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Jethro Tull - Thick as a Brick CD (album) cover

THICK AS A BRICK

Jethro Tull

 

Prog Folk

4.64 | 3699 ratings

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Glimmung
5 stars First I'd like to say hello and that this is my first review.The best place for me to start here would the songwriting after all we are talking about one album length track. The band very much becoming the sum of its parts with Ian Anderson floating atop conducting with his flute. The first 25 minutes of this album earn it the five star review alone. One inspired melody followed by the next as if some supernatural force is dragging the band along for the ride changing keys,tempos and time signatures with subtle ease. With so many blaring contrasts in the sound that transition so smoothly you hardly notice you've gone from folk to hard rock to renaissance dances and back around. Jethro Tull along with Genesis to me where the songsmiths of prog and used there brilliant songs to show there musician ship when needed, where some bands of the time were working on the opposite side of things(I'm not forgetting the many flute solos and one seemingly out of place drum solo on this album but those parts were never carrying the song as much as a they were a byproduct of the song.). I have to now talk about Barriemore Barlow only because it seems no one else on this site is compelled to. I feel like some of you might take this man for granite. With the deeply grooving rhythms and flair and excitement he brings to his instrument it is a key part to a large part of this album. Ill say no more go back and listen for your self. There is one major thing this album lacks, consistency for the album does drag along at times on side 2 something that I personally think next years A Passion Play seems to do a better job not doing. Not to say that A Passion Play is a better album but I do believe it to be a much more consistent album. I have and will keep recommending this to friends interested in Jethro Tull and or prog though it is one long song it is incredibly accessible and pleasing to the ears. There is no really difficult passages to get through or uninspired melodies or playing for all 40 plus mins and lets keep in mind that this album reached number one on the charts in the US. With the perspective that history has given us that seems like an impossible feat in today's world. But regardless of the decade it speaks to the music that's on the album that it can transcend the genre like all of the classics to have its ageless place in history. This album is such an eclectic blend of sounds it is rather hard to break it down in a review which i think might be some of the point of not just the album but Jethro Tull it self. So I think the best way to do any justice in a review would be to urge any readers to go out and listen to it as soon as they can so they to can be so overcome by the album that they find it hard to put into words as well.
Glimmung | 5/5 |

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