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Jethro Tull: Aqualung

 A l b u m   D e t a i l s


Label: Chrysalis Records
Released: 1971.03.31
Time:
 43:35
Category: Progressive Rock
Producer(s): See Artists ...
Rating:
Media type: CD
Web address: www.j-tull.com
Appears with: Ian Anderson, Martin Barre
Purchase date: 1988.10.20
Price in €: 14,99





 S o n g s ,   T r a c k s


AQUALUNG
[1] Aqualung (Jennie Anderson/Ian Anderson) - 6:31
[2] Cross-Eyed Mary (Ian Anderson) - 4:09
[3] Cheap Day Return (Ian Anderson) - 1:23
[4] Mother Goose (Ian Anderson) - 3:52
[5] Wond'ring Aloud (Ian Anderson) - 1:56
[6] Up To Me (Ian Anderson) - 3:18

MY GOD
[7] My God (Ian Anderson) - 7:10
[8] Hymn 43 (Ian Anderson) - 3:18
[9] Slipstream (Ian Anderson) - 1:13
[10] Locomotive Breath (Ian Anderson) - 4:25
[11] Wind-Up (Ian Anderson) - 5:42

 A r t i s t s ,   P e r s o n n e l


IAN ANDERSON - Lead Vocals, Flute, Acoustic Guitar, Producer
MARTIN BARRE - Electric Guitar, Descant Recorder
CLIVE BUNKER - Drums, Percussion
JOHN EVAN - Piano, Organ, Mellotron
JEFFREY HAMMOND-HAMMOND - Bass Guitar, Alto Recorder, Odd Voices

TERRY ELLIS - Producer
JOHN BURNS - Engineer

 C o m m e n t s ,   N o t e s


1971 LP Reprise 2035
1990 CD Chrysalis 21044
1991 LP Capitol 21044
1992 CS Capitol 21044
1992 CD Capitol 21044
1995 CD Chrysalis F2-21044
1995 CS Chrysalis F4-21044
1997 CD DCC 1105
1997 LP DCC 2030
1998 CD EMI 95401
1999 CD Chrysalis 95401



Released April ’71, Ian Anderson composed this concept album around the theme of an organised religion’s role in society. No rock band had ever dealt with the subject so thoroughly. One of the most cohesive concept albums ever recorded, ‘Aqualung’ featured amazing use of dynamics and Tull’s least subtle and most complicated music to date. Jeffery Hammond-Hammond was brought in as the new Tull bassist. Martin Barre, John Evans and Clive Bunker completed the fourth Tull line-up that recorded this album.
At the end of a brief US tour, Bunker left to get married and form a band called ‘Jude’ with Robin Trower. Ian Anderson recruited Barriemore Barlow. Barlow remained drummer for the next eight years. ‘Aqualung’ took the world by storm, reaching No.4 in the British charts and becoming the band’s first top ten US release at No.7.

J-Tull.com



After veering sharply from the blues inluences of their debut, This Was, Jethro Tull's sound quickly coalesced around jazz-tinged English folk influences and the antics of frontman/flautist Ian Anderson. But it was guitarist Martin Barre's swaggering riff off the title track of the band's fourth album that would become Tull's indelibly clichéd trademark-and the band's entrée into a long reign as arena-rock perennials. But there's a lot more to Aqualung than the riffage of that cut and its cousins, "Cross-Eyed Mary" and "Locomotive Breath." In an era when pseudo-Christian spirituality was a de rigueur, if cheap, musical commodity (from the overblown operatics of Jesus Christ Superstar to one-hit pop wonders such as "Spirit in the Sky" and "Put Your Hand in the Hand"), Anderson and company openly challenged the value of organized religion with a thematic album savvy enough to layer its thought-provoking lyrics between heavy strata of FM-friendly guitar bedrock. A cliché, perhaps; a landmark, no doubt. And a record many maintain is still Tull's finest hour.

Jerry McCulley - Amazon.com



Aqualung ('71) ist das bekannteste Jethro-Tull-Album und das erste, mit dem sich Ian Anderson, Martin Barre und ihre ständig wechselnde Begleitmannschaft voll und ganz in der Avantgarde-Rock-Szene etablieren konnten. Der sehr blues- und folklastige Ansatz der frühen Jahre ist einem sehr viel breiteren Stilspektrum gewichen, das aber trotz Andersons hohem musikalischem Anspruch nie kopflastig wirkt. Im Vergleich zum ebenfalls schon in diese Richtung tendierenden Album Benefit ('70) ist das Songwriting durchgehend besser. Der Titeltrack, "Cross-Eyed Mary" und "Locomotive Breath" gehören zu den zehn grandiosesten Tull-Songs aller Zeiten und vereinen auf geniale Weise eingängige Melodien mit vertrackten instrumentalen Unterbauten und mächtig in die Beine gehenden Rhythmen. Von den ausufernden Epen späterer Jahre ist hier noch nichts zu spüren, und dennoch glänzen die Engländer mit enorm progressiven Songideen, die auch beim 20. Durchlauf noch neue Nuancen offenbaren. Ein echter Klassiker der Rock-Geschichte!

