| Aqualung | ||||
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| Studio album by Jethro Tull | ||||
| Released | 19 March 1971 (UK) 3 May 1971 (US) |
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| Recorded | December 1970–February 1971 at Island Studios, Basing Street, London | |||
| Genre | Progressive rock | |||
| Length | 42:55 | |||
| Label | Island (UK) Reprise (US) Chrysalis/Capitol (US re-issue) |
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| Producer | Ian Anderson Terry Ellis |
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| Jethro Tull chronology | ||||
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Aqualung is the fourth studio album by the rock band Jethro Tull. Released in 1971, Aqualung, despite the band's disapproval, is regarded as a concept album, featuring a central theme of "the distinction between religion and God".[1] The album's "dour musings on faith and religion" have marked it as "one of the most cerebral albums ever to reach millions of rock listeners".[2] Aqualung's success marked a turning point in the band's career, with them going on to become a major radio and touring act.
Recorded in Island Records' studio in London, it was their first album with John Evan as a full-time member, their first with new bassist Jeffrey Hammond and last album featuring Clive Bunker on drums. The album is something of a departure from the band's previous works, featuring more acoustic material than previous releases; and—inspired by photographs of homeless people on the Thames Embankment taken by singer Ian Anderson's wife Jennie—contains a number of recurring themes, addressing religion along with Anderson's own personal experiences.
Aqualung has sold over 7 million units worldwide according to Anderson, and is thus Jethro Tull's best selling album. The album was generally well-received critically, and has been included on several music magazine "best of" lists. The album spawned one single, "Hymn 43", and has been cited as an inspiration by bands such as Iron Maiden.
Contents |
After an American tour in 1970, bass player Glenn Cornick was fired from the band,[3] and was replaced with Jeffrey Hammond, an old friend of Ian Anderson's.[4] Aqualung would be the first recording Hammond would do with the band. It would also mark the first time John Evan had recorded a full album with the band, as his only prior involvement was to overdub several keyboard parts on the previous album, Benefit. The album was one of the first to be recorded at the newly opened studios of Island Records in Basing Street, London. Led Zeppelin were recording their untitled fourth album at the same time. In an interview on the 25th anniversary edition of the album, Tull's bandleader Ian Anderson said that trying to record in their studio was very difficult, due to its "horrible, cold, echoey" feel.[5] There were two recording studios at the location; Led Zeppelin worked in the smaller studio while Tull got the larger,[6] which was the main body of a converted church. The orchestrals were arranged by David Palmer, who had worked with the band since This Was, and would later join as a keyboard player. Aqualung would be the last Jethro Tull album to include Clive Bunker as a band member, as he retired shortly after recording to start a family.[5]
The songs on the album cover a variety of musical genres, with elements of folk, blues, psychedelia and hard rock.[7] The "riff-heavy" nature of tracks such as "Locomotive Breath", "Hymn 43" and "Wind Up" is regarded as a factor in the band's increased success after the release of the album, with Jethro Tull becoming "a major arena act" and a "fixture on FM radio".[2] In a stylistic departure from Jethro Tull's earlier albums, many of Aqualung's songs are primarily acoustic. "Cheap Day Return", "Wond'ring Aloud" and "Slipstream" are short, completely acoustic "bridges," and "Mother Goose" is also mostly acoustic. Anderson claims his main inspirations for writing the album were Roy Harper and Bert Jansch.[5]
Aqualung has widely been regarded as a concept album, featuring a central theme of "the distinction between religion and God".[1] The album's "dour musings on faith and religion" have marked it as "one of the most cerebral albums ever to reach millions of rock listeners".[2] Academic discussions of the nature of concept albums have frequently listed Aqualung amongst their number.[8][9][10]
