bit is ok, but I love the 'Pig-Me And The Whore' section to death, and the acoustic parts in the middle are quite pretty. I'd give this album something between a high 8 and a low 9 - I think it's really good. I agree that Brick is better, but I certainly don't think I'm deceiving myself. This is just another one of those "love-it-or-hate-it" albums that Tull put out.

Braxton LeCroy <[email protected]> (24.08.2000)

"Baker Street Muse" is one of Tull's best pieces. Its structure is brilliant and its lyrical content mastreful. I love it. A great album too. A 9.

Thomas M. Silvestri <[email protected]> (17.12.2000)

This record is ably defended (most impressively, to my mind, by Iain Langer) on many insightful levels here, so even a career-long Tull fan like me doesn't have much to add. But I will say this to George: Do you simply not like acoustic ballads or have you just not listened to "Requiem" and "One White Duck/O...," etc. more than a few times? These are two of Ian's most brilliant and personal songs, light years away emotionally and compositionally from earlier masterpieces like "Reasons for Waiting" and "Sossity..." (which is saying a hell of a lot!) Part of their greatness is that they do NOT merely lean on standard folk progressions but experiment quite boldly with same. Maybe you're just not in tune with the album's central themes, Ian's break-up with his first wife and the downside of rock stardom, which so thoroughly inform both these songs and, of course, the entire "Baker St. Muse" suite.
[Special author note: just to raise all doubts, I'll state here that (a) I like good acoustic ballads a lot and could name several dozens of gorgeous acoustic ballads without second thought and (b) I have listened to both of the songs mentioned above for at least ten or fifteen times. It isn't a terrible problem with me - they are both listenable. But while Ian might be 'boldly experimenting' with folk progressions on both of them, I don't hear anything in these two songs, melody-wise, that would distinguish them from the far more memorable and graceful acoustic snippets off Aqualung, for instance. Yes, true enough, songs with no distinguishable or memorable vocal or instrumental melodies really bother me. And I don't view the intelligent and thoughtful lyrics as an excuse for getting rid of the melodies.]

Year Of Release: 1976
Record rating = 7
Overall rating = 10

This one has some rockin' power and memorable tunes. At least...
Best song: TOO OLD TO ROCK'N'ROLL TOO YOUNG TO DIE

This is where me and Tull fans differ big time. Because I find it to be a huge (even if only temporary, and, moreover, accidental) improvement over Minstrel, while fans (and critics alike) regard it as Tull's weakest Seventies' album, and count it as a totally dismissable anomaly in the catalog. And yet, that suits me all right, because Too Old really doesn't sound like generic late-Seventies Tull and thus, naturally, evitates all of late-Seventies Tull's faults. The tunes are relatively short, the melodies are undoubtable, and some of the emotion is quite sincere. Okay, scrap that last one - I don't really know if Ian Anderson is being more sincere on this little 'side excursion' than on the main medieval-folk-rock course, but hey, I'd personally prefer to believe what I actually believe. Makes sense to you?
The album was originally supposed to be a soundtrack to a film about an old rocker called Ray Lomas who is suffering from the change of epochs and is somewhat stuck in his past while the world is passing him by and the chicks won't go out with him any more. But then he suddenly has some strange things happening to him which I won't comment upon here, then he gets into a motorbyke accident and upon his convalescence suddenly finds out that his favourite tunes are hip again, so he succeeds in becoming a star again. At least, that's what the short comic strip found inside the album is supposed to tell us. Don't really know what the film was trying to get through - maybe it's the idea that fashion is changeable and true art never dies. Probably that. The fact which should bother us more, though, is that the music to the film (which never happened, by the way) is quite a respectable effort.
As is usual for that period, however, the title track completely overshadows every other tune on here. It's a rightful Tull classic, starting with a pathetic, but fascinating guitar pattern and featuring truly clever lyrics about the fates of old rockers (quite a serious problem back in 1976, by the way; even though Ray Lomas is really a Fifties' star, the problem of 'dinosaurism' had already begun to establish itself; Ian is clearly autobiographical at this point, and lots of people would be perfectly happy to relate, I'm sure). It's truly great, and, in what is a sublime and skilful mood change, even transforms into a speedy brassy rocker at the end, for a short while. Ian had never been so gloriously anthemic before.
Other relative standouts include the album closer - 'The Chequered Flag (Dead Or Alive)', with its 'grand' refrain (unfortunately, Ian's vocals are dug incredibly low in the mix, and this somewhat spoils the fun), the moody jazz tune 'From A Dead Beat To An Old Greaser' with a moving sax solo by David Palmer, and the pretty ballad 'Crazed Institution'. All of them soft, tender, and never bogged down by excessive instrumentation or self-indulgent pseudo-prog jamming. Suddenly, Ian sounds completely human and humane again: I can identify with these songs, a thing I'd never experienced previously since at least Thick As A Brick. But I tell you, there's not even a single really bad tune on the whole record - almost every song has at least a little to say, be it the beautiful classical guitar on 'Salamander', or the strange rhythms of 'Taxi Grab', or the weird lyrics of 'Pied Piper', or the audacious pounding of 'Quizz Kid'. Also, like I said, most of the tunes are short, and the moments which can bore you are bound to pass quickly.
Of course, Ian's come a long way since the good old early days, and his ability to offer a good hookline has dimmed - but only dimmed, and at repeated listens the melodies really come out and even start occupying these little places on these cute little racks of yours we call 'brain cells'. Nothing on here really grabs you by the scruff of yer neck (apart from the title track, of course); Martin isn't too loud, the rhythm section is a wee bit lethargic, and no solid guitar riffs at that. But the songs are written as songs, not as sonic excursions into fantasy world, and as such, hold my attention pretty well. And there's hardly anything else I can say about the individual numbers.
I think the record was really saved by the fact that it was supposed to be a soundtrack to a film about rock'n'roll. So it was supposed to be more rocking than Ian's other contemporary efforts. It would be indeed strange to see Ray Lomas accompanied by Elizabethan tunes or Celtic ballads. And that's the most obvious reason why the fans hate it so much: it's just because it doesn't fit to one's perception of 'classic Tull'. Sure. If you're looking for stuff like 'One White Duck' or 'Baker St Muse', this certainly isn't 'classic Tull'. But on the other side, it's entertaining, professional, memorable Tull, and it's also a good conceptual album (few prog-rockers ever touched these topics in the Seventies, preferring to remain within their unlimited world of fantasy). So I'm not ashamed to give it seven 'stars'. It deserves it, even though the lack of truly outstanding tunes makes it impossible to raise the rating higher.
Oh, yeah. This album also saw some major personnel changes: Jeffrey Hammond-Hammond left the band, being replaced by David Glascock (a real pity: we'll never hear these phenomenal bass lines again), and the already mentioned above Dave Palmer became the sixth official member of the band, although the reasons for this are uncertain. Did they really need a second keyboard player/orchestrator or was he admitted just for being an old acquaintance of Ian's?

