SONGS FROM THE WOOD - 40TH ANNIVERSARY EDITION - THE COUNTRY SET

The lavish 40th anniversary edition boxed set of Songs From the Wood includes the now customary Steven Wilson spring cleaning of the original album and associated tracks, plus a reconstructed version of the Capital Center concert in Maryland in November 1977. (Multi-track tapes of the first four songs were missing, so a little massaging was done to restore these to the set from tapes of a gig some weeks later.)

The live material hails from late in the Songs From the Wood tour - when much of Heavy Horses had already been recorded and it just needed some embellishments and mixing - so by this point the band are well and truly attuned to the material, integrating it into a string of Tull classics which take in an impressive span of their career - with every album from Stand Up onwards represented in some fashion. I primarily like these Tull boxed sets for the live shows they offer (I haven't bothered with the ones which don't include a live gig), and the Songs From the Wood one is no exception.