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Post by nonrabbit on Jun 5, 2015 20:45:15 GMT
myglobalmind.com/INTERVIEW WITH IAN ANDERSON, JETHRO TULLPublished on June 5th, 2015 Interviewed by Karen Hetherington (Journalist/Writer/Contributor) Myglobalmind Webzine Trying to grasp and indeed convey the essence of Jethro Tull is a difficult task which I’m not sure has been successfully accomplished in full biographies on the band, and is certainly impossible in few short paragraphs. Jethro Tull first broke onto the music scene in 1967. The late 60s were a time, which, in my opinion was the most exciting and revolutionary in music history. A time which seen Led Zeppelin guitarist Jimmy Page playing the guitar with a violin bow, Jimi Hendrix playing the guitar with his teeth and Pink Floyd playing music heavy with psychedelia. It seemed that everyone was looking for a new sound, the next best thing and something with an edge to make their mark on the industry. The music of these artists and many others of this era is undeniably timeless, however, Jethro Tull have stood the test of time and weathered the winds of change better than most. It was the introduction of the flute which gave Jethro Tull the sound by which they became instantly distinguishable. Their early sound was very blues orientated but their musical diversity became quickly apparent and seemed to have no boundaries. The complete article/interview here Beat you to it Grae by about five hours. And there's me thinking you hung onto my every post   jethrotull.proboards.com/post/58135/threadAnd TT too |
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Post by maddogfagin on Jun 6, 2015 8:42:56 GMT
myglobalmind.com/INTERVIEW WITH IAN ANDERSON, JETHRO TULLPublished on June 5th, 2015 Interviewed by Karen Hetherington (Journalist/Writer/Contributor) Myglobalmind Webzine Trying to grasp and indeed convey the essence of Jethro Tull is a difficult task which I’m not sure has been successfully accomplished in full biographies on the band, and is certainly impossible in few short paragraphs. Jethro Tull first broke onto the music scene in 1967. The late 60s were a time, which, in my opinion was the most exciting and revolutionary in music history. A time which seen Led Zeppelin guitarist Jimmy Page playing the guitar with a violin bow, Jimi Hendrix playing the guitar with his teeth and Pink Floyd playing music heavy with psychedelia. It seemed that everyone was looking for a new sound, the next best thing and something with an edge to make their mark on the industry. The music of these artists and many others of this era is undeniably timeless, however, Jethro Tull have stood the test of time and weathered the winds of change better than most. It was the introduction of the flute which gave Jethro Tull the sound by which they became instantly distinguishable. Their early sound was very blues orientated but their musical diversity became quickly apparent and seemed to have no boundaries. The complete article/interview here Beat you to it Grae by about five hours. And there's me thinking you hung onto my every post jethrotull.proboards.com/post/58135/threadAnd TT too Oh good grief that's me in trouble. Looks like I'm down for double maths homework and a fearsome cross country run as recompense  |
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Post by Deleted on Jun 6, 2015 13:55:09 GMT
Oh good grief that's me in trouble. Looks like I'm down for double maths homework and a fearsome cross country run as recompense  |
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Post by maddogfagin on Jun 6, 2015 14:36:48 GMT
P ure Supernova - 05062015 - Featuring Ian Anderson of Jethro Tull interviewBy PureSupernova Web page link |
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Post by maddogfagin on Jun 13, 2015 8:09:10 GMT
flavioontivero.weebly.com/Ian Anderson's 10 essential folk-rock albums6/13/2015 flavioontivero.weebly.com/audio-news/ian-andersons-10-essential-folk-rock-albums Ask Ian Anderson - best known, of course, as the be-fluted frontman of Jethro Tull - for 10 folk-rock album selections of his choice and you won’t find your usual Dylans and Byrds. Instead you’re sent down a rabbit hole of European whizz kids from the band-jumping fiddle philanderers of Irish folk, to Finnish hamlets and back to Blighty. Folk-rock, as Anderson points out early in our talk, should in our esteemed guide’s seasoned opinion really be deemed 'folk revival' - a melting pot of folk song and lyrics from across Europe and the bold rhythmic influences of rock ’n’ roll. Step this way, then, for a round-up of some bonafide folk revival heroes and lesser-spotted treasures… Ian Anderson brings his Jethro Tull Rock Opera to the UK in September. Buy Ian Anderson 2015 UK tour tickets “Roy Harper, like me, was schooled in the Blackpool area of North West England and went on to escape and come down south to seek fame and fortune as a folk musician. "He wanted to be on a stage with a towering amplifier behind, belting out aggressive music and we rather envied Roy’s simple, essential style"“He was a wondering troubadour with an acoustic guitar who sang very personalised and sometimes controversial songs. He wanted to be in a rock band, as often people like that do. "His fascination with Pink Floyd, Led Zeppelin and Jethro Tull is known and his chums like Jimmy Page and some members of Pink Floyd and me, was I think partly because he wanted to be like us. “He wanted to be on a stage with a towering amplifier behind, belting out aggressive music and we, as songwriters, rather envied Roy’s simple, essential style and way of working. “We liked the idea of just packing a rucksack and heading out without being encumbered by trucks and buses and road crews! There was a mutual interest and ‘grass is greener’ effect about it.” “Around the first time I went to America in 1969 I found myself in a Holiday Inn on the outskirts of Boston and the other residents in the Holiday Inn were a band called Pentangle. "They did bring together these elements, rather like a rock supergroup, like Cream, except they came from folk and jazz backgrounds rather than blues and rock"“They had the tag of being folk jazz at the time but in fact their influences were very broad. In a way they were the first super group of unlikely musicians that came from backgrounds not conventionally allied. “They didn’t have a long time together, but particularly with their first album, I got to know and like them and their musical approach. They weren’t big on the loud and more rhythmic sense of it, but they did bring together these elements, rather like a rock supergroup, like Cream, except they came from folk and jazz backgrounds rather than blues and rock. “I think they were important and they were much respected, particularly in America.” “Fairport Convention generally have the tag of being ‘the all-time folk-rock band of Britain’ and deservedly so. "They do in a very worthy sense have the right to be crowned the most important folk-rock band ever"“They began with a much more American focus to their music, which is often forgotten. It was much less traditional than it became a few years later. They fell back more into being a traditional folk band, but with all the rhythmic and rock sensitivity that would come to them. “Some of those members of Fairport did play with rock bands, including Dave Pegg who played with Jetrho Tull, too. But they do in a very worthy sense have the right to be crowned the most important folk-rock band ever. “I thought I might find something quirky, but I do have to go back to Liege And Lief because it’s the one that put them on the map. It’s the one you can’t escape, the biggie – their Aqualung, if you like!” “In the early to mid-70s we came across Steeleye Span. I knew of them as a traditional British folk group trying a more rock approach to presenting their music. "They didn’t have the rough-edged credibility that Fairport did, but they had an awareness of British folk music going back hundreds of years"“They were seen as being a little too twee, they didn’t have the rough-edged credibility that Fairport did, but they certainly brought an awareness of British folk music going back hundreds of years. “They were very keen students of British folk music and they were looking very diligently for sources of material from traditional lyrics and they