You can say whatever you want to about Jethro Tull, but you
\ncan’t say they’ll always do what’s expected of them.<\/p>\n
After riding the crest of their popularity with
\nAqualung<\/i>, diving twice into the concept album pool with
\nThick As A Brick<\/i> and
\nA Passion Play<\/i> and salvaging a third concept album to make
\nthe slightly harder-edged
\nWar Child<\/i>, Ian Anderson and company all but abandoned their
\ntrademark sound for a more medieval acoustic sound, complete with
\nstringed accompaniment.<\/p>\n
The resulting album,
\nMinstrel In The Gallery<\/i>, is a challenging listen. There is
\nenough of a tip of the hat to the style which brought Jethro Tull
\nto the forefront, but at times this disc has more of the feel of an
\nAnderson solo effort than a band outing. Plus, at times, the disc
\nfeels like its volume could have been turned up more than a notch –
\nand, no, I’m not suggesting that electric instruments should have
\nbeen used. (This disc was recently re-issued with bonus material.
\nI’m still working from the original release. Lousy budget
\nrestraints.)<\/p>\n
The title track does something which I find intriguing:
\n“Minstrel In The Gallery” ties the group’s new fascination with
\nacoustic-based music together with the electric pseudo-hard-rock
\nsound which they had become known for. It’s a daring move to split
\nthe song in two like this — and those who grew up solely with the
\nearly best-of compilations might not be familiar with the Baroque
\nstylings of the first half of the song. But it’s a move that works,
\nand works well — particularly if you happen to like acoustic
\nmusic. The only weakness in the song is the drawn-out instrumental
\nbreak which tries to merge the two musical worlds. It sometimes
\nfeels forced, and often doesn’t seem like the players know when the
\ninterlude is supposed to end.<\/p>\n
In all fairness, the band does try to stick to its rock roots as
\nmuch as possible on the first half of
\nMinstrel In The Gallery<\/i>, though the results are a little
\nmixed. “Cold Wind To Valhalla” is a decent enough track (and could
\neasily be considered a forgotten gem in Jethro Tull’s discography),
\nbut “Black Satin Dancer” doesn’t quite seem as focused as one would
\nlike. Honestly, had Anderson kept this one in a quieter vein, it
\nwould have worked better.<\/p>\n
Ah, the quieter vein — and the need for producers to utilize
\nthe master volume knob when mixing an album. The quieter numbers on
\nthis album – “Requiem” and “One White Duck\/0^10=Nothing At All” —
\nboth are so soft (at least on my mix) that one needs to turn their
\nstereo amplifiers up just to hear Anderson’s vocals and acoustic
\nguitar work.<\/p>\n
It is on these numbers where the disc often feels like it’s
\nbecoming a solo project for Anderson. Make no mistake, Anderson is
\nJethro Tull (and a strong case could also be made for guitarist
\nMartin Barre), but without the full instrumentation of his
\nbandmates, the sparseness of these tracks, no matter how beautiful
\nthey are, throws the listener for a brief loop.<\/p>\n
The centerpiece of the disc is “Baker Street Muse,” a 17-minute
\nepic which reinforces the belief that Jethro Tull was able to
\nperform longer pieces without becoming overblown farces of
\nthemselves, all the more keeping the listener’s interest throughout
\nthe piece. Coming off of the critical failure of
\nA Passion Play<\/i>, this was a risk, albeit a calculated one,
\nand it worked well for Tull. It’s a little hard to follow at times,
\nbut it doesn’t become weighted down in its own storyline, making it
\nanother high-water mark for the band.<\/p>\n
Yes,
\nMinstrel In The Gallery<\/i> is not always an easy listen —
\nmostly because you’re hearing a band who was definitely in flux,
\nnot quite knowing which way to take their music next. But it is a
\nworthwhile listen, even if it takes you more than one spin in the
\nCD player to fully grasp and appreciate what Anderson and crew were
\ntrying to accomplish nearly 30 years ago.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":26754,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"artist":[5643],"rating":[5615],"class_list":["post-38021","review","type-review","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","artist-jethro-tull","rating-rating-b"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/38021","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/review"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=38021"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/38021\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/26754"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=38021"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"artist","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/artist?post=38021"},{"taxonomy":"rating","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rating?post=38021"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}