Jethro+tull

Following the end of the Stormwatch tour in early 1980, Jethro Tull would undergo its largest line-up shuffle to date, resulting in Barriemore Barlow, John Evan and Dee Palmer all leaving the band. Jethro Tull was left with Anderson (the only original member), Martin Barre and Dave Pegg.

To some, Jethro Tull will always be associated with Ian Anderson's flute playing and more rocking, arena-worthy moments. But like Led Zeppelin, Tull was all about balancing their sonic mood swings; they could effortlessly transform between being loud & proud rock & rollers to more tranquil folksmen in the blink of an eye. The 2007 compilation, The Best of Acoustic Jethro Tull is self-explanatory, since the 24-track set focuses solely on the "unplugged" side of Tull. But some of Tull's finest moments were acoustic guitar-based, including such early classics as "Mother Goose," "Skating Away (On the Thin Ice of the New Day)," and "Fat Man" (here's a fun game to play: the next time you watch the movie Boogie Nights, try to spot the scene that uses the latter song)…

Also known as Jethro Tull: This Is the First 20 Years. It consists of interviews with fans, record company executives and frontman Ian Anderson giving a rough chronology of the band, interspersed with clips from music videos and live performances…

Jethro Tull were an English rock band formed in Luton, Bedfordshire in 1967. Initially playing blues rock, the band soon developed its sound to incorporate elements of British folk music and hard rock to forge a progressive rock signature. The band was led by vocalist/flautist/guitarist Ian Anderson, and featured a revolving door of lineups through the years including significant members such as longtime guitarist Martin Barre, keyboardist John Evan, drummers Clive Bunker, Barriemore Barlow, and Doane Perry, and bassists Glenn Cornick, Jeffrey Hammond, and Dave Pegg…

Released just as punk was taking hold on the public's imagination in America and making groups like Jethro Tull seem like dinosaurs on their way to extinction, Bursting Out became a seemingly perpetual denizen of the cutout bins for years afterward. However, it happened to be a good album, a more-than-decent capturing of a live Tull concert from Europe. The sound is remarkably good, given the group's arena rock status at the time, and the repertoire is a solid representation of the group's history, going all the way back to "A New Day Yesterday" from their second album and up through 1978's Heavy Horses, with stops along the way for "Bouree," "Aqualung," "Locomotive Breath," "Cross-Eyed Mary," and a compact reprise of Thick as a Brick.

While audiophile editions of Thick as a Brick, Aqualung, Living in the Past, and A Passion Play are easily obtainable, Tull's very earliest albums have languished in substandard editions on CD for ten years. This triple-CD box from England, part of EMI's 100th Anniversary reissue series, rectifies the problem, featuring newly remastered versions of This Was, Stand Up, and Benefit, each packaged in a miniature re-creation of the original LP sleeve…

Listen to this collection, put together to capitalize on the explosive growth in the group's audience after Aqualung, and it's easy to understand just how fine a group Jethro Tull was in the early '70s. Most of the songs, apart from a few heavily played album tracks ("Song for Jeffrey," etc.) and a pair of live tracks from a 1970 Carnegie Hall show, came off of singles and EPs that, apart from the title song, were scarcely known in America, and it's all so solid that it needs no apology or explanation. Not only was Ian Anderson writing solid songs every time out, but the group's rhythm section was about the best in progressive rock's pop division. Along with any of the group's first five albums, this collection is seminal and essential to any Tull collection, and the only compilation by the group that is a must-own disc.

Jethro Tull’s 1970 classic Benefit will be celebrated in a brand-new 4CD/2DVD set, featuring remixes by Steven Wilson, an abundance of previously unreleased material, packaged within a deluxe hardback book, containing 100 pages of commentary from numerous contributors alongside hordes of images of the band creating and performing their first million-selling album. Benefit (The 50th Anniversary Enhanced Edition) will be out on 5th November. Following the successes This Was (1968) and Stand Up (1969), Jethro Tull returned in 1970 with their third studio album in as many years. Benefit (The 50th Anniversary Enhanced Edition) contains a copious amount of expanded material, building upon the 2013 Steven Wilson remixes. CD3 contains a previously unreleased Steven Wilson remix of Jethro Tull performing at Tanglewood in 1970. Further to that, CD4 contains a newly remastered version of a concert at The Aragon Ballroom in 1970 in mono.

This celebration of Jethro Tull’s tenth album follows a similar pattern to previous reissues, with the first disc containing a Steven Wilson remix followed by some ‘associated recordings’ including the previously unreleased Old Aces Die Hard and Working John, Working Joe. CDs two and three offer 22 track live tracks, recorded on the Songs From The Wood Tour across two American dates, (Boston on 6 December 1977 and Maryland on 21 November 1977). These unheard tracks have been remixed to stereo by Jakko Jakszyk and are completely unheard. There are two DVDs in this set. The first contains a 5.1 surround sound mix (DTS and Dolby 5.1) and 96/24 LPCM stereo versions of the both the original and Steven Wilson remixed version of Songs From The Wood. This DVD also features selected associated tracks, as well as various quad mixes and flat transfers. The other DVD contains video footage from that Maryland gig of 21 November 1977. The audio has been mixed to stereo and 5.1.