Too old to rock'n'roll, too young to die, but never too late to mail your ideas

Your worthy comments:

Michael Bruun Petersen <[email protected]> (02.10.99)

I pretty much agree with the above. There are no bad songs here.
But there is also only one truly great song. ('Salamander' almost makes it two, but it's too short and too similar to the start of 'Cold Wind to Valhalla'.) Best song: 'The Chequered Flag'. Full of sadness and regret, but in a very quiet and beautiful way. Unfortunately the volume of this track is quite a bit lower than the rest of the album so you'll have to adjust your stereo whenever you get to this track.
Rating: 7

John McFerrin <[email protected]> (14.12.99)

I also found this on the same server (see John's comment on Crest Of A Knave below - G.S.), and downloaded a copy. The first time I had ever tried to listen to it was almost a year ago, and for some reason even though I had borrowed it, I just had no desire to sit through it, and shut it off in track one
This time, though, I listened to it straight through, and sure enough, not a single bad song! Not too many great songs, but every single song is good. Sure, it diverges highly from the tull-formula, but considering that that formula had given us Passion Play, Warchild, and Minstrel, that's not too much of a bad thing
7

Tikhonov Konstantin <[email protected]> (03.03.2000)

What can I say about Too Old To Rock'n'Roll? A few excellent songs in... hmmm... a not very good album. While pop-oriented listeners loves this album much more than Passion Play or Minstrel, Too Old contains a couple of weak songs ("Whizz Kid", "Big Dipper") simply ruins the album's impressions. After the Minstrel this light-weight album was an almost catastrophe. Yes, Ian and David Palmer wanted to write a parody musical for Adam Faith, yes, after the explosion of punk and Tull's late 80's reborn, the concept of the album is somewhat prophecy, yes, if we takes particular songs, they're not bad, but the whole album is incomparable with anything that Tull did before (even with This Was).
Of course, Too Old To Rock'n'Roll have his nice moments, in a matter of fact the last three songs on each side of the LP are good (Ian's vocals on "Too Old To Rock'n'Roll" and David's sax on "From A Dead Beat" are stunning), but even they couldn't save this album for me. Well, everybody had a bad days... and good times will coming very soon!
I heard that in 1996 EMI released the limited edition of gold CD but I didn't meet anybody who've seen this CD. Listen the regular edition and keep remaster in mind.
Brief conclusions - Too Old To Rock'n'Roll is not good as its predecessors, but I have it anyway. And I think that even unsuccessful Tull's album would be the masterpiece for many, many bands. (Fairport Convention or Eagles blown of proud if they could made something like that!) So take it. Best song? Indeed, the excellent "Too Old To Rock'n'Roll". Rating - 6.

Tikhonov Konstantin <[email protected]> (18.03.2000)

I can't believe it! Nobody mention it! I wrote "Whizz Kid" instead of "Quizz Kid" and I wrote it wrong deliberately 'cause I wanted to see how much attention readers pays to George's pages. Hey, Tullers, are you blind? (And I thought the readers just didn't pay much attention to Konstantin's comments:) - G.S.)

Philip Maddox <[email protected]> (07.07.2000)

This album is really underrated. In most Tull-fan polls, this album is usually the 3rd most hated (behind Under Wraps and A, but ahead of Rock Island). I don't get that at all, because I think this album is at least decent. Actually, there is one song on here I detest - 'Bad Eyed 'N' Loveless' is the epitome of tunelessness. Stupid lyrics, stupid music, stupid EVERYTHING! I hate I hate it I hate it. The rest of this album is quite decent, however. The title track and 'The Chequered Flag' are both classics. The title track tells a story in itself, even without the aid of the rest of this stuff. And 'The Chequered Flag' is among the prettiest songs Tull ever did - I especially love how the strings join the chorus at the end. 'Salamander' is great, too, but that guitar lick is VERY similar to the beginning of 'Cold Wind To Valhalla'. The rest is comprised of decent rockers ('Quizz Kid', 'Crazed Institution', etc.) and a pretty ballad ('From A Dead Beat To An Old Greaser'). You're right about that 7 in every way - some great tunes, but not enough excellent material to boost it higher. I like it better than Warchild, though. I just really hate 'Bad Eyed 'n' Loveless'.

Thomas M. Silvestri <[email protected]> (17.12.2000)

Proof of Anderson's genius is that even lesser albums like this one contain bits of total brilliance, like "Pied Piper." If you had to play one short song to give someone an idea of what Jethro Tull was about musically, lyrically, and emotionally, "...Piper" might do the job. It should also be mentioned that this album is notable for a title that has inspired endless variations in the press, often probably from journalists who've never even heard the record. My favorite example: The photo of Bill Clinton and Monica Lewinsky at a public function that was captioned, "Too Old to Rock 'n' Roll, Too Young to Lie?"

