24 June, 2021

Spin me back down the years and the days of my youth: Discovering Jethro Tull

Jethro Tull (or their social media person) recently asked fans via Twitter for stories about discovering the band's music. Since I rather like their music and have for a while now, I thought I'd write a little something about it.

Like a lot of people my age, I first encountered Jethro Tull on classic rock radio in the first half of the 1980s. The way I recall it, stations played mostly songs from Aqualung – the title track, of course, plus "Locomotive Breath", "Hymn 43", and "Cross Eyed Mary". I remember also hearing "Living in the Past" and "Bungle in the Jungle". And I wouldn't doubt that I also heard "Bouree" and that edit of "Thick as a Brick" which is basically the first 2 or 3 minutes of the piece. Perhaps "Teacher" was in there as well. Now that I think about it, I surely heard "Skating Away on the Thin Ice of the New Day" too. Basically, it was the standard classic rock fare.


And so while I had "discovered" Tull's music on the radio as I was running headlong into my teens, it wasn't until 1987 that I looked beyond the appetizers being served on the radio and into their back catalog in search of the main course.

By that year I had been a Genesis fan for about 5 years and was busy exploring other progressive rock bands. More than one elder proghead had given me the "If you like old Genesis, then you need to check out…" speech. It was an interesting year as prog stalwarts Yes, Pink Floyd, Rush, and, of course, Jethro Tull all released albums that year. I recall seeing ads for Tull's latest, Crest of a Knave, in Kerrang and other music zines that I read at the time and at some point I said to myself, "Now is the time for me to get into Jethro Tull."

I began by getting a copy of Crest of a Knave. It seemed that most older progheads I encountered at this time were more interested in what the band had done in the 70s. Sure, I was interested in that too but I was also keen to hear what they were up to now because they weren't a band from some distant point in my past – I was just a teenager – but a band that was still around flexing their creative muscles.

While I don't recall exactly how long it took, I suspect it was only a matter of days before I had thoroughly consumed, absorbed, and fallen in love with Crest of a Knave.

Sure, Ian Anderson's voice was quite different from what I was accustomed to. I was unaware throat problems in 1985/86 had narrowed his range and made it raspier, grittier. Having never heard Under Wraps at this time, I had no conception of Crest of a Knave as having any atavistic qualities to it. Martin Barre's guitar had never played second fiddle to keyboards, to my ears.

While the drum machine and synths on "Steel Monkey" brought ZZ Top's mid-80s stuff to mind, the album as a whole just sounded like the quirky Jethro Tull that I had enjoyed on the radio as it had plenty of loud electric guitar that was usually doing some twisty turny pas de deux with the flute. There was the expected acoustic guitar but also a guest violin courtesy of some gentleman named Ric Sanders. A clutch of more straight-ahead rockers was complemented by songs like "Budapest" and "Farm on the Freeway" which balanced acoustic and electric, fast and slow, and loud and soft. These longer songs took melodic detours and went the scenic route full of dynamic playing.


The next step for me on my journey into Tull was to return to the source of many a musical discovery for me – my older brother's tape collection. Eager for more flute-laden proggy goodness, I scoured it and eventually found a tape with 1982's The Broadsword and the Beast on one side and Thick as a Brick on the other. I immediately took to Broadsword with its loud guitars sharing space with synthesizers plus the occasional mandolin. Thick as a Brick took longer but I eventually fell under the spell of its bouncy folk melodies and crazy time signatures.

At this point I was completely hooked and began to seek out and devour the rest of Tull's albums. That fall I went to see them in Chicago with a friend of mine who was also a prog neophyte trying to catch up with the back catalog of many a progressive rock band. While there were no codpieces to be had, it was rockin'. The setlist had a good variety of songs from the band's career and didn't neglect the new stuff which sat well alongside 70s classics.

I would go on to gobble up the rest of Tull's records, see the band/Ian Anderson in concert several more times, and write a goofy essay in which I attempted to tease out some meaning from Anderson's lyrics (or at least something meaningful to me). I was even allowed backstage before one of their shows and got to have Martin Barre and Shona Anderson poke fun at me – all in good jest, of course. It's hard to believe it's been 34 years since I got into Jethro Tull and discovered their music in a meaningful way.


It was only a few years ago that I was able to find a copy of that very first Tull show I attended back in 1987, along with the opening set by Fairport Convention whose fiddle player was one Ric Sanders. Here's "Farm on the Freeway" from that very concert.


The full setlist from that night:
Songs From The Wood
Thick As A Brick/Steel Monkey
Farm On The Freeway/Heavy Horses
Living In The Past/Serenade To A Cuckoo
Budapest
Hunting Girl
The Waking Edge (intro)/'Classical' Instrumental/Keyboard Solo/Drum Solo
Wond'ring Aloud
Skating Away...
Jump Start
Too Old To Rock'N'Roll...
Aqualung
Locomotive Breath/Thick As A Brick (reprise)
Wind Up

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