would often write music to go with those lyrics. “They toured with Jethro Tull in the mid-70s and I produced one of their albums [1974’s Now We Are Six], but I only really ‘produced’ in the sense that I supervised the mix - other than getting David Bowie to come and play saxophone on one of the tracks!” “Stevie Winwood was the guy who would have been least likely to have been an influence to me. Then Traffic recorded the album John Barleycorn Must Die. "It gave it something that only a soulful singer and a group of musicians with experience of jazz and blues and rock music could have done"“While you couldn’t call it a folk album it did feature that particular song which was done in a really hybrid way. It gave it something that only a soulful singer and a group of musicians with experience of jazz and blues and rock music could have done. “Although it’s certainly not from a band that were ever considered folk-rock, it was a very worthy contribution. Coming from Birmingham Steve Winwood did have some awareness of that tradition and the folk music of Britain, as well as the black American folk music - by which I mean blues and R&B, which is, if you like, the folk music of North America - which formed the greater part of his awareness. “Certainly the American music I grew up with was black folk music, not the white folk revivalists for whom I had little time or interest!” “Somebody gave me this cassette sometime in the late 70s and it proved to be very well-worn in the end! For me it’s the all-time classic Irish folk-rock album. "It’s not rock in the sense of it being electric guitar and crashing drums, but it has that huge rhythmic sensitivity"“It’s not rock in the sense of it being electric guitar and crashing drums, but it has that huge rhythmic sensitivity that comes from that knowledge of rock music. They were an amalgam of lots of things happening at the time, but that album for me is the great one. “It sits in the middle of the story of some of those individual musicians and I feel led us very naturally to the music that became Riverdance and brought about a huge awareness of Irish music on a much more global level than ever before. “Irish music became universally known after Bill Whelan’s music in Riverdance and, of course, he was one of the group of musicians in that scene from quite early days.” “This band were from the rural hamlets around Helsinki and, like many of the folk musicians growing up then, they played and sang in church choirs and were part of a hugely musical community. "I met Värttinä. They didn’t look or talk to me like they did on record - I’m sure the feeling was mutual!"“They began singing in a very peculiar way where there would be very close harmonies and they’d suddenly go into unison and then split up again. It was sung entirely in Finnish, so I have no idea to this day what the hell these women were singing about they sound very intoxicating and exciting. “I met Värttinä a few years after I started listening to them and the magic wasn’t there. They didn’t look or talk to me like they did on record – I’m sure the feeling was mutual! “It sounds fascinating and I want it to be about huge, grand subjects of love and life and death. I’m probably wrong, it’s probably as dreary as English language lyrics are. It’s always best to stay with the fantasy!” “Andy Irvine and Davy Spillane, who were part of the Planxty scene later on went to Bulgaria where they recorded an album with local folk musicians called EastWind. "It must have been a hugely exciting, passionate album to record"“It’s an enormously complicated album with intricate time signatures and complex musical lines, one in which someone like me, with quite a lot of listening experience, really has to work hard to find out where the repetition lies. “It’s tricky stuff and amazingly well-played. It must have been a hugely exciting, passionate album to record and it fits into my definition of folk-rock because it’s about bringing together elements, pulling things together and people with that experience from different genres and being able to get the best out of each other. “Again, Bill Whelan was involved and played some of the instruments on it [keyboards and piano], too. So it’s part of that long connectivity between different groups and nations over several decades.” “The Young Dubliners is one of the least original and least satisfying names you could come up with, given that the old Dubliners have been around for some time! It was set up in what was a slightly jokey moment, and they became known as The Young Dubs. "They carry the fighting spirit of Irish music with them and they’re an energetic and hugely fun band"“They had grown up in Ireland and they emigrated to California and found some local musicians in Los Angeles and created this kind of musical personification of the Irish pub which you’ll find in every capital city around the world. “They carry the fighting spirit of Irish music with them and they’re an energetic and hugely fun band. They came about on the coattails of punk and they had quite a punk attitude when we first met them. “Red was the album they were promoting when they were the opening act for our tour and we became quite close to those guys.” “I’ve known about Seth Lakeman since he first came to public attention. We’ve not toured together, but we’ve worked together - he was a guest on one of my shows and I’ve played on a couple of his songs. "He’s a great blender of tradition and modernity. He has a quite energetic approach to playing and it’s one that is exemplary"“He’s someone who I think has a musical approach that belongs right back in the early 70s but he’s doing it in the new millennium. To me he does it in a very familiar-sounding way. “He takes traditional songs and traditional stories and sets them to music and lyrics of his own invention. He’s another great blender of tradition and modernity. He has a quite energetic approach to playing and it’s one that is exemplary. I hope he has a long career. “Poor Man’s Heaven brought him into the more rock field and it’s more rhythmic and a lot more solid in the bass and drums department. For me, he definitely qualifies as today’s top folk-rock musician.”
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Post by nonrabbit on Jun 14, 2015 11:00:54 GMT
flavioontivero.weebly.com/“ Andy Irvine and Davy Spillane, who were part of the Planxty scene later on went to Bulgaria where they recorded an album with local folk musicians called EastWind. "It must have been a hugely exciting, passionate album to record"“It’s an enormously complicated album with intricate time signatures and complex musical lines, one in which someone like me, with quite a lot of listening experience, really has to work hard to find out where the repetition lies. “It’s tricky stuff and amazingly well-played. It must have been a hugely exciting, passionate album to record and it fits into my definition of folk-rock because it’s about bringing together elements, pulling things together and people with that experience from different genres and being able to get the best out of each other. “Again, Bill Whelan was involved and played some of the instruments on it [keyboards and piano], too. So it’s part of that long connectivity between different groups and nations over several decades.” Andy Irvine hails from Fermanagh and lives not far from me. He plays the odd local festival along with Donal Lunny Planxty in my humble opinion were the best of Irish bands. Here's a vid of a track from the album Ian mentioned called Eastwind There's a great blend of roots and similarities too. |
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Post by Deleted on Jun 15, 2015 13:51:22 GMT
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Post by Deleted on Jun 19, 2015 12:33:18 GMT
Jethro Tull - Ian Anderson - Servus TV
Rudolf Weber
Published on Jun 19, 2015
Ian Anderson das Interwiev - Dolezal Backstage
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Post by JTull 007 on Jun 19, 2015 14:57:17 GMT
Amazing video combined with interview footage from 1976  I hope there could be more of this.
Ian tends to get very awkward at times because he feels pressure to say something unusual.
When he says he is a 'Rock Star' but feels like Rock 'n Roll is too much about audience noise
during softer songs, I suppose he regrets the way shows were back in the 70's.