Year Of Release: 1977
Record rating = 7
Overall rating = 10

Err.. folk rock, you said? What are you - pulling my leg? It's not bad, but it's too boring to be good folk rock.
Best song: SONGS FROM THE WOOD

Beginning of the band's short-lived 'folk-rock' period, which was quite natural: medieval British music does lead onto the tricky path of folk. Just look at that photo of Ian on the album cover: he looks as if he's been living his quiet and peaceful life in some Kent or Sussex thicket for years, calmly doing his little farming and hunting business, instead of invigorating American hippy audiences with rip-roaring versions of 'Teacher' and 'Locomotive Breath'. What should one expect of such an album? Well, most of you would probably say: 'Well, it should have lotsa acoustic tracks, featuring old exotic instruments, the mandolin, the bagpipes, etc., etc., with romantic balladeering lyrics and beautiful vocal harmonies. Did I get it right?'
Well, no, you didn't. Actually, there's only one track on the whole album which comes close to this description, and it's a real gem: 'The Whistler' is a truly beautiful epic, although the lyrics are one hundred percent prog rock disguised as folk poetry. Otherwise, though, it features wonderful singing, flute and acoustic guitar, all clearly influenced by real folk music, most certainly of Celtic origin. Yup, dig it, folks, it's one of Anderson's most satisfying folk-rock efforts indeed. Check out Barriemore Barlow's amazing martial drum fills, too, the guy really swings on that one.
But none of the other songs are true folk. The title track happens to be, once again, the best cut on here, and during its first two minutes it almost manages to lure you into thinking this is going to be folk (yes, the vocal harmonies are there, to be sure), but then Martin Barre steps in with the electric and it suddenly becomes a wrathful rocker! Thanks Goodness, it works, as the guitar/flute interplay is wild enough to drive you insane but tame enough to make up for a chaotic sonic disaster; but it doesn't work on, say, the totally unbearable epic 'Pibroch (Cap In Hand)' with its cacophony of distorted guitars probably being the main 'attraction'. A nine minute megamonster, it is a pure feast of self-indulgence: perhaps the most memorable thing about it is those exact poisonous guitar lines that Martin puts into the intro section and then proceeds to repeat on every occasion, but they just sound so darn ugly and so darn sharp (in the bad sense of the word)! And apart from those, the song doesn't even come close to memorability. Standard generic Tull-style muzak.
Same goes for the utterly bland and uninteresting 'Hunting Girl' (poisonous ugly guitar tone again, and what's with those cheesy synths? Are we doing disco?), and the mini-hit ('Ring Out Solstice Bells') is sure to fade out of your memory even after an unlimited set of listens. The melodies which come straight from Minstrel (which isn't too promising, either) are being endlessly recycled with Ian clearly bothering more about lyrics. Which are usually tripe, because combining Robert Burns-style poetry with his own progressive ambitions isn't a very reasonable thing to do. Perhaps the best track out of this sea of filler is 'Velvet Green', parts of which also come close to authentic Celtic/Olde Anglo-Saxon stylistics, but while the song is rather pretty, it rarely comes around to much more than something reminiscing of a generic soundtrack to some Robin Hood movie.
I don't really want to be too harsh on the album; it is - predictably - a cult favourite among Tull lovers, and apart from Martin's guitar tone on a couple of songs and 'Pibroch's totally inadequate length, there's nothing offensive about it. At least it doesn't boast endless acoustic ramblings that would reduce it to one hundred percent atmospherics: it has rhythms and energy, and that makes the record easier to sit through. But what's the final result anyway? Apart from the title track, 'The Whistler' and a couple more pretty, but short ventures into a more folkish territory ('Jack-In-The-Green', 'Cup Of Wonder'), there's not much to praise here. So thanks a lot Ian, for adding a few more songs to the 'golden Tull' collection, but all that filler could be saved... for later.
Oh, and specially for diehards - don't waste your breath accusing me of being a 'pure rock'n'roll' fan, much less a 'pure pop' fan. Nope. I love Aqualung and Thick As A Brick dearly, and none of these albums can be called 'pure rock'n'roll'. But they were vigorous, innovative, daring and successful musical experiments. Songs From The Wood, on the other hand, is an old man's pathetic attempt at re-vitalizing the same ideas for the hundredth time by trying to put them into a slightly different context. I gotta give it to 'im: the old man hasn't wasted all his talent yet, and hey, he was just turning thirty after all. But no daring stylistic branching out (and this wasn't such an unprecedented branching out for Tull, as fans like to put it - most of the themes on here had already been explored previously on albums from Brick to Minstrel, even if on a smaller scale), anyway, no daring stylistic branching out can compensate for the LACK of CATCHY MELODIES. Did I break it to you for the first time? Guess not.
Playing dumb some more, I'll reiterate: 'Songs From The Wood' and 'The Whistler' are catchy. 'Pibroch' and 'Velvet Green' are not. Everything else falls in between, as catchiness is a relative parameter. My original rating was an overall nine, but I mellowed out and made it an overall ten. Why? Well, I just happen to love the goddamn album cover so darn much. What a cool and romantic place to think of something adventurous and emotional. Perhaps it was in this position that Ian actually composed 'let me bring you songs from the wood'... Aaahh. Nah. He probably composed 'Fire At Midnight' in this position, the dumb pathetic album closer that's less memorable than anything on here. So much for inspiration.

Songs from the wood make you feel much better? Then mail your ideas

Your worthy comments:

John McFerrin <[email protected]> (10.08.99)

Y'know, I really wanted to like this album, I really did. All these hard-core Tullers all over the net kept saying it was so great, and I wanted so much to believe them. But alas .... urrgh. I like the title track, 'Jack In The Green', and 'the Whistler'. The rest of it isn't bad persay, but not interesting at all. I guess a 6 is alright for this, but it really disappointed me a lot

Michael Bruun Petersen <[email protected]> (02.10.99)

As mentioned above, many hard-core fans are extremely fond of this one. I can understand why, but I don't agree.
The good parts are very good indeed. The title track, 'Velvet Green' and 'Fire at Midnight' are some of the very best Tull songs. And once you get past the "Lets make the guitar sound like a bagpipe" intro, 'Pibroach' is also very good. But the rest is a little too much "happy fairies in the wood" stuff for my taste. Best song: 'Velvet Green'

Richard C. Dickison <[email protected]> (17.12.99)

Well, I hate to leave the only comment I make about Ian a bad one about that A album (ARRRRGH).
Thank you Mr. Petersen for your description of this period as a series, The Woods, The Country, and The Sea. Add to that, the Minstrel In The Gallery being The City, and it seems to make some sense.
I would love to make Ian out to be more intelligent and poetic than ever so erratic.
I really do like this period of his music though, No one else was or has ever come close to this. A combination of Elizabethan stylism and rock was interesting to me, and gave him authentic reasons for his beautiful flute playing.
I agree with George that Minstrel In The Gallery was a one off tune, and a weak album.
I will also agree that Ian was very loose in keeping to his themes when he used them. But if you take this period in perspective, it really had allot going for it. With a brief revisit to these themes in Broadsword and The Beast, being the last of this successful style.
I think most people will prefer to go back to Aqualung or Thick As A Brick for their Tull music but I really find these albums to be more interesting, thats my opinion at least.