The initial idea for the album was sparked by some photographs that Anderson's wife Jennie took of homeless people on the Thames Embankment. The appearance of one man in particular caught the interest of the couple, who together wrote the title song "Aqualung".[11] The first side of the LP, titled Aqualung, contains several character sketches, including the eponymous character of the title track, and the schoolgirl prostitute Cross-Eyed Mary, as well as two autobiographical tracks; including "Cheap Day Return," written by Ian Anderson after a visit to his critically ill father.[12] The second side, titled My God, contains three tracks—"My God," "Hymn 43" and "Wind-Up"—that address religion in an introspective, and sometimes irreverent, manner. However, despite the names given to the album's two sides and their related subject matter, Anderson has consistently maintained that Aqualung is not a "concept album". A 2005 interview included on Aqualung Live gives Anderson's thoughts on the matter:
I always said at the time that this is not a concept album; this is just an album of varied songs of varied instrumentation and intensity in which three or four are the kind of keynote pieces for the album but it doesn't make it a concept album. In my mind when it came to writing the next album, Thick as a Brick, was done very much in the sense of: 'Whuh, if they thought Aqualung was a concept album, Oh! Okay, we'll show you a concept album.' And it was done as a kind of spoof, a send-up, of the concept album genre. ... But Aqualung itself, in my mind was never a concept album. Just a bunch of songs.[13]
Drummer Clive Bunker believes that the record's perception as a concept album is a case of "Chinese whispers", explaining "you play the record to a couple of Americans, tell them that there's a lyrical theme loosely linking a few songs, and then notice the figure of the Aqualung character on the cover, and suddenly the word is out that Jethro Tull have done a concept album".[5]
The thematic elements Jethro Tull explored on the album—those of the effects of urbanisation on nature, and of the effects of social constructs such as religion on society—would be developed further on most of the band's subsequent releases.[14] Ian Anderson's frustration over the album's labelling as a concept album directly led to the creation of Thick as a Brick, intended to be a deliberately "over the top" concept album in response.[15]
"Lick Your Fingers Clean" was recorded for Aqualung but did not make the final cut. The song was drastically re-worked as "Two Fingers" for Tull's 1974 album, War Child. "Lick Your Fingers Clean" was eventually released in 1988 on the 20 Years of Jethro Tull collection. It was then released as a bonus track on the 1996 reissue of Aqualung.
Another song, "Wond'ring Again" was recorded in early sessions in 1970 and considered for release on the album before Anderson decided to drop it from the final tracklisting. It was subsequently released on the compilation album, Living in the Past, in 1972. However, elements of the song—essentially its coda—were included on Aqualung as "Wond'ring Aloud." Glenn Cornick played bass on the song and says it is his favorite song he recorded with the band.[5] Cornick also played bass on early studio recordings of "My God" and "a couple of other songs", though he did not say which they were.[5]
The album's original cover art by Burton Silverman features a watercolour portrait of a long haired, bearded man in shabby clothes. The idea for the cover came from a photograph Anderson's wife took of a homeless man on Thames Embankment, and Anderson later felt it would have been better to have used the photograph rather than commission the painting.[11] Ian Anderson recalls posing for a photograph for the painting, though Silverman claims it was a self-portrait. The artwork was commissioned and purchased by Chrysalis Records head Terry Ellis. Artist Silverman claims the art was only licensed for use as an album cover, and not for merchandising; and approached the band seeking remuneration for its further use. Silverman and Anderson have different accounts of level of enmity involved in this. The original artwork for both the front and back covers are now privately owned by an unknown family, apparently having been stolen from a London hotel room.[5]
In April 1971, Aqualung peaked at number 4 on the UK Album Chart; when the CD version was released in 1996, it reached number 52.[16] It peaked at #7 on the Billboard Music Charts' North American pop albums chart; the single "Hymn 43" hit #91 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart.[17] The album would go on to sell over seven million copies, and is the band's best-selling album.[18] Aqualung was one of only two Jethro Tull albums released in quadraphonic sound, the other being War Child. The quadraphonic version of "Wind Up", which is in a slightly higher key, is included on the later CD reissue of the album as "Wind Up (quad version)".[18]