At least he didn't give up and as ticket prices rose over the years, more Tull Fans would listen
instead of yelling "Play Aqualung!"  Love the clips from "Lap of Luxury" and "Steelmonkey"  "In the sulphur city, where men are men! We bolt those beams then climb again"
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Post by JTull 007 on Jun 26, 2015 0:09:18 GMT
 Not easy to understand but the music shines through... Wow! Video by Carlos Abbatemarco
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Post by maddogfagin on Jun 28, 2015 15:34:12 GMT
www.uberrock.co.uk/Ian Anderson - Uber Rock Interview Exclusive Written by Michael Anthony Sunday, 28 June 2015 03:00 Direct link to original article Ian Anderson is a man who needs little introduction. As the main driving force behind the music of Jethro Tull for nigh on half a century, he is a legendary figure and one of the giants of the rock era. But a Jethro Tull ‘rock opera’ and a rock opera tour? Mamma Mia! That takes a bit of explanation. Luckily the man himself (Ian Anderson not old Jethro) was on hand to ‘re-imagine’ matters and explain them to a receptive and recitative Michael Anthony. So, Ian, a Jethro Tull rock opera? What’s the premise or idea behind this, then? Well, it’s essentially that I can’t think of any other way to describe what you do when you gather together some songs, join them together with a timeline, a narrative, put them in a context and use the operatic device of the recitative to join these things together. The ‘recitative’? It’s a sung or spoken dramatised way of introducing the next piece of music. It’s an operatic device. ‘Rock Operas’ have been around as long as I’ve been a professional musician and it’s a very tedious and tiresome term that I fully expect to announce to a chorus of jeers and catcalls but I just can’t think of another way to describe doing that kind of theatrical approach. It’s not a stage musical, it’s a performance, a concert performance, a rock concert. What I’m doing is going out there and playing a bunch of rock songs that most of our fans have heard us play many times in the past but giving them a context and a narrative storyline based on the original Jethro Tull’s life story but re-imagined in the very near future. Yeah, I noticed that line in the press information, actually, “re-imagined as if in the near future”. Can you explain what that means? Well, the original Jethro Tull was an agricultural inventor who is written about in the history books briefly. There are some accounts of his life story which I read last summer when I finally got around to finding out who the original Jethro Tull really was, and I was struck by, in a kind of smiley way, just how, wow, you know, I wrote a song about that once and goodness me that next thing that he did, I kind of have another song that’s a bit like that, and, before I’d got very far with it, half an hour later I’d made a list of about 30 songs of my own that I thought could be slipped into the story of Jethro Tull. Rather than do it as a period piece, like Downton Abbey with a flute, I thought it would be a lot more relevant to bring it up to date and cast our original Jethro Tull not as some eighteenth century guy in that particular sort of long wig and the garb of the era, making his first seed drill out of the cobbled together bits of wood from the foot pedals of his church organ, but as a present day bio-chemist working on developments of new technologies to employ genetic modification and cloning and other ways of bringing about increased production to satisfy the needs of an ever-expanding planetary population. So is there a lot of your own perspective in the way you’re presenting Jethro Tull? Oh, of course. I’m dramatising the story. Not in the sense of having him murder anybody or embark on furious affairs with Italian film stars or anything, I’m just trying to develop his story in a subtle and careful way to touch upon, I suppose, the dilemma to be faced by those engaged in such pursuits where agri-business is clearly out there to make profits and is also tied up with the job of actually providing for people from limited resources. I think we find in many places around the world a very uneasy relationship between making money out of something and trying to be a do-gooder. Tony Blair spectacularly is failing at that because his public image is at an all time low and seemingly whatever good things Tony Blair has tried to do through charitable organisations, his work is hugely overshadowed by his apparently quite arrogant way of feathering his own nest and probably doing it in a rather insidious and untruthful manner. I don’t know, I’m not his bank manager or one of his tax advisors, but it is rather odd that probably the most important Labour politician we’ve had for 50 years has turned out to behave almost like an arch Tory in terms of most of those capitalistic meanderings. But, you know, it’s a difficult job. Even if Tony Blair really was the good guy and we’re just being fed rather scurrilous information that we draw conclusions from, even if he was the good guy, it’s a very difficult tightrope to walk in terms of trying to do good things when money is involved. When I do charity things at Christmas and play cathedrals and churches I have a real simple way of doing it. I simply say the ticket money, you keep. In other words, 100% of what the audience pay to buy their tickets stays with the cathedral. It doesn’t come to me at all. I fund the cost of doing the show, I pay the wages of band and crew and hotels and travel and various sorts of whatever is necessary. That costs me about five or six thousand pounds a show. On the other hand, I could leave twenty to thirty thousand pound of ticket money in the hands of a cathedral to keep their roof on. And so it’s very simple for me because I can be really clear cut about it. But it’s not so easy when you’re engaged in a profitable enterprise. Whether you’re a petrochemical company or an energy company or in agri-business or in the drugs or the pharmaceutical industry, you know, ultimately, you are about saving lives. However, if you’re one of the big pharma companies, it costs you millions or even billions to develop new drugs for treatment and you’ve got to try to recover that outlay and you’ve got to try to make a profit to stay in business. But there’s a difference between making a modest profit and making a huge amount of profit with your Chief Executive being paid millions of paid a year in salary. That’s obviously something for them to decide, if that’s really acceptable, but I personally think not. I think there should be a higher calling if you’re involved in the world of pharmaceuticals or food production or energy supply. I don’t think you should be going into those businesses at all if profiteering is the only motive. You’ve given a great answer there. I was going to ask you about the dramatisation because when you first hear “18th Century Agriculturalist” you probably don’t immediately think of Pierce Brosnan or Meryl Streep and the kind of modern stuff that you see on the TV, but I think the answer you’ve just given really sets the context and brings it to life. Well, one thing that occurred to me was that in recent times we’ve seen contemporary rock music being used in historical dramas. Peaky Blinders, for example – you know, something set in a time 70 or 80 years ago but with a contemporary rock music accompaniment. The first time you heard it you thought “Oh!” and then you accept it. And, really, why should we be bound by convention? If the music explains the mood and the atmosphere then I think it’s kind of fitting. So I was really pleased when I heard that and thought that it worked as fairly sophisticated well filmed and well presented television drama entertainment. Excellent series! And I think we’re seeing that in other areas of period drama work too, that you can put contemporary music to it. In fact, my son-in-law was asking me about some music for something he was working on, as a producer rather than as an actor, and asking if I had any contacts or could think of some music that would work for them for this particular scene in a movie. I said, well, you’ve got two choices, really, you either find some authentic period music of that age and you have it played by musicians playing those instruments, so that it’s all very authentic and correct for the time, or you abandon that completely and let me find you one of my Icelandic friends or an Italian soundtrack composer or somebody who’ll bring a realisation which has got nothing to do with historical perspective but who is going to fit the mood of the drama. And I think that maybe is the better way to go because there is a danger, when you start trying to find music for period pieces, that it starts to become a bit too Ritchie Blackmore.  You mentioned having a list of 30 songs when you started thinking about the music you’d use. How difficult was it in the end to narrow those down? Well, I started really looking through the lyrics and I had to find ones that a) were the most popular Jethro Tull songs and b) were ones where the lyrics required either no change or only a little change. So, that narrowed it down for me to a number that, when I chopped the recitatives into the mix and also added the five new pieces that I needed to cover very contemporary issues, were not too difficult to find. I certainly had plenty more that I could have pushed in there but I’m limited really by the realities of playing essentially two one hour sets with a twenty minute intermission. Going beyond that is sheer folly. I mean, I’m looking with relief at the show times tomorrow night when I go to see The Elephant Man. It starts at 7:30pm and finishes at 9:20pm so I have less than two hours with an intermission, if I’m not enjoying it too much or I’m getting a bit twitchy. And so, I’m personally of the belief that once you hit the two hour mark, you’re kind of done – it’s not wise to go on beyond that, people really want to get out and get home. And the new songs you mentioned have been written to plug gaps in the story line? Well, to expand upon the story line rather than plug gaps – to develop the story line to give it credence in the contemporary sense that I’m doing it. I mean, this is all complete, it’s all been recorded and demoed for everybody to learn and to do all the bedrock for the video accompanying which has to be all time coded and locked in. The special guests have recorded their sections during the last few weeks and odd days that I’ve worked in a green screen studio recording them, and then all the video editing and building of the video segments has to take place over the next few weeks, so it’s a lot of work. It’s a big job doing a show where you’re utilising a lot of multi-media approaches. So the ‘virtual guests’, as I’ve seen them described, will be on video? Yes, currently