Tikhonov Konstantin <[email protected]> (03.03.2000)

Of course, Songs From The Wood is not folk rock! It's Jethro Tull's folk rock! But what'd you call a folk rock? Dylan? Byrds? Jefferson Airplane? Fairport Convention? D'you ever listen Steeleye Span's Below The Salt? Alan Stivell's Chemins De Terre? Horslips' The Tain? Clannad's second album? THIS IS FOLK ROCK!
Songs From The Wood is definitely based on folk elements and I'm tired to repeat - Ian's musical creativity is incomparable. I heard many comments "Man, they sounds like Jethro Tull!" but I can't say that just one of them was true (I must be honest, "Thomas The Rhymer" from Steeleye Span's Now We Are Six is closest and its the only one... and produced by Rena Sanderone, by the way).
Well, folk flowed onto Tull's music right since 1968 ("Christmas Song"), and eight years later Ian wrote his fifth masterpiece. The title track have amazing vocal harmonies (even Martin and David sings!) while Mr. Barre's guitar and Mr. Barlow's drums don't let you forget... this is still Jethro Tull! "Jack-In-The-Green" is acoustic folk ballad, "Cup Of Wonder" is full of Pagan images (whole album's lyrics is true folk), and "Hunting Girl" is what I call the perfect example of Jethro Tull's folk rock with frivolous lyrics, wringing guitar's and bass' passages and above it all - Mr. Country Squire himself with his mocking voice and brilliant flute. The following "Solstice Bells" holds the flag of Pagan imaginary while "Velvet Green" and "The Whistler" is classic folk masterpieces. Did I say that "Hunting Girl" is the perfect example of Jethro Tull's folk rock? Yeah, I did, but "Pibroch" is even better - dragging Martin's riffs around Ian's acoustic intermissions is genius. And who else can close the album with such wonderful ballad as "Fire At Midnight"?
This is the latest Tull's album features on gold CD. Take it while it's still available!
So let me bring you songs from the wood! Jethro Ian's first folk masterpiece is fresh and really full of life-long celebrations. Best songs... title track, "Hunting Girl", "Pibroch" and "Fire At Midnight" are my favourites but the rest is excellent too. Rating - 8.

Philip Maddox <[email protected]> (07.07.2000)

You know what? I've always absolutely LOVED this album! It's an attempt at a sort of "folk-prog" that certainly sounds unique. Nobody else put out records like this. I love the title track, 'The Whistler', 'Velvet Green', and 'Pibroch' in particular. I love the way the weird guitar noises wrap around the melody in 'Pibroch', and that flute solo in the middle is breathtaking - it may be my favorite Ian solo ever. 'Hunting Girl' is cool, too - those opening keyboard lines are awesome! The weakest tune on here (for me, at least) is 'Jack In The Green', which is ok, but uneventful. They improved the formula of that one immensely on 'One Brown Mouse'. Really, I'd have to give this a 10. It's my third favorite Tull album (behind Stand Up and Brick). This is another one of those albums that the Tull fans seem to love, but leaves most people kind of cold. I don't even really understand the appeal of the album myself - all I know is that is is extremely pretty, memorable, and consistent. And that's good enough for me.

Year Of Release: 1978
Record rating = 8
Overall rating = 11

Second time around, the attempt is much more solid: the atmosphere is quite charming.
Best song: HEAVY HORSES

Well, I feel I have to take back all the bad things I've said about that last album, because somehow Ian managed to correct most of those mistakes on here. This is yet another stab at a 'folk-prog' album, but the 'folk' is clearly prevailing over the 'prog', at long last. The more complicated, intrinsic material is, as usual, crappy (the lengthy jam session 'No Lullaby', the impenetrable travelogue 'Journeyman' and the self-indulgent anti-establishment epic 'Acres Wild' are all forgettable). The rest of the material, strange enough, is quite fine. It is mostly dedicated to praising the virtues of various living creatures (a nod to Pink Floyd's Animals, mayhaps?), with curiously straightforward lyrics that manage to evitate all of Anderson's usual crookedness. This may not appeal to some hardcore fans, but I find the general atmosphere warm, inviting and genuinely gentle, as a result. The album opener, 'And The Mouse Police Never Sleeps', kicks in with a funny, but strong flute/drum onslaught, punctuated by even more funny children's lyrics (not to mention the groovy fadeout with a lot of voices that keep on repeating the title of the song until they get completely out of breath). 'Moths' is a charming folk ballad with (finally!) an original, catchy and memorable melody. And 'One Brown Mouse' is a direct adaptation from a nursery rhyme. It's fun!
However, so as to show everybody that he's not completely off his hobby, Anderson managed to conjure what was left of the old Tull magic and shove it into the title track which might be the band's most stupendous work since Thick As A Brick. Ian's heartfelt ode to the equine race, it is highlighted by fantastic lead guitar courtesy of Mr Barre (my favourite part is the mighty intro) and manages not to bore me during all of its eight minutes: maybe this is due to various tricks played on the way, such as the tune's sudden transformation into a fast joyful jig halfway through, before it reverts back to the opening lines. It's slightly similar to 'Aqualung' in structure and sound, even though significantly more lightweight. You just have to hear it, mind you. It's arguably the best thing Anderson ever made since 1972.
So, as you might have guessed, I pretty much enjoy the whole album. Again, it does seem to deviate from the standard Tull formula, what with all the nursery rhyme lyrics and straightforward folkish ditties, but maybe that's just the reason why I love it. I need no further proof for the fact that Ian Anderson really could pull a decent tune out of his sleeve at any particular moment in his career if only he had the need or the desire to do it. Unfortunately, such moments were rather rare. Most of the time he just dragged along, bathing in the warmth of his unlimited fantasy and subjugating the unfortunate listener to whatever nonsense he might have transformed into 'songs'. A pity, this. Heavy Horses is real good. B'lieve me. Wait! I forgot 'The Rover'! It's a great song, too! Especially the refrain! When Ian howls 'cos I'm the ROUUUVER', it really sends shivers down my spine! Buy this album! Especially if you were a fan of 'Hickory Dickory Dock' when you were five years old.

