UNDER WRAPS

Jethro Tull's flirtations with synthesizers, which they made no secret of in the early 1980s with "A" and "The Broadsword and the Beast", reached their peak with "Under Wraps" (1984), the fifteenth album by the band led by Ian Anderson. The result is not a harmonious and cohesive fusion of styles, but rather a bland limbo in which the band shamelessly abandoned the paths of folk, prog and rock and embraced the artifice of synth pop and electronic music.

The acoustic crumbs immersed in the rhythmic "European Legacy", Martin Barre's fresh guitar riffs, very much in the style of Rush's 'Power Windows' in the restless "Heat", and the medieval and clean 2Under Wraps #2" (a rarity within the context of the album...) are some brief flashes that barely escape the discreet level of an inconsequential work where songs like "Lay of Luxury", "Saboteur", "Astronomy", "Nobody's Car", "Automotive Engineering" and "General Crossing", hyper-loaded with Peter-John Vettese's artificial synthesizers and drum machines and sequencers in place of drums and percussion in melodies of excessive lightness and very little consistency, are a meagre contribution to the legacy of one of the genre's iconic bands.

"Under Wraps" is undoubtedly Jethro Tull's most controversial and polarising album. Without much commercial impact, it ended up damaging the British band's image among a large portion of their fan base.

Failed.

2/2.5 stars

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