three guests have recorded their pieces. They play sometimes just tiny little snippets, sometimes they sing a verse, that depends on the character. They’re actually playing characters with things to say so they are working largely with existing lyrics, although sometimes the pronouns are changed, sometimes, in the case of one or two songs, a completely new verse has been written as a development to bring it closer to this realisation of the songs. But the music is all authentic, the way it was originally recorded. I decided from the beginning I would absolutely go back to the original recorded arrangements of these songs because I felt that was really part of what this should be about. So although I’ve performed different arrangements of many of those songs over the years, I’m going right back to the authentic, original versions. And all performed live on the tour? The musicians on stage are all live, absolutely, and the guests are on video. Are you keeping the identities of the guests under wraps? Well, it’s not a question of “under wraps”, it’s just that in a way it’s kind of nice when you don’t know who these people are. I rather like the idea that they reveal themselves and I back announce them at the end so you know who they are. But we’re not talking about Eric Clapton. It’s not Sting. I don’t have any famous guests. They’re not going to do it for nothing. And even if they did, their managers would be finding ways to try and get paid for it, and I can’t afford to employ the services even of those people that I’ve worked with before. I wouldn’t, for instance, ask Bruce Dickinson to do it because he’s already been very kind enough to come and give his services on a concert at Canterbury Cathedral three or four years ago. I would never go back and ask people to do these things again because I think it is prevailing upon their generosity that they’ve done something for you, and the spirit of it, without payment. I would feel awkward about doing it and capitalising on their presence because it would become known that they were doing it. In a way you would be having somebody there, putting bums on seats potentially, selling tickets and not being paid for it. I couldn’t countenance doing that. My special guests who are doing it are being paid for doing the recording and are being paid a residual fee per show for being there. But they’re not famous names. And the band that you’ve assembled for the live performance ... They are the same guys who’ve been playing with me, whether it’s billed as Ian Anderson or Jethro Tull, for the last ten years or so. They’ve all played as members of, simply, Jethro Tull, when it’s been called that, and so they are the guys that I’ve been working with for quite a while. And the same guys we’ll see you with at the Ramblin’ Man Fair? Indeed, yes, the same people. Will any of the new material from the rock opera appear in your solo shows or do you see them as very distinct projects? Well, the shows that I do when it’s the odd festival thing or a summer concert outdoors are not really the time to be presenting vast amounts of new material. It’s not what people go to festivals for. They just go there to have their meatloaf – I mean meatloaf in the sense of meat and potatoes, you know, they want a diet they’re very familiar with, they don’t want to stray from their comfort zone. That’s the whole point of festivals, they’re a celebration of stuff that you eagerly anticipate and you know what you’re going to get. You don’t go to a Rolling Stones concert to hear them play new material, for God’s sake, as they have found to their cost in times gone by, and at a festival even less so – it’s not a time to start playing new material, it’s a time to enjoy and celebrate your classic repertoire. And luckily in my case I’ve got quite a lot of it. But there are some of the heavy hitters that tend to be included in all concerts, like ‘Locomotive Breath’ and ‘Aqualung’, for example. There may be one or two songs that are from the last album, ‘Homo Erraticus’, but that’s about all I dare risk in terms of anything new because I know from experience that there will be a sort of confused and bewildered look on the faces of most of the audience who simply don’t know that material. Some of the songs, of course, from the so-called rock opera, are also songs I play in a ‘best of’ repertoire. So there’s a little bit of that. But I’m certainly not out there to present some unfamiliar material to a festival date. And I shouldn’t think that any of the other acts on the bill will be doing that either. They know, like me, that it’s sheer folly to assume that an audience is going to want to hear your newly recorded masterwork that frankly they’re not really that interested in, particularly on that day. It’s amazing really, I guess it’s quite an exciting time for Tull fans with the rock opera, the solo appearances and reissues popping up. And not only that but in the case of Martin Barre [Jethro Tull guitarist], who’s out and about doing his solo tours, they get to see him and hear different versions of Jethro Tull music interpreted by him. For the real Jethro Tull fans, with all the reissues, box sets and things, there’s much more out there than there was, perhaps during the 1980s and even during the 1990s, and there’s much more going on if they want to assimilate it, buy it, watch it, listen to it. We’re presenting, I suppose, many more opportunities for the real fans, but in a way we also have to think about fans who are new fans and when I look out I always like to see in an audience a bunch of folks who have never been to a Jethro Tull concert before who are there to listen to music that their parents grew up with. And that’s part of the fascination, I think, that when you are in your late teens/early twenties you kind of find out who your parents are because you tend to want to know then what they read, what they watched, what they listened to. It becomes a way of getting in touch with your parents’ generation and in doing that sometimes you find that there are some great books that they read or some fabulous movies that they saw, or television series, and, of course, perhaps more so than anything else, rock music. So it’s a way of bringing generations together that your music is introduced to another generation of younger fans. Obviously it’s not one for one – it’s maybe ten percent of the people out there in certain places are in their late teens or early twenties, but it’s nice to see them. And if you play outdoor shows, particularly in certain countries of the world, then you’ll find evidence of the younger fans is much more obvious because they tend to be the ones at the front and tend to be the ones who are the most animated. I remember playing at a festival in Brazil in February – just a one-off show we flew out to do – and, I mean, it was amazing. Just walking on stage, all I saw was a sea of faces, all of who seemed to be teens and twenties. I didn’t see any old folks at all. They were probably there but way in the distance at the back near the portaloos – they don’t want to stray too far from the toilets when they get to that age. You do get the sense, don’t’ you, that there’s been something of a revival, and you do see younger people coming to gigs? I wouldn’t call it a revival, I just think it’s an ongoing fascination with rock music, because it is the musical currency of not just one generation but now two or even three. I think it’s a music phenomenon that is very widespread across the planet in terms of being in the hearts and souls of three generations of people for whom it means a lot. I think it’s not so much a kind of revitalisation or something happening again, I think it’s just maintaining a continuity, really, from generation to generation. Thank you Ian, that’s a great way to end. Thanks for your time, and good luck with the tour. Thank you. The tour starts in September, and until then I have quite a few dates here and there in various places doing just a regular rock show. In its way, that’s really quite fun because I don’t have the pressures of videos and guests and complications and production issues, I’m just walking on the stage and playing and going for it. So when the rock opera tour gets underway in September it is the beginning of a series of concert tours into 2016 which are somewhat more elaborate and more theatrical in terms of precision and the same every night but still playing the material that I’ve written and enjoyed for many, many years. Tour and ticket details: ‘Jethro Tull – the Rock Opera’ honours the life story of the 18th Century English agriculturalist after which the band was named back in 1968. A 6 date UK tour has been announced between 8th– 14th September 2015 that takes in Basingstoke, London, Birmingham, York, Gateshead and Salford. Tickets are priced £28 and £32, except in Birmingham £27.50-£32.50. Doors open at 18:30. There is no support. Show starts at 19:30, with a brief interval at 20:30, and ends at 22:00. More information at jethrotull.com/jethro-tull-the-rock-opera/ Live photographs courtesy of Martin Webb
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Post by maddogfagin on Jun 29, 2015 7:57:58 GMT
concertblogger.com/Interview with Ian Anderson: Jethro Tull in The “Aria” This FallPosted by: Danny Coleman June 28, 2015 concertblogger.com/2015/06/jethro-tull-in-the-aria-this-fall/ “Our agent at the time was a history graduate, we were dithering about searching for band names and he suggested it and I was sort of like; yeah, well, OK. Then it dawned on me; we’re named after a dead guy,” explained founding member and music icon Ian Anderson with a laugh on how legendary rock band Jethro Tull got their name. “So let that be a lesson to you children; pay attention in history class!” The year was 1968 and Tull was on their way to becoming an emerging force to be reckoned with in what was becoming the post Beatles era of rock music. Album oriented “Classic Rock,” had begun to dominate radio airwaves and harder, more heavy concept records were lining record store shelves. Every band, unique in its own way, from the album packaging and art to their on and off stage gimmicks or antics; music was changing and Jethro Tull was an integral part of it. Anderson, the front man and face of the band is widely credited with introducing the flute into rock music. Helping to launch an entire trend into the genre; Anderson blazed a trail with his use of this wind instrument. Now more than four decades later, thirty studio and live albums and more than sixty million records sold world wide; Anderson is bringing his first “Quasi rock opera” to the masses. Tickets are now on sale for “Jethro Tull, The Rock Opera,” premiers in the U.S. beginning with a show at the Chicago Theater in Chicago,IL on November 1 and ending with a show in Newark, NJ on November 11 at the New Jersey Performing Arts Center. “Other than the