No lullaby for you until you mail me your ideas

Your worthy comments:

John McFerrin <[email protected]> (19.05.99)

Heh. Very cute. Yeah, this is a nice little album. The title track is something, I must admit. I wish 'No Lullaby' was more live the liver version, where he doesn't repeat the whole song, as it's quite a good song other wise. And yeah, there's forgettable stuff, but it's a very pleasant and enjoyable album, unlike, say, Minstrel in the Gallery.

Michael Bruun Petersen <[email protected]> (02.10.99)

In many ways this is similar to Songs from the Wood. But the tone is darker and thus more to my liking. With a few exceptions the lyrics don't seem very nursery-rhyme like to me. Now go back and reread what George wrote about the title track. It's all true. Except that the final song - 'Weathercock' - is even better. A beautiful melody nicely shared by both mandolin, flute and guitars. And some of Ian's best lyrics ever.
Rating: 8. Some of the songs are only average.

Richard C. Dickison <[email protected]> (21.12.99)

Here is a real peak for Ian in this series of albums, begining with Mistrel In The Gallery and ending with Storm Watch. Now the real reason for this is Ian is finally orchestrating his music appropriately. What I mean is that on many, many of his albums you get the feeling that his schedule of an album a year was detrimental to the music. Listen close to Storm Watch where he brings in heavier rock elements, at times it sounds like the lead guitar and the drummer are over playing what could have been some beautiful passages. While right here on Heavy Horses he held back and perfected the playfulness of Songs From The Wood. The music is balanced more towards the simple strings and less towards the electric. Still, there is an edge and dynamic feel here. 'Acres Wild' sounds fine to me, sorry George, 'Moths' has beautiful guitar parts and George and I agree fully on 'The Rover'. This album is a gem for those searching for a perfect Tull album, this is as close as it gets at this stage of the game.

Tikhonov Konstantin <[email protected]> (03.03.2000)

Songs From The Wood and Heavy Horses are a twins-brothers... Who's for mother-history worth more? (Another Russian folk joke)
Well, unknown wise man said almost anything. The sixth Jethro Ian's masterpiece is another folk rock classic, so I and my friends are still choosing the best. My opinion - particular songs on Heavy Horses are stronger than songs on Songs From The Wood but as the complete album Songs From The Wood stands a little higher its follower. (This is my very personal opinion and its not made on the stone.)
So, what about songs themselves? Opening "Mouse Police" rocks with its funny lyrics, while "Acres Wild" is excellent folk ballad and "No Lullaby" is full of dark tones and angry guitar's passages (pretty good song, but a shorter live version on "Bursting Out" is much better). The most remarkable song on the first side is "Moths" with incredible harmonies and crystal lyrics (one of Ian's best sad romantic efforts). The one and only track really disappoints me is "Journeyman" - this bitter sarcastic song is absolutely out of concept, it could be good on "Stormwatch", but here...
Side two opens with nice "Rover" and another fans' (not my) favourite "One Brown Mouse" (too simple for my taste). But they all pales in brilliance of "Heavy Horses", nine minutes of pure perfection, the most beautiful song Mr. Ian Anderson even wrote. If Thick As A Brick is my all-time favourite album, "Heavy Horses" could be my all-time favourite song... [Could be... if you suddenly forget "Minstrel" or "Budapest" or "Black Sunday" or "Broadsword" or about a two dozen of other songs... my own remark to myself.] Martin's leads is amazing, Darryl Way's violin makes the gentle web while Ian's voice shines through. And "Weathercock" is another Tull's folk classic with Scottish jig passages and strong lyrics.
Bad news: no gold CD, no Japanese releases. Wait for remaster.
And in the end... Heavy Horses isn't Tull's best album, but its definitely the most beautiful Jethro Ian's masterpiece. "Moths", "Heavy Horses" and "Weathercock" are highlights. Rating - 8.

Philip Maddox <[email protected]> (07.07.2000)

Actually, I think this is a little bit of a step down from the last one, but I'd still give it a 9. 'Acres Wild' is ok, but not great. Same goes for 'Journeyman'. And 'Weathercock' never struck me very strongly, as it's buried by the epic title track. The rest of this stuff is absolutely wonderful, however. My favorites are 'One Brown Mouse' (which is beautiful), 'Rover', and 'Moths'. However, nothing stacks up against the title track - it may just be the best track Tull ever recorded - right up there with 'Black Sunday' (which I really wish was on a GOOD album instead of A). Every part of it is wonderful - the majestic chorus, the charming verses, the joyous fast part - EVERY LAST SECOND!!! The rest of the album is good, too - 'Mouse Police' is funny, 'No Lullaby' is powerful, and well... that's every song on the album. This record's really hard to find, though. Everyone NEEDS to hear that title track - words just fail me. Great song, great album.

Thomas M. Silvestri <[email protected]> (23.09.2000)

Note to Heavy Horses lovers: Can anyone explain the curiously remixed version of "Moths" that appears on the 25th anniversary box, which for some reason loses some key flute riffs and other nice details of arrangement?
P.S. That alternate mix of "Moths" and the live "Locomotive Breath/Black Sunday" medley are, of course, on the 20th and not the 25th anniversary box (my typo). But while I'm at it, I might as well add that I think the really class stuff on this box is "Overhang," "Kelpie," "Mayhem Maybe," "Motoreyes," "Down at the End of Your Road" (originally B-side of "Steel Monkey" 45) and a few other songs that, if included on Broadsword..., could've rendered it a lot more diverse and enjoyable.