Michael Rensen - Amazon.de



Yes were sleeker, Emerson Lake and Palmer were grander, and Genesis more ingenious. But Jethro Tull were the most frazzled British art rockers of their day. That is never more clear than on the flighty Aqualung, the band's biggest U.S. hit. The title piece begins with some hoary singing from frontman Ian Anderson before everything gets swept up into a fast forest groove. "Cross-Eyed Mary" ushers in the flute-over-drums textures that became a Tull hallmark; some funk anchors the verses, which dovetail into a cranky singalong chorus. There's a prevailing woodwind litheness throughout the album, cut by mad piano runs and the granite solidity of the drums. A tension is in the background - even quiet folk pieces such as "Cheap Day Return" seem to be under some kind of inescapable pressure. But it's on the hell-bent "Locomotive Breath" that Tull bring their frazzle front and center, its barrage of clip-clop rhythms doubling and tripling themselves before Anderson can glide off onto one of his harried flute excursions.
Aqualung was a bear to make, Anderson has said, because of the difficulty of hearing all the parts in a Seventies studio. Today, it's the sparse quality of Aqualung you notice - the handmade sound of a band working to convey the kind of anxiety that now gets slapped onto tape with much more booming technology but far less care.

JAMES HUNTER - RS 879 October 11, 2001
© Copyright 2001 RollingStone.com



Released at a time when a lot of bands were embracing pop-Christianity ( a la Jesus Christ, Superstar), Aqualung was a bold statement for a rock group, a pro-God anti-church tract that probably got lots of teenagers wrestling with these ideas for the first time in their lives. This was the album that made Jethro Tull a fixture on FM radio, with riff-heavy songs like "My God," "Hymn 43," "Locomotive Breath," "Cross-Eyed Mary," "Wind Up," and the title track. And from there, they became a major arena act, and a fixture at the top of the record charts for most of the 1970's. Mixing hard-rock and folk melodies with Ian Anderson's dour musings on faith and religion (mostly how organized religion had restricted man's relationship with God), the record was extremely profound for a No. 7 chart hit, one of the most cerebral albums ever to reach millions of rock listeners. Indeed, from this point on, Anderson and company were compelled to stretch the lyrical envelope right to the breaking point. As a compact disc, Aqualung has gone through numerous editions, mostly owing to problems finding an original master tape when the CD boom began. When the album was issued by Chrysalis through Columbia Records in the mid-1980's, the source tape was an LP production master, and the first release was criticized for thin, tinny sound; Columbia remastered it sometime around 1987 or 1988, in a version with better sound. Chrysalis later switched distribution to Capitol-EMI, and they released a decent sounding CD that is currently available. Chrysalis also issued a 25th anniversary edition in 1996.

Bruce Eder - All Music Guide
 

 L y r i c s

Aqualung

Sitting on a park bench -
eyeing ittle girls with bad intent.
Snot running down his nose -
greasy fingers smearing shabby clothes.
Drying in the cold sun -
Watching as the frilly panties run.
Feeling like a dead duck -
spitting out pieces of his broken luck.
Sun streaking cold -
an old man wandering lonely.
Taking time
the only way he knows.
Leg hurting bad,
as he bends to pick a dog-end -
he goes down to the bog
and warms his feet.

Feeling alone -
the army's up the rode
salvation à la mode and
a cup of tea.
Aqualung my friend -
don't start away uneasy
you poor old sod, you see, it's only me.
Do you still remember
December's foggy freeze -
when the ice that
clings on to your beard is
screaming agony.
And you snatch your rattling last breaths
with deep-sea-diver sounds,
and the flowers bloom like
madness in the spring.


Cross-Eyed Mary

Who would be a poor man, a beggarman, a thief -
if he had a rich man in his hand.
And who would steal the candy
from a laughing baby's mouth
if he could take it from the money man.
Cross-eyed Mary goes jumping in again.
She signs no contract
but she always plays the game.
Dines in Hampstead village
on expense accounted gruel,
and the jack-knife barber drops her off at school.
Laughing in the playground - gets no kicks from little boys:
would rather make it with a letching grey.
Or maybe her attention is drawn by Aqualung,
who watches through the railings as they play.
Cross-eyed Mary finds it hard to get along.
She's a poor man's rich girl
and she'll do it for a song.
She's a rich man stealer
but her favour's good and strong:
She's the Robin Hood of Highgate -
helps the poor man get along.


Cheap Day Return

On Preston platform
do your soft shoe shuffle dance.
Brush away the cigarette ash that's
falling down your pants.
And you sadly wonder
does the nurse treat your old man
the way she should.
She made you tea,
asked for your autograph -
what a laugh.


Mother Goose

As I did walk by Hampstead Fair
I came upon Mother Goose - so I turned her loose -
she was screaming.
And a foreign student said to me -
was it really true there are elephants and lions too
in Piccadilly Circus?
Walked down by the bathing pond
to try and catch some sun.
Saw at least a hundred schoolgirls sobbing
into hankerchiefs as one.
I don't believe they knew
I was a schoolboy.