Pretty Things and then Pete Townsend writing what is the all time greatest rock opera “Tommy,” which really isn’t an opera at all, not in the operatic sense, it’s not in the traditional connected sense where it’s a series of arias incorporated to tell a story; it’s a series of songs that were put together to tell a great story and this is something like that but not quite,” explained Anderson. “This is the re-imagined story of the agricultural inventor who suffered with bronchial disorders as a child and who, as he got older, moved to study in France hoping that he could find ways to treat his illnesses. All these years later I started looking into that, I wanted to find something out about him and I discovered that whether it be by fate or accident; many songs that I’ve written coincide with his life or career. I didn’t know at the time I wrote it that a song such as “Aqualung” could actually relate to his bronchial disorder but it is all quite similar and there are quite a few of the songs that are like this; so I assembled them all together into this sort of an opera style show.” “Heavy Horses,” “Farm On The Freeway,” “Songs From The Wood,” “Aqualung,” “Living In The Past,” “Wind-Up,” “A New Day Yesterday,” “The Witch’s Promise,” “Locomotive Breath” and multiple other classic from the Tull collection will be part of this undertaking; some modified a bit to “fit the bill” so to speak but not drastically altered. “I didn’t do much really in the way of altering the songs,” he explained. “What I did was bring them up to speed to reflect a modern day chemist who is trying to feed the planet; a very hungry planet. Other than obvious cosmetic changes and a few pronoun changes; I’ve done very little in the way of changing the material. Those who come to the show are going to hear approximately twenty songs from the best of the Jethro Tull repertoire and they’ll all be relevant to the show and what I am trying to do; so obviously there will be no “Bungle In the Jungle,” Anderson said with a slight laugh. Also included in this presentation will be some new material and some “Virtual guests” as well. “I’m using the original lyrics for the most part and incorporating them in a theatrical, multi-media event. The virtual guests will be on a large screen and will interject at precise moments to help tell the story.” Anderson’s concerns about the show are minimal at best; even sort of poking fun at himself or any possible detractors who think an aging rock star is grasping at straws to continue chasing a ship which has set sail. “Oh I am sure there are cynics out there who are thinking, “Look at this pathetic old man trying to get his music out” and they can’t see a very old chap doing what I am still doing; I say humor me until I am ready to go away.” This series of eight shows in November are just the start of something much bigger to top off 2015 and prepare the band for a larger scale tour in 2016. “We are scheduling more in 2016 after Easter. In September we will take it to the west coast of the U.S. and shows in Europe as well. I am looking forward to this tour but as I get older I don’t want to be away from family for prolonged periods of time. I’m not a homebody by any stretch but doing months on end on the road doesn’t hold the same appeal as it did years ago when we were younger and more; shall we say expressive and versatile?As the laughter faded from his voice a seemingly confident Ian Anderson, the face of Jethro Tull took his leave. A leave which will bring he and the band back here once again come fall. Anderson once said, “A band to me is whomever is in the room at the time.” Well, this tour features a new band, a new show and a few history lessons as well and tickets are on sale now. To obtain tickets or learn more about Jethro Tull; please visit www.jethrotull.com.
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Post by maddogfagin on Jun 30, 2015 8:14:43 GMT
www.examiner.com/Jethro Tull pays homage to namesake with 2015 operaJune 29, 2015 www.examiner.com/article/jethro-tull-pays-homage-to-namesake-with-2015-operaFor 47 years, Ian Anderson, the front man, flautist, acoustic guitarist, mandolin player and primary songwriter of British rock group, Jethro Tull, has fielded questions about the band's curious name, which their 1968 agent chose for them the week they appeared at London's Marquee Club gig. But now Anderson and his current lineup will celebrate the owner of that name with a brand new production: JETHRO TULL: THE ROCK OPERA. Concurrently a "Best of Jethro Tull" concert will take place. The Jethro Tull lineup has changed over the years, but most of the personnel onstage will be performers Anderson has known for at least a decade. John O'Hara will be on keyboards, David Goodier, on bass, Florian Opahle, on electric guitar, Scott Hammond, on drums, and the most recent musician, Ryan O'Donnell, will contribute theatrics and vocals. Conceptually, this premiere will bring together five new original songs, video productions of guest artists and, when required, lyrical rewriting to guarantee that songs used from the band's vast repertoire will embrace the spirit of the original Jethro Tull, the 18th century agriculturist. Jethro Tull is known for incorporating varied styles of music in studio albums as well as onstage. While debut, This Was' was blues-inspired, the 1969 follow-up, 'Stand Up' drew from multiple genres. Songs from those albums and Living in the Past, Benefit, Aqualung and Thick as a Brick are now considered classics. US and UK dates have already been confirmed for 2015, with additional dates for the latter part of the year still to come. Below Ian elaborates on a few essential topics. Examiner: Will there be any surprise guests? IA: I’m not going to tell you who they are. There will be four or five in total. They’re going to be doing sometimes a lot, sometimes a little, sometimes just a couple of lines. It won’t be Sting. It won’t be Elvis Presley. It won’t be people that you would probably even know. Two of them are regular performers in stage musicals. They sing and play instruments as well. One is a classical musician. Another one is a jazz musician. Examiner: In an artistic sense, was it more or less challenging to work around the nonfictional Jethro Tull as opposed to a fictional character of your own creation like Gerald Bostock? IA: Well, I’m a writer. I’m supposed to be able to do that stuff. It’s what I do for a living. I’ve been writing all of my life. I’ve been writing songs that are either partly autobiographical, which for most people are easier because we know about our lives and we bleat and moan and complain about being in love, out of love, having no money; all the things that form the substance of pop song lyrics from time in memorial. The heart-on-sleeve talking about our own experiences are the thing that most people find easiest to write about. I’m not saying I do, but most people clearly do or that’s all they do, but then I’m an observational writer. I also write about people and to some extent they’re real people that I know, people that I’ve met, people that I’ve been watching via the media and sometimes they are imagined people, they are characters of my invention, so if you like, fictional or non fictional, it’s what I’ve been doing for 47 years, so hopefully I’ve learned to do that by now. PB: You express concerns about endangered animals on your website. What's the solution? IA It’s one of those things that it’s always easier for us to feel passionate about because we understand the very simple rules of conservation of wild animals. Most people are in agreement quite easily about issues of that sort because they’re not essentially human and we don’t have to consider the human aspect, but behind most problems of animal conservation, we have some villains. It’s not that they’re just quietly dying out because they don’t feel like living anymore, they’re dying out always because of some human pressure and whether that is poaching of rhinos or elephants in certain countries of the world, where those things happen for financial gain and in some countries, again, to satisfy the warped mentality of those who think that they’re some huge, medicinal lure or sexual revitalization property, they continue to drive those illegal trades--or whether it’s just the fact that we’re digging up areas to put more motorways, train tracks, logging roads into cutting off animals from their normal area of being able to survive in an appropriate population density and have territorial minimal requirements. However we look at it, we’re the bad guys. The reason animals are dying out is because we are forcing them to it. There might be a few exceptions that you might argue are to do with climatic change or severe weather or seismic activity, but in most cases, I think we can say, in the back of it, that it’s human intervention that is causing the problems. So it’s easy just to focus in a very narrow way on the animals themselves, that by giving some money, somehow, you might think that you’re going to fix the problem, but, again, it comes down to us, making choices. Do we want to share our planet with a huge, vast wonderful variety of animal and plant species or do we want that to reduce considerably because, frankly, we care about ourselves more than we do about that diversity? Again, we’ve got to make those decisions and we’ve got to have those conversations and understand why it is we’re thinking about, perhaps, cleaning up the mess a little bit by assuaging our guilt by supporting some wildlife trust or some conservation body. I’m not saying we shouldn’t. We absolutely should and we should do it as much as possible but the root cause is us. PB: You're still going strong. You and the band are entertaining people from all over the world. Do you think you'll keep up this pace? IA: Last year was a slight reduction on the previous year; this year is a slight reduction on last year. For 2016, I just had a conversation with one of my agents to say, really, I think for all of us in the band and for some of the crew, we would rather work shorter spells and not go away for two weeks as we have for three weeks in this last period. It’s kind of too long to be doing one thing and the merciless traveling and recording. It’s a lot of fun, but there comes a point in your life when you’ve got to balance that up with other things. So I think for all of us, it’s probably better to restrict our tours to being one or three or ten shows at a time and then having a few days off, rather than just having it roll on and on and on and hardly have any time to pursue other activities, even commercially or hobby wise, family, whatever it might be. So we will, as a performing body, slow down a little bit, but it’s just finding a balance that’s appropriate for changing times. For my case, I’d probably be happy doing 50 or 60 shows a year, rather than 100.