Year Of Release: 1978
Record rating = 9
Overall rating = 12

The definite live prog album. Barre and company all get a chance to shine, and there's next to no filler.
Best song: FLUTE SOLO IMPROVISATION

Ah, finally, here comes the moment we've all been waiting for so long - a live album. Now, seriously, after having read the last four or five reviews, you might come to the conclusion that by the mid-Seventies Tull had completely metamorphosed into a deadly serious and deadly dull prog act with not an inch of entertainment value. Well, you're dead wrong, and it's my fault - partially. Partially, though, it is the fault of Ian Anderson who'd waited until 1978 to release this brilliant live album. It is a well-known fact, indeed, that Ian is, and always was, an incredible showman: Jethro Tull concerts were well worth watching even in the darkest times of synths and crappy generic metal riffage. The problem is, of course, that only a small part of his dazzling show is able to translate well onto a disc; like with the Stones, the Who and Fleetwood Mac, it really has to be seen to be believed. Even so, the music is awesome, and just like every professional and inspired band with enough self-respect, the Tullers played it loud, gruff and gritty on stage, often turning even throwaways into unforgettable show numbers.
This here album was recorded all over Europe, although rumour has it that most of the numbers were culled from a Frankfurt show. It's funny, by the way, how the whole deal starts with the announcer proclaiming the arrival of Tull in several different languages, as if they were combining the 'venues', but then it turns out that there's only one voice doing this, so it must be an overdub. Let's hope there are no other overdubs here, shall we? The sound is quite good, although I'm able to see some problems with the mix (Barlow's drumming, in particular, suffers on several numbers), and everybody's in top form, so there ain't no real technical problems here. And, of course, the main point is the setlist. The setlist is near-perfect! Out of the whole list, the only song that I still can hardly stand is 'Hunting Girl' from Songs On The Wood. The album opener, 'No Lullaby', though, sounds fresher, more energetic, tight and memorable, than on the original - an ideal example of how the band was able to improve its sound live.
Elsewhere, they draw heavily on the classics - 'Minstrel In The Gallery', 'Too Old To Rock'n'Roll', 'Songs From The Wood', 'Skating Away', to name a few - trimming them down mercilessly to fit into the long program (that's not bad at all) and decorating them with tasteful gimmicks, like all those swooping keyboard noises in 'Skating Away' or bits of boogie-woogie on 'Too Old To Rock'n'Roll'. They even go as far as to resuscitate 'A New Day Yesterday', and deliver a fiery, crunchy version that suddenly comes to an abrupt stop halfway through and goes into Anderson's 'Flute Solo Improvisation'. Now I say, it's worth owning the whole double album for this piece of music alone, since it really showcases Ian as the Lord God of that instrument. Nobody can play like he does - those fast, pulsating puffs and whuffs are enough to thrill a stone. And when he occasionally descends into 'God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen' and 'Bouree' on the way, wow... these are moments of Medieval Folk Catharsis. Beautiful, stupendous, exciting... what else? Nothing. Oh, yes. You may hate Ian's flute playing. In which case I'm not speaking to ya!
Other highlights include a severely abridged 'Thick As A Brick': obviously, they didn't have the time (nor the wish, I think) to perform the suite in its entirety, so they just took a small bunch of segments, but they took most of the best ones, right? I don't think Martin Barre is as hot on this version as on the Madison Square Garden version from the same year (which you can see in the 20 Years Of Jethro Tull video), but he's hot. Hot enough. And, of course, the audience goes mad on the obligatory Aqualung crowd faves: 'Cross-Eyed Mary' is especially good, with Ian drowning the venue in his sea of flute sound, but 'Locomotive Breath' comes close (I like the version on A Little Light Music a little more, but then again, that one's a little more metallic, so guess it's a tie), and the title track is no slouch, either. Funniest moment: at the end of the show, Anderson reprises 'Aqualung', and changes the lyrics to sing 'goodbye, my friends, don't you start away uneasy', and then quickly realizes he has to mumble the next line, because he's got to sing 'you poor old sods, you see it's only me'; so he sings something like 'you poor old sons, you see it's only... could be anybody?' Heh heh. You poor old sod, you just made a spectacular live album! Get it if you find it, in fact, you'd better get this one instead of a compilation. Compilations are for suckers.
Oh, and this album seems to come in two versions: personally, I have the 1-CD version which cuts away a couple of songs, while the 2-CD version has the entire original 2-LP content. But I found this one cheap, and do you really want me to go and buy the 2-CD version dear? No way!

A new day yesterday, an old day now for mailing your ideas

Your worthy comments:

John McFerrin <[email protected]> (28.08.99)

C'mon, George, be a man! Give it a 10!
Seriously, folks, George isn't kidding one bit; this album simply rules from start to finish (except for the aforementioned 'Hunting Girl,' but hey, one song doesn't ruin the whole album.) 'No Lullaby' sounds about a million times better here than on HH, the few 'filler' tracks are cute enough to be throroughly enjoyable ('Jack in the Green,' 'One Brown Mouse'), and the hits ... wow. Whatever dross may have been in the originals (Songs from the Wood, Minstrel in the Gallery) is trimmed away, leaving you with completely lean and mean rockin' machines. If Barre would play with that much energy on the records (or if Ian would let him, anyways), I'd be a hardcore fan for life. Oh, and ditto on the 'Flute Solo Improv' and the Aqualung cuts.
OH, and what the heck is the deal with the 2 CD version? I saw a copy of it in the imports section of a local CD shop, and for paying like 15 bucks more, you only get 3 MORE SONGS. WTF??!!!! And two of them are less than two minutes long (though the live 'Sweet Dream') might be cool. Get the single CD version if at all possible, people.

Tikhonov Konstantin <[email protected]> (03.03.2000)