The album's only single was "Hymn 43", which was released on 14 August 1971. It reached number 91 on the Billboard Hot 100 charts, spending two weeks in the chart.[17] The song was the first single released by the band in the United States.[18] It was later included in the video game Rock Band 2 as downloadable content;[19] which also featured the album's title track.[20]
The album was re-released in a fortieth anniversary edition on 31 October 2011. The release contains a new stereo and 5.1 surround remix of the album by Porcupine Tree's Steven Wilson, and comes in two different editions—a "collector's edition" containing the album on LP and two CDs, as well as DVD and Blu-Ray discs and a hardback book; and a "special edition" containing the two CDs and an abridged version of the book.[21]
On its release, Aqualung was met with favourable reviews. Rolling Stone lauded its "fine musicianship", calling it "serious and intelligent", although feeling that the album's seriousness "undermined" its quality.[1] Sounds said that its "taste and variety" made it the band's "finest" work.[22] Robert Christgau, however, was more critical of the album, rating it a C+, and calling Anderson's lyrics "inchoate" and "pretentious".[23]
Allmusic give the album four-and-a-half stars out of five, calling it "a bold statement" and "extremely profound".[2] Steve Harris, the bass player for the heavy metal band Iron Maiden, has called Aqualung "a classic album", lauding its "fantastic playing, fantastic songs, attitude [and] vibe". Iron Maiden would go on to cover "Cross-Eyed Mary" as the B-side of their 1983 single "The Trooper".[5]
Aqualung has also been appraised highly in retrospective listings—Rolling Stone included it on their list of "The 500 Greatest Albums of All Time", at number 337,[24] whilst UK magazine Q listed it a number 7 in their "40 Cosmic Rock Albums" countdown.[25][26] Martin Barre's solo on the album's title track was included in Guitarist magazine's list of "The 20 Greatest Guitar Solos of All Time" at number 20.[27]
All songs written and composed by Ian Anderson, except where noted.
| Side One - Aqualung | |||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| No. | Title | Length | |||||||
| 1. | "Aqualung" (Ian Anderson, Jennie Anderson) | 6:34 | |||||||
| 2. | "Cross-Eyed Mary" | 4:06 | |||||||
| 3. | "Cheap Day Return" | 1:21 | |||||||
| 4. | "Mother Goose" | 3:51 | |||||||
| 5. | "Wond'ring Aloud" | 1:53 | |||||||
| 6. | "Up to Me" | 3:15 | |||||||
| Side Two - My God | |||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| No. | Title | Length | |||||||
| 1. | "My God" | 7:08 | |||||||
| 2. | "Hymn 43" | 3:14 | |||||||
| 3. | "Slipstream" | 1:13 | |||||||
| 4. | "Locomotive Breath" | 4:23 | |||||||
| 5. | "Wind Up" | 6:01 | |||||||
Note that original North American Reprise Records pressings of Aqualung contained a slightly edited version of the title song, with its first three seconds (i.e., the first repetition of the song's signature riff) removed. These pressings correspondingly list the song's length at 6:31.
The 1996 and 1999 remastered CDs added six bonus tracks and extensive liner notes:
| No. | Title | Length |
|---|---|---|
| 12. | "Lick Your Fingers Clean" | 2:46 |
| 13. | "Wind Up (Quad Version)" | 5:24 |
| 14. | "Excerpts From the Ian Anderson Interview" (Mojo Magazine) | 13:59 |
| 15. | "A Song For Jeffrey" (BBC) | 2:51 |
| 16. | "Fat Man" (BBC) | 2:57 |
| 17. | "Bourée" (BBC, written by Ian Anderson, Johann Sebastian Bach) | 3:58 |
The 2011 remixed and remastered version by Steven Wilson added the following tracks to the original album track listing:
| No. | Title | Length |
|---|---|---|
| 12. | "Lick Your Fingers Clean" | 2:49 |
| 13. | "Just Trying to Be" | 1:37 |
| 14. | "My God (Early Version)" | 9:42 |
| 15. | "Wond'ring Aloud (13th December 1970)" | 1:51 |
| 16. | "Wind-Up (Early Version)" | 5:21 |
| 17. | "Slipstream (Take 2)" | 0:54 |
| 18. | "Up the 'Pool (Early Version)" | 1:12 |
| 19. | "Wond'ring Aloud, Again (Full Morgan Version)" | 7:07 |
| 20. | "Life Is a Long Song" | 3:19 |
| 21. | "Up the 'Pool (New Mix)" | 3:12 |
| 22. | "Dr. Bogenbroom" | 3:00 |
| 23. | "From Later" | 2:08 |
| 24. | "Nursie" | 1:37 |
| 25. | "US Radio Spot" | 0:52 |
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