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Post by steelmonkey on Jul 1, 2015 5:17:34 GMT
I found it....light at the end of the tunnel...one of those interviews includes projected rock opera on USA west coast in September 2016...only 15 months away.
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Post by Deleted on Jul 7, 2015 14:00:49 GMT
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Post by maddogfagin on Jul 24, 2015 18:30:42 GMT
www.pennyblackmusic.co.uk/Artist: Ian Anderson Title: Interview Category: Interviews Author: Lisa Torem Date Published: 22/07/2015 www.pennyblackmusic.co.uk/MagSitePages/Article/7964/Ian-Anderson-InterviewIan-Anderson-Interview After 47 years on the road and in the studio, Ian Anderson, songwriter, lead singer, flautist, and mandolin and acoustic guitar player of British prog rock band, Jethro Tull, graces the international stage with Jethro Tull: The Rock Opera, which is based on the life of the real life Tull, an 18th century industrialist. To bring the story to life, Anderson has written several new songs and incorporated classic Tull repertoire into the production. This year, he and his touring band will also present a Best of Jethro Tull Concert. PB: With the Jethro Tull Rock Opera, you said on your website that you’ve looked through your repertoire and discovered so many fits. Can you elaborate on how a song like ‘Locomotive Breath’ might fit into the theme? IA: There were some perfect fits; songs like ‘Farm on the Freeway’ and a few others, some were an imperfect fit, but either stretched a little bit by changing the story line or stretched to fit a little better by changing some lines of vocal or even adding a new verse. I suppose it was somewhat of a surprise at finding that there were all of these possibilities amongst lyrics that I’d written over the years, that fitted how little we know about the life story of the original Jethro Tull, but my job as a writer is to be creative and make things fit, so that’s what I do. PB: Tull’s inventions were not really used until about a century after he developed them. Will you be exploring some of the controversy in his life? IA: His position at the time was not particularly controversial—he made a study of agricultural methods in the UK and Italy and France and he was someone who travelled partly because of seeking a respite from pulmonary infections that he suffered as a child— cue the song, ‘Aqualung’--and he wrote about these things and incorporated them into his book ‘Horse-hoeing Husbandry’, an instant bestseller, because they didn’t have things like that back then. But his methodologies were discussed within the farming community in the agricultural college and he would be someone who, I suppose, was quite well known to agriculturists in his lifetime but history remembers him as being a defining figure among doubtless several who were part of the general ongoing improvement to agricultural methods. He was wrong about a couple of things. For instance, he didn’t see the point of adding any nutrients back to the soil. He was a person who believed that simply tilling would be enough, that by magically infusing the soil, turning it over and getting the air into it, it would suddenly do the trick and, of course, it didn’t and now we know that plants take nutrients out of the soil. Some plants, however, put them back in. So these days you would follow your oilseed rape by a crop of winter wheat because the oilseed rape will fix nitrogen in the soil and you increase your fertility by having oilseed rape, for instance, as a break crop, as indeed you would do with certain other crops that you use as a break crop, but these things weren’t known back then. They are known now and, of course, we put millions and millions of tons of chemicals as fertilizers into our soil and we pour on tons and tons of pesticides and herbicides. Those things weren’t known in Jethro Tull’s day, so I fancy rather that if he were around today studying agriculture, he’d be a biochemist working on genetically modified organisms, cloning, that sort of thing, and, of course, would be controversial in the sense that the difficult decision between growing increased productivity in agriculture in order to feed the increases in population on the planet and he would be doing that and having to weigh up, was this a good thing or a bad thing to do, just as you as a consumer will have to weigh up and your children after you, is it a good idea to be eating these things or do we just go hungry. Because frankly, if you’re not prepared to eat genetically modified organisms in the future, you are going to go hungry because there won’t be enough of the good stuff as you think of it left, so these are quandaries not only for us as consumers but those that are involved in agribusiness as to what is the ethically most correct way to move forward given that we, unavoidably, are facing nine billion people on planet Earth forty years from now. PB: You mentioned using the classical form, recitative. So is that what the audience should expect or will there be more of a fusion between classical and rock? IA: What I’m going out to do is to play the best of Jethro Tull, the best known Jethro Tull songs that I’ve written over the years and adding to those another five new songs which help explain and take us through the narrative. What people should expect is they’re going to see the Best of Jethro Tull concert with a few added frills and some careful packaging because all of the video material is designed to keep people interested, to put songs into a context, to give the storyline some sense of meaning, but when you are dealing with a bunch of songs—and it’s just the same if you go to the opera—I’ve been to the opera a few times, I don’t have a f**king clue what’s going on—first of all, it’s usually in another language and even if it isn’t, I still can’t understand what they’re singing because they seem to employ strange diction even in English language opera. So it’s really hard to know what the Hell is going on when you go to the opera and if you didn’t have the programme and read what’s supposed to be the storyline, you would be kind of stuck. I think even if you were going to see a contemporary musical, it does help to know what it’s about. I went to see Pete Townshend’s staging of ‘Quadrophenia’ as a theatre musical three years ago. I came at half-time and I thought, I’m going to have to read every word that’s in this programme because I hadn’t a clue what was going on. It was just done via the songs. There was no recitative. There were no explanations, no acting or spoken word. It was just a collection of songs and although the cast were performing it with great gusto and dancing around and singing and doing whatever else, it was, for me, impossible to know what was going on because I wasn’t familiar with Quadrophenia as a work. It was just something I was seeing and hearing for the first time. I didn’t know what was going on. If I was a Japanese tourist in London, I would be absolutely clueless as to what was taking place. That applies to ‘Quadrophenia’, it also applies to the majority of classical operas; that you’re probably not going to know what it is and how you’re following a storyline if you don’t already know the story because you’ve read it on a page. And, of course, one of the dilemmas I face is having to put the storyline into fairly simple and concise English, but because of playing around many countries in the world, I also will probably have to have a flyer or something that we print or have access to on the website. Then people who have bought a ticket can see, clearly written in their own language, what the storyline is, to give it a little more sense and make more of it than simply a collection of “best of” songs joined together with some frothy moments of video acting and little musical segments that join the songs together and introduce the next one and where it’s going: that being the recitative classical opera technique, usually either unaccompanied or partially accompanied. That’s kind of the approach I’ve taken, to make these sung loosely, sometimes sung precisely, sometimes even spoken with one or two instruments accompanying, to keep it simple and keep it musically in a different instrumentation and presentation to the body of the songs, which are in all cases played pretty much as they were originally recorded. We were using the original arrangements for that material, so it should sound musically like it did on the record, albeit with some other guest singers, singing odd little bits here and there because we’re giving them characters; we’re letting them, in a way, act out the characters. We have three other