IDIOTS!!! STUPID IDIOTS!!! How can you say that castrated version of Bursting Out is better? D'you listen the original? Oh Saint Ian, forgive 'em! They don't understand what they says...
Oh yeah, I got it, hard life in the capitalist countries, the working class people must save the each cent... (It never occurred to you, buddy, that some people just don't treat Ian Anderson as Father, Son and the Holy Ghost in one person like you do? - G.S.) Off the jokes, man, the US CD edition of Bursting Out is real piece of shit! It's not including three songs - excellent version of "Sweet Dream", Martin's and Barrie's solo "Conundrum" (I calls it "Cannon Drum") and Martin's little nice guitar piece "Quatrain" and that's not all! Some brainless Yankees cuts almost all Ian's stage banter... jocks, introductions, comments - everything! They turns an unforgettable concert into the dead meat! Pass the next thousand series of Star Wars or Titanic and buy yourself a UK 2CD release (around 20-25 bucks, by the way)!
So what about the concert? IT'S AWESOME!!! THE BEST LIVE PERFORMANCE THAT I'VE EVER HEARD!!! Ian and friends wasn't Technique Gods as Blackmore or Wakeman (sorry, Ian, Martin, John, John again, David and Barry) but together they could wipe any other band! Only Rainbow Live In Germany is comparable with its almighty guitar's power, wall-crashing drums and unbelievable vocals!
Now look what we have on the normal, unraped edition. The show begins with a few energetic introductions shouted by Claude Nobs (band's old friend), the musicians warms their fingers and tears down into the smashing version of "No Lullaby". Performance, sound, technique - everything is great! As Claude said, sit back, relax and make yourself comfortable to enjoy an evening with Jethro Tull! Next comes "Sweet Dream" and its acoustic intermission is wonderful. The crowd is full of enthusiasm and so the musicians. Now lets have a break and lets Ian introduce you a band: Martin, John, John again, Barrie and David (he's gone for a piss but he'll be back in a minute). Its time to a couple of acoustic numbers - "Skating Away", "Jack-In-The-Green" and "One Brown Mouse". I can't say that I fell in love with originals but here they are damn good. And don't miss Ian's cruel wit! But there's no place to jokes - though heavy blues' riffs of "New Day" we comes to the flute solo improvisation, "God Rest Ye Merry" and "Bouree". Nobody can't play on the flute like Mr. One-Legged Flautist can! My hand to God! The crowd roars while "Songs From The Wood" voices leads us to the last first part's gem, "Thick As A Brick". D'you think nobody can play this better? Yes, nobody but Tull. Wait only a four months and on October 9th you'll listen it.
OK, quickly change the disc, and now we got... "Hunting Girl"! Jesus, Martin's guitar and John's bass passages are fantastic! Silly sods, of course I sing about some other... OF COURSE! "Too Old To Rock'n'Roll, Too Young To Die"! So its time to let Ian rest for awhile - its time for "Conundrum". Clive's Carnegie's solo I loves more but angry Barrie is ultimate Tull's drummer anyway. He'll show yourself when "Minstrel In The Gallery" looks down upon the smiling faces... And here we come! The side four of the LP are Aqualung masterpieces. Blitzing "Cross Eyed Mary" fades into accurate "Quatrain"... The show's over? No, no, no! We wants the encore! We wants Aqualung! And here's His Majesty - powerful, fast, energetic! Martin is God! Barrie is God! And God is Ian! The crowd still cries! More! More! More! And John sits to the piano and begins... "Locomotive Breath"! The band is real locomotive, nobody will stop 'em! Nobody could even try! The hardest Tull's performance you heard in your life! Enjoy!
Well, it almost done. I've already said about releases (Goddamn! No gold! No Japanese! Goddamn!), so let me tell you about my lovings - "No Lullaby", "Sweet Dream", "Hunting Girl" and the astonishing encore. The seventh Jethro Ian's masterpiece gets 9 (only 'cause Thick As A Brick got 10).

Tikhonov Konstantin <[email protected]> (18.03.2000)

I'm sorry, man, I didn't know that you have a problems with a sense of humour. Next time I will write something like that: It's a joke, George. You can laugh. Open your mouth and say: ha! ha! ha! Actually, I loved the Trinity idea. The Father is Ian, the Son is Martin, but who's the Holy Ghost? Maybe Mr. Tull himself? (?????? No, it's not me who's going nuts - G. S.)

Philip Maddox <[email protected]> (09.07.2000)

I have the 2-CD set, which has a killer rendition of 'Sweet Dream', an ok instrumental called 'Conundrum' which eventually turns into a drum solo, and a cute, short jig called 'Quatrain'. I recommend that one just because I hate it when people screw with original albums and cut material off (like the old Beatles and Rolling Stone American releases). I don't care on albums like Living In The Past because those songs can be found elsewhere, but chopping off songs is kinda dumb - they could have made it a budget 2-CD set, like Yesshows. That problem aside, though, this is a killer live album - it's hard to beat tracks like 'One Brown Mouse', 'Minstrel In The Gallery', 'Cross Eyed Mary' and 'Thick As A Brick'. Plus, that flute solo is amazing, as Ian's solos generally are. I even like 'Hunting Girl' quite a bit. I'd give this a really high 9, just because it's hard for me to give a live album a perfect score (Live At Leeds excepted). This is still the best live Tull album by a good margin - if you see it next to A Little Light Music, PLEASE get this!

Year Of Release: 1979
Record rating = 6
Overall rating = 9

Aw shucks, not again. Apocalypsis a la Barre/Anderson interplay? Doesn't sound frightening at all.
Best song: ELEGY

With Heavy Horses probably being regarded by everybody as a practical joke, Ian decided it was time to get serious once again. So he concocted a conceptual album, built around the subject of the end of the world. The planet has run out of resources, the 'dark ages' are coming, everything is thrown into chaos, etc., etc. A polar bear prepares to annihilate an oil refinery or something on the back cover, while Ian Anderson (in the persona of the deity Stormwatch) is observing the panorama through binoculars on the front. Very well. But what about the music?
Well, even though this concept does seem to be a natural prolongation of the line developed on Songs From The Wood and especially Heavy Horses (which is the opposition of a pure, 'natural' world to the modern technological nightmare; hey, are we speaking Kinks?), the music doesn't resemble the one on those two albums not one weeny-meeny bit. The folk elements, be they pseudo-folk (as on SFTW) or genuine, childlike-folk (as on HH), are entirely gone, and the good old 'Tull formula' is back. Which means at least half of the songs are unlistenable. The two long epics ('Dark Ages' and 'Flying Dutchman') are simply horrible; even worse, Ian has subconsciously begun to seriously recycle his past successes (the fast part on 'Dark Ages' looks like it's been lifted directly from 'Play In Time'; not that 'Play In Time' is a good song, if ya know what I be meanin'). And a couple of shorter tracks are no better ('North Sea Oil', 'Something's On The Move'). The novelty factor is quite high, too: the orchestrated ballad 'Home', for example, which could have been a perfect number in the hands of Elton John, but in the hands of Ian Anderson it does look a little weird. So is the comedy instrumental 'Warm Sporran', which paves the road to the even more loathsome 'Pine Marten's Jig'. Ah well. Back to front again. This stuff isn't just loooong and dreary and boooring like the stuff on Minstrel, nor is it particularly repellent as the worst moments on Songs. It's just not enlightening. The long tracks just drag on and on and on, with the band never knowing when is the right time to shut up, and the shorter songs have no melodies. Pathetic. I hope it didn't sell.
The good news is that, like any standard Seventies' Tull album, it has its small quantities of prime stuff. Personally, I like the catchy, upbeat refrain of 'Orion', though it's no great shakes. But at least two of the songs here gotta range among the classics (note that this is the first album since Stand Up with no title track, so I can't even call it a 'one-song album'. Okay, a 'two-song album' will do). These are the dark, utterly pessimistic and deeply bitter Celtic ballad 'Dun Ringill', with its brilliant use of echo to emphasize the sound of the main line 'goodbye, Dun Ringill', and the closing instrumental 'Elegy' which is no 'Bouree' but is still the second best instrumental recorded by the band; it builds on a deeply moving melody that gets carried either by Ian's flute or Barre's guitar with a solid touch of orchestration and provides at least a very comfortable ending to the album. These two tracks will at least make sure your money isn't just thrown away.
The album was the last of the classic Tull line-up. After this, bassist Glascock died of an infection and the band parted on holiday. Not that they broke up on intention: it seems that Ian wanted to do a solo album, but the managers (the scum!) persuaded him to dub it a Jethro Tull album, so he just ended up firing everybody but Barre and getting on with other members. The group became a revolving door in no time, and, frankly speaking, I shouldn't even be reviewing it. But, anyway, since the band, no matter who played in it, was always just a group of technical support for carrying out Ian's ideas, I might go ahead and continue. Even though there's little to praise about later period Tull.