And a bearded lady said to me -
if you start your raving and your misbehaving -
you'll be sorry.
Then the chicken-fancier came to play -
with his long red beard (and his sister's weird:
she drives a lorry).

Laughed down by the putting green -
I popped `em in their holes.
Four and twenty labourers were labouring -
digging up their gold.
I don't believe they knew
that I was Long John Silver.

Saw Johnny Scarecrow make his rounds
in his jet-black mac (which he won't give back) -
stole it from a snow man.


Wond'ring Aloud

Wond'ring aloud -
how we feel today.
Last night sipped the sunset -
my hands in her hair.
We are our own saviours
as we start both our hearts beating life
into each other.
Wond'ring aloud -
will the years treat us well.
As she floats in the kitchen,
I'm tasting the smell
of toast as the butter runs.
Then she comes, spilling crumbs on the bed
and I shake my head.
And it's only the giving
that makes you what you are.


Up To Me

Take you to the cinema
and leave you in a Wimpy Bar -
you tell me that we've gone to far -
come running up to me.
Make the scene at Cousin Jack's -
leave him put the bottles back -
mends his glasses that I cracked -
well that one's up to me.
Buy a silver cloud to ride -
pack the tennis club inside -
trouser cuffs hung far too wide -
well it was up to me.
Tyres down on your bicicle -
your nose feels like an icicle -
the yellow fingered smoky girl
is looking up to me.
Well I'm a common working man
with a half of bitter - bread and jam
and if it pleases me I'll put one on you man -
when the copper fades away.
The rainy season comes to pass -

the day-glo pirate sinks at last -
and if I laughed a bit to fast.
Well it was up to me.


My God

People - what have you done -
locked Him in His golden cage.
Made Him bend to your religion -
Him resurrected from the grave.
He is the god of nothing -
if that's all that you can see.
You are the god of everything -
He's inside you and me.
So lean upon Him gently
and don't call on Him to save you
from your social graces
and the sins you used to waive.
The bloody Church of England -
in chains of history -
requests your earthly presence at
the vicarage for tea.
And the graven image you-know-who -
with His plastic crucifix -
he's got him fixed -
confuses me as to who and where and why -
as to how he gets his kicks.
Confessing to the endless sin - the endless whining sounds.
You'll be praying till next Thursday to
all the gods that you can count.


Hymn 43

Oh father high in heaven - smile down upon your son
whose busy with his money games - his women and his gun.
Oh Jesus save me!
And the unsung Western hero killed an Indian or three
and made his name in Hollywood
to set the white man free.
Oh Jesus save me!
If Jesus saves - well, He'd better save Himself
from the gory glory seekers who use His name in death.
Oh Jesus save me!
I saw him in the city and on the mountains of the moon -
His cross was rather bloody -
He could hardly roll His stone.
Oh Jesus save me!


Slipstream

Well the lush separation unfolds you -
and the products of wealth
push you along on the bow wave
of the spiritless undying selves.
And you press on God's waiter your last dime -
as he hands you the bill.
And you spin in the slipstream -
timeless - unreasoning -
paddle right out of the mess.


Locomotive Breath

In the shuffling madess
of the locomotive breath,
runs the all-time loser,
headlong to his death.
He feels the piston scraping -
steam breaking on his brow -
old Charlie stole the handle and
the train won't stop going -
no way to slow down.
He sees his children jumping off
at the stations - one by one.
His woman and his best friend -
in bed and having fun.
He's crawling down the corridor
on his hands and knees -
old Charlie stole the handle and
the train won't stop going -
no way to slow down.
He hears the silence howling -
catches angels as they fall.
And the all-time winner
has got him by the balls.
He picks up Gideons Bible -
open at page one -
old Charlie stole the handle and
the train won't stop going -
no way to slow down.


Wind Up

When I was young and they packed me off to school
and taught me how not to play the game,
I didn't mind if they groomed me for success,
or if they said that I was a fool.
So I left there in the morning
with their God tucked underneath my arm -
their half-assed smiles and the book of rules.
So I asked this God a question
and by way of firm reply,
He said - I'm not the kind you have to wind up on Sundays.
So to my old headmaster (and to anyone who cares):
before I'm through I'd like to say my prayers -
I don't believe you:
you had the whole damn thing all wrong -
He's not the kind you have to wind up on Sundays.
Well you can excomunicate me on my way to Sunday school
and have all the bishops harmonize these lines -
how do you dare tell me that I'm my Father's son
when that was just an accident of Birth.
I'd rather look around me - compose a better song
`cos that's the honest measure of my worth.
In your pomp and all your glory you're a poorer man than me,
as you lick the boots of death born out of fear.
I don't believe you:
you had the whole damn thing all wrong -
He's not the kind you have to wind up on Sundays.

 M P 3   S a m p l e s


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