video guests currently. PB: Jethro Tull’s inventions were sometimes viewed with suspicion. If you look ahead 100 years from now, what will people be suspicious of? IA: A hundred years from now they’ll probably be suspicious of what on earth it was that their great-grandparents were doing to have gotten them into that situation. We are really facing a tidal wave of humanity that believes that it needs to catch up with the affluent West. How on earth are we not going to be in trouble? Especially because we can’t escape the fact that it is the cultural and religious nature of certain nationalities, certain groups of people, ethnically, culturally to have large family sizes. It’s going to be very difficult to persuade them that perhaps the nicest thing to do is to limit them to one or two children each. That’s not something that governments can make people do, that’s not something that I can make people do, they have to make those decisions for themselves because they think it’s the morally appropriate way for us all to go together into the future, facing as we do a finite series of resources: foodwise, waterwise, air qualitywise and landwise. So from every standpoint, we have to make decisions and some people are going to make those decisions just as they already have. In most of Northwestern Europe where most countries have a fertility of about 1.6, in other words to every fertile woman, 1.6 children are born, that’s because women are educated. Women make decisions in the family to the size of family they want, so clearly it is, roughly speaking, divided pretty equally between one and two or sometimes between none and perhaps three. But basically, where women have education and they play a responsible part, where they’re allowed to play a responsible part in the family decision-making, then smaller families result. Wherever women are dominated by a patriarchal society that tends to treat them as baby machines then, of course, there will be four or five children per fertile woman. Where religion - and, believe me, this still happens - demands that you go forth and multiply at a furious rate because it’s your job to plant as many people on the planet of your parents’ religion, then that is a worrying scenario, especially right now. I’m not going to be drawn into vilifying any particular religious or ethnic groups, but you know who I’m talking about. They’re out there. They’re going to make lots of babies because they want to control the planet. I think things have to change. We can’t avoid the fact that we as people on a finite planet, we don’t have anywhere else to go. We don’t have Star Trek. We don’t even have Richard Branson that can get a rocket to work. For most of us, getting off of the planet is not even close to being a dream so we are stuck with what we’ve got and have to work together to find the best possible solution and that means employing all of our skills, our science, our engineering, our technologies to cope with the increase of population that we’re going to have. It clearly can’t go on forever but we can be pretty sure that at least 9 billion people will be trying to survive together in another forty or fifty years time on this planet and it’s going to get pretty rough. PB: About five years ago, you took a stand regarding the artist’s right to play where he/she wishes. IA: I tend to agree that when an artist agrees to play for a ton of money in a war zone, that that’s reprehensible, but if the artist chooses to go there in order to make a difference, and in my case, it may have been that I’ve been to, obviously, Israel, or probably one or two other questionable places, my attitude is that, if I go there, I’m not going to receive any personal reward from it. I’m going to take what resources I gather and spread them in a way which, I think, is responsible, which is a small amount of money in the big scheme of things, but I choose to do it in the sense that I think it can make a difference. And even if I’m not sure that it’s going to make a difference, if I think the slightest balance of probabilities is that it could make a positive difference, I’m going to do it. I’m not going to sit at home, hiding under the bed because somebody goes, "Boo, you’re a bad guy because you’ve been to Israel." That’s so simplistic and childish. We should all be going there trying to make a difference and it’s a country in which a lot of difference needs to be made, because there are a lot of people of different ethnic and cultural backgrounds and there’s a gender problem, where women generally don’t get that great a deal. So I’m all for trying to do things in places that bring entertainment and a bit of amusement to some folks, but it’s my decision if I go there. As to what I do with the money--it ain’t going into my bank account, I can promise you. PB: Thank you. 
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Post by maddogfagin on Jul 31, 2015 10:19:20 GMT
www.theboltonnews.co.uk/Ian Anderson tells the tale of Jethro Tull Vickie Scullard, news feature writer / Thursday 30 July 2015 Article Link
"I'm trying to give this a more obvious storyline than most operas as I find a lot of them confusing."
Backing Ian will be his usual cohorts in David Goodier, John O'Hara, Florian Opahle and Scott Hammond.
He added: "We hope to record something live, but probably next year."
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Post by steelmonkey on Jul 31, 2015 17:48:12 GMT
Live recording next year...capture the new songs and alternate versions of war horses.
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Post by maddogfagin on Aug 1, 2015 9:34:51 GMT
Live recording next year...capture the new songs and alternate versions of war horses. If it is for 2016 then the it's highly likely the evil bootleggers will get there first. |
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Post by nonrabbit on Aug 4, 2015 12:53:29 GMT
Don't shout at me if this has been featured before. It's in my favourite category - Ian meets over exuberant American interviewer. It's on Skype - watch for his facial expressions and wtf happened at the end? Loved to have seen his expression then. www.growingbolder.com/growing-bolder-tv-ian-anderson-916636/"Jethro Tull is very nearly at the top of my list" Bill Shafer  |
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Post by maddogfagin on Aug 4, 2015 14:17:11 GMT
Don't shout at me if this has been featured before. It's in my favourite category - Ian meets over exuberant American interviewer. It's on Skype - watch for his facial expressions and wtf happened at the end? Loved to have seen his expression then. www.growingbolder.com/growing-bolder-tv-ian-anderson-916636/"Jethro Tull is very nearly at the top of my list" Bill Shafer Brilliant |
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Post by JTull 007 on Aug 4, 2015 18:28:38 GMT
Don't shout at me if this has been featured before. It's in my favourite category - Ian meets over exuberant American interviewer. It's on Skype - watch for his facial expressions and wtf happened at the end?
Loved to have seen his expression then.www.growingbolder.com/growing-bolder-tv-ian-anderson-916636/"Jethro Tull is very nearly at the top of my list" Bill Shafer
Talking on the phone while sitting in front of a camera made this even more difficult.
I think they prefer to have a video screen on Ian's end to give him a better perspective,
however, this guy dropped the ball and ended without even saying good bye or see 'ya later. WTF  |
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Post by nonrabbit on Aug 5, 2015 9:10:53 GMT
I think the format of this tv show was a little awkward for Ian in general.
Talking on the phone while sitting in front of a camera made this even more difficult.
I think they prefer to have a video screen on Ian's end to give him a better perspective,
however, this guy dropped the ball and ended without even saying good bye or see 'ya later. WTF I think your right Ian looked awkward from the word go. The interviewer's timing was out as well I suspect he was joking when he said to Ian that he hoped that it was Ian paying for the call rather than them. He said it too quickly and Ian took it seriously - well he might |
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Post by JTull 007 on Aug 6, 2015 16:47:20 GMT
Special thanks to Francis Tallava for posting this earlier today on Facebook
Love this interview from Germany after TULL played Rostock Stadhalle on November 26th Jethro Tull's Ian Anderson Nordmagazin - 27/11/2014  Nordmag Link  Ian Anderson has been successful with a delicate flute at the Hard Rock business.
In Rostock he showed Wednesday he can on the flute, including something new.