Something's on the move! Ain't it you mailing me your ideas?

Your worthy comments:

Michael Bruun Petersen <[email protected]> (02.10.99)

This is a natural successor to Songs from the Wood and Heavy Horses. I don't think Ian had this in mind, but you could consider this to be the third part of a trilogy. (the woods, the country, the sea).
Anyway - Stormwatch is dark, foreboding and very, very good. Every single track is good. It has the best "worst song" of any Tull album. ('Something's on the Move').
And now a little nitpicking. The main line of 'Dun Ringill' is "down by Dun Ringill" and not "goodbye Dun Ringill.
Best song: 'Elegy'
Rating: 9

Richard C. Dickison <[email protected]> (21.12.99)

Interesting how you see him leaving behind this unique style he had created in this series of albums.
Here he has decided to start bringing a more rock sound to his music. The bad choice was he did not orchestrate it into the album, at times I cringe, the guitarist almost sounds like he wanted to be on some other band, and was that drummer going deaf?
It has it's moments though, 'Dun Ringill' echo's through nicely, 'Elegy' is perfect. But these moments are harder to come by, some songs start off right but lead to back into some really mucky playing, again the guitarist and that drummer.
Oh, let's not forget the keyboardist but George has stated that problem a few times, right?
He would re-visit the things that were wrong here in Broadsword and The Beast, and in my opinion correct a majority, but why did he not just spend more time listening to some of this stuff he obviously tossed out with out much thought. He still needed to work on some of the effects too. They only helped create more murk and sounded tacked on, Ian use those volume controls next time.
Anyway, again the saving grace here is that Ian had created a sound truly unique and seperate from what most of the prog movement was doing and obviouly he had more fun than allot of the other bands.

Tikhonov Konstantin <[email protected]> (03.03.2000)

Oh, Stormatch... the sad album and the sad story. John Glascock untimely died from heart disease after the unsuccessful surgery (rest in peace, John), so old good Tull couldn't be exist no more. John's close friend Barrie left after the followed tour, Ian began his solo project... well, that's another tale.
I've read your review almost without any interest (you're becoming very predictable), so lets see what we have on the album. Anti-utopia? Why not? OK, last folk effort is depressive (maybe too depressive), but they're still Tull, they're still masters, you cannot drinks the skills, so why d'you think its bad? Aggressive "North Sea Oil" drives ahead (in Tull's folk rock capital word is ROCK) while "Orion" and gently orchestrated "Home" lets you rest before apocalyptic "Dark Ages" rise with its high-speed Martin's guitar and Ian's scornful lyrics. Next came jazzy "Warm Sporran" and I think its too much banal optimistic before I found another, very funny (and dirty) interpretation - probably Ian wanted to say that Ices Are Coming, so, boys, you need to keep your balls warm... OK, OK, its weird, I'm only joking! "Something On The Move" was light-weight for me too, but after such overrated bullshit like Titanic it can be the joyful requiem for DiCaprio (I means Titanic drowned and I'm so happy!). Sadness still flows through dark elegant "Old Ghosts", "Dun Ringill" and "Flying Dutchman" and really materialises into one of the gentlest Tull's tunes, David Palmer's "Elegy". A few months later this unearthly melody (dedicated to dying David's father) became a symbolic farewell to John Glascock and the good old days of good old Tull. For many, many fans things were never the same again.
Pass the editions (no gold, no Japanese).
The final word... last classic work of classic seventies' Tull... if you're not agree, re-listen the album. Best songs here are first three and "Elegy". Rating - seven.

Philip Maddox <[email protected]> (09.07.2000)

I'd slap an 8 on this one. A lot of Tull fans see this as the conclusion of a "folk" trilogy, which I don't see, as this isn't folk music at all - even Ian said that this was never intended to sound like the last two albums. But I still think there's a lot of good stuff on here. I agree that the best songs are 'Elegy' (which David Palmer wrote - imagine, a non-Ian song on a Tull record!) and 'Dun Ringill' (which is one of my all time favorites). I really like 'North Sea Oil', too. 'Home' is kinda pretty too. I don't even mind the long songs on here - they aren't mind blowing, but they're certainly interesting and at least good. My least favorite song on here is probably 'Something's On The Move', which bores me more in 3 minutes than either of the long tracks. This was an important album for Tull - thing were quite different after this one came out (though Broadsword probably could have come out in the seventies minus the electronics).
And just to be obnoxious, I'm gonna point out that there was no title track on Benefit, either. Heh heh heh.

David Lyons <[email protected]> (16.12.2000)

Okay, okay, right. I 've just about had enough. I've read all these reviews, and all of Mr Konstantins wildly delusional comments, and now he accuses George of being predictable? People in glass houses, really. Or perhaps it ought to be amended, in this case, to 'people in padded cells'. At least, for the sake of humanity, I hope thats where he is. The Ian Anderson Home For The Fanatically Bewildered. What must it be like to adore one single band soooooo much? Makes me shudder just to imagine. And, for the record, I really quite like Jethro Tull, as I mentioned earlier.