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Post by maddogfagin on Aug 13, 2015 8:00:04 GMT
www.chroniclelive.co.uk/Ex Jethro Tull main man Ian Anderson brings Jethro Tull: The Rock Opera to Sage Gatehead16:00, 12 AUGUST 2015 BY ALAN NICHOLwww.chroniclelive.co.uk/whats-on/music-nightlife-news/ex-jethro-tull-main-man-9834391Ian Anderson delves into the past of the real Jethro Tull for his latest show which arrives at Sage Gateshead in September  To most music fans of a certain vintage, Ian Anderson will always be synonymous with the band Jethro Tull. The archetypal image of the wild-haired dervish, standing on one leg, flute to his lips is probably etched on the memory, particularly as the Tull albums sold in millions around the world. Well, the very same musician is back in the region next month, for a gig in Sage Gateshead’s Hall 1 (Sunday, September 13), entitled Jethro Tull: The Rock Opera. He is here, with his band, to pay due homage to the “real” Jethro Tull, the 18th Century agriculturist (and one time legal student) whose name the band “borrowed” back in the late 60s. The forthcoming shows use the story of the original Jethro Tull’s life – re-imagined in the modern day – with the help of graphics etc and featuring “all the good stuff”, as Anderson put it, from the copious repertoire of the unique band. By way of a brief recap, Jethro Tull (the band) formed in Blackpool 1967 – where the Anderson family had moved to from Scotland – originally as a blues trio, before going on to conquer much of the record-buying world as a band renowned for musicianship and stage-craft. At the time of the band’s formation, the teenage Anderson played some guitar but looking back to those days, the Fife-born musician recalled: “I didn’t want to be just another third-rate guitar player who sounded like a bunch of other third-rate guitar players. I wanted to do something that was a bit more idiosyncratic, hence the switch to another instrument. “When Jethro Tull began, I think I’d been playing the flute for about two weeks. It was a quick learning curve ... literally every night I walked onstage was a flute lesson.”  Taking Anderson’s comments literally, there have been close to 50 years of “ flute lessons” since that time and his is one of the most recognisable profiles in modern popular music. I spoke to Ian recently and asked him what motivated the latest project. Eloquent and forthright, he relates the tale: “I was travelling through Europe last summer, in the car in fact, and I decided to do something I hadn’t really done before and that is look up the life and times of the original Jethro Tull. “I’d never really wanted to get too close to that because of a sense of embarrassment at being named after a dead guy whose place in history was unknown to me when I gave a bewildered nod to our agent when he suggested the name back in 1968. “The more I thought about it and the more I read, it just came to mind and I set out to quickly look at the band’s catalogue and tick off a number of songs that had some bearing on Jethro’s life and there were quite a few!” With Anderson’s best placed irony, he added: “So it wasn’t because I wanted to dress in tights and wear a wig and period clothes, that would be twee and embarrassing and I thought, no, I’ll bring it into the present day.” Anderson’s latest project is no superficial flirtation, however, he actually has a wealth of experience when it comes to matters agricultural. He and his family have around three decades-worth of knowledge in both arable, stock and fish farming, so the project was hardly breaking new ground (apologies for the pun), as it were. Warming to the theme, Ian continues: “People often find it somewhat difficult that a person in the lowly world of rock music can actually have a brain! “My credentials, my experience and my knowledge may not be supreme but it’s a considerable working knowledge of over three decades of being involved in farming.” Many of the important topical issues – global-warming, climate change, population growth, cheap-food production etc – can be seen within the context of Anderson’s project but the songs, which is essentially what the audience will pay to hear, are strong enough to stand multiple interpretations. Effectively, the project/tour constitutes a “greatest hits” show with a theme. Before the band amassed those multi-million sales figures, world tours and the rest there had been, as is often the case with emerging bands/artists, a period of penury which acts as a counter-weight to the good times. Anderson well remembers some of those hard times and one occasion in particular, a year before Tull’s formation, on Tyneside. Laughing at the memory, he tells me: “I’m mindful of the first time I played Newcastle, it was the Club A Go Go. We only knew that the Animals famously played there. I do remember we were penniless but we had been tipped-off that there was a place to eat in Newcastle for, you know, a shilling (5p) or whatever. “It was essentially like a soup kitchen for the homeless – that basically included half of the pop and rock groups in the UK – and I’m not joking but the knives and forks were all chained to the tables! “The nearest thing to home was sleeping on top of the Hammond organ in the back of a Ford Transit. It was a salutary lesson in what being a musician is all about.”  I mention to Anderson – who was awarded the MBE in 2008 – that another significant milestone looms, just two or three years hence, 50 years in music. Any plans to celebrate, I venture? “Yes, an early bed ! With or without cocoa,” he replies. “I’ve never really been a one for anniversaries, it’s always been the record company which has prompted them,” he adds rather modestly. Over their long career, Jethro Tull have variously been described as blues-rock, folk-rock, psychedelic-rock and progressive-rock but whatever they were called they have a broad enough appeal to enable them to sell (depending on the data-source) in excess of 60 million albums worldwide, 11 of them went “gold” and Aqualung alone sold more than seven million copies. With that in mind, Jethro Tull:The Rock Opera sounds like a perfect opportunity to tap-into that huge and varied catalogue while filling-in on the life and times of gifted English eccentric who fashioned a seed drill from church-organ pedals and revolutionised agricultural development.
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Post by steelmonkey on Aug 13, 2015 15:49:22 GMT
That's us, I guess 'rock fans of a certain vintage'
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Post by maddogfagin on Aug 14, 2015 8:13:23 GMT
That's us, I guess 'rock fans of a certain vintage' Mature, rather like an old vintage wine |
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Post by steelmonkey on Aug 14, 2015 15:59:58 GMT
' Mature ? I'm not mature. I'm bloody demented '
Pete Townshend
Psychoderelict.....which fetaures the line ' thicker than a housebrick'
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Post by Deleted on Aug 22, 2015 17:37:24 GMT
More: Interview with Jethro Tull’s Ian AndersonHASH: You have worked closely with Steven Wilson on remixes. Does working closely with the albums again take you back to the original sessions? ANDERSON: There is a certain amount of “flashback” that goes on when you go into the detail of the mixing; the detail of the instruments and so on. Steven has a free reign to get to the understanding of the music and present some rough mixes to me. I then listen to them and maybe go into his studio a couple of times and refine things; maybe making a few changes here and there in the process. He’s actually in the USA at the moment on tour and this morning he sent me some mixes of what he had done while he was in his dressing room on his laptop; preparing the elements for the new mixies, even while he’s on tour doing his own stuff. We’re working on Too Old to Rock and Roll, Too Young to Die at the moment and against all the odds, we found some songs that were never released on the original, so we have at least three previously unreleased songs. HASH: What other Jethro Tull rereleases can we expect as far as reissues go? ANDERSON: Steven is going to continue with the 1970’s releases, I suppose we would be into Songs from the Wood, Heavy Horses and Stormwatch; that will probably be it for him. Once we hit the 80’s, he would have done so many Jethro Tull albums. I always said to him, that when he thinks it’s time to bow out and stop doing these, feel free. I guess for him, that classic period of Jethro Tull in the 70’s was when he was growing up and getting acquainted with rock music, our music, King Crimson, and others that were having an impact on him. He went on to be a musician, indeed a progressive rock musician very much because of the bands that influenced him as a teenager growing up. For him to work on this music is something that is part of his musical heritage. I suppose when you get into the 80’s, he was already up and running as a musician himself, so he probably didn’t pay much attention to us anymore (laughing). forums.stevehoffman.tv/threads/jethro-tull-too-old-to-rock-and-roll-too-young-to-die-deluxe-2016.434431/page-7 |
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Post by steelmonkey on Aug 22, 2015 22:33:59 GMT
Three new songs on next re-release. Good that !
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I hope there could be more of this.
Love the clips from "Lap of Luxury" and "Steelmonkey" 
"In the sulphur city, where men are men! We bolt those beams then climb again" 
Not easy to understand but the music shines through... Wow! 
. Anyone else? I know of one other 