c o n r a d

After the success of Thick as a Brick, Jethro Tull moved to France for tax purposes and began recording their new album. They didn't finish recording there, but much of what they did do formed the nucleus for A Passion Play, which was completed back in England. This album was another single-song affair, but the musical style had drifted yet again. This time the addition of saxophones played by Ian Anderson gave the band a very different sound; coupled with some somewhat unconventional melodies, this reminds me a little of Gentle Giant, though the Ian Anderson songwriting style is unmistakable. The album tells the story of Ronnie Pilgrim, who we first meet at his death. In the afterlife he is taken to a place called "The Viewing Room", where he gets to see the edited highlights of his life, which are generally embarassing. An intermission is filled by a twee morality play done in the style of a bad "Peter and the Wolf", which some may find amusing. Back to the main play and Ronnie Pilgrim is taken to heaven, which he dislikes, so then he goes to hell, which he also dislikes. The play ends with Ronnie Pilgrim being reborn. The play is like The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway in style, but I personally find it to be more rewarding and a little less self indulgent, bespectacled hare and all. Unfortunately the music on this album suffers in comparison with Thick as a Brick. There are certainly moments that are almost as good, and the music flows together very well, but there is still a noticeable drop in quality. It's not that bad an album, but Jethro Tull probably suffered from having set the bar too high. Certainly, though, this is a superior album to most of Tull's 80's output. While I am not entirely enthusiastic about this album, it should be noted that many consider this to be Tull's finest hour. It particularly appeals to those who have a penchant for big concept albums and less accessible melodies. I personally prefer the so called "Chateau d'Isaster" tapes recorded in France and which appear on Nightcap. Give this album a number of plays through before you make up your mind on it. review by Conrad Leviston — 8-13-03 —

m a t t

Jethro Tull followed 1972's Thick as a Brick a year later with A Passion Play, perhaps the most controversial item in the band's catalog. It was another concept album, another album-length suite (though this time the individual songs were segued instead of really being one long piece) and it had an even more serious theme (death, afterlife, rebirth). I have heard it repeated by some of the elder statesmen of progressive rock fandom that one cannot fully appreciate A Passion Play without having experienced its stage performance. I never saw it and I suspect that most people out there who currently own the album haven't seen it either; ultimately the music is survived by the CD recording, and that is how it must be judged today. I wouldn't say that A Passion Play is one of Jethro Tull's best albums, but I do think it is very good, especially when the rushed circumstances of its creation are considered. As every Jethro Tull fan knows, the band began recording its sixth studio album while in France during a brief stint as tax exiles. A large chunk of music was written and recorded in France but, for various reasons, the project was abandoned. Three tracks from these sessions were released on the band's 20 Years of Jethro Tull box-set and, 8 years later, much more of it ended up on Nightcap, a two-disc compilation of unreleased material. The 20 Years tracks ("Scenario," "Audition," "No Rehearsal") did not involve any music later used for A Passion Play, but Nightcap reveals that a lot of A Passion Play's music had originally been written for something else entirely: a conceptual suite about animals, humans and nature. It would not be out of line to say, then, that A Passion Play is largely a cut-and-paste job that paired existing music intended for an unrelated project with an entirely new narrative that was whipped up in time to meet a deadline. Such less-than-ideal circumstances would have to negatively impact the final product and I do think that the compromised nature of this album shows through, though this is mostly manifest in the lyrics. The music, however, strikes me as being quite good. The sound is not radically different from Thick as a Brick. Again, John Evans (piano, organ, synthesizers) and Ian Anderson (flute, acoustic guitar, saxophone) are the principal players and Martin Barre is of even lesser importance; even when he's given something to do, his ancillary guitar parts are usually buried deep in the mix. This is the first time that Ian Anderson experimented with saxophone on a record and his airy, thin tone makes the instrument sound almost like an extra synthesizer to me at times. There is, generally, more happening in the music here than on Thick as a Brick in terms of the density of the arrangements. John Evans' less-imposing organs and synthesizers permit a balance to the soundstage that allows the listener to easily absorb all the little details; the textures and the counterpoints. As a composition, the piece often lacks the melodic pull and crackling energy supplied by Thick as a Brick, but if that album is to be the yardstick of quality then many albums better than A Passion Play will also suffer by comparison. An urgency does build in the music as the story moves toward its climax (the last 15 minutes or so of the album, starting with "Foot of Our Stairs") and I think the final moments are as gripping and satisfying as the conclusion to Thick as a Brick. I've seen complaints about the music on this album being either tuneless or unapproachable and I have to say I've never found this to be the case. This was one of the earlier progressive rock albums that I ever purchased — only my third or fourth Tull album — and the music always seemed quite accessible and even pretty. Where the album doesn't quite make it for me is the lyrics. I don't think they're really bad, but when you aspire to write a story about subjects so huge as life, death, the afterlife, God, Satan and humanity, you probably shouldn't pick the time to do it when you were forced to produce something in two weeks because you needed to get an album out before the tour. But that's what Anderson did. There is a generally-followable story but I don't think that it flows very well and although there are some nice lines and effective imagery here and there, the lyrics seem too concerned with wordplay and making literary allusions than with really saying something. I mean, it's nice that Mr. Anderson is familiar with Dante's Inferno, but the references don't seem to do much more than make the audience aware of this, and provide a crutch to bolster Anderson's growing interest in cultivating an occasionally-distracting medieval/pre-industrial image for himself and the band. I wouldn't want to deride the whole thing as just smoke and mirrors because I do think that Anderson was a capable enough writer to have done something better with this subject had there been more time. Additionally, although Anderson may have bit off more than he could adequately chew in a pinch, I don't think the results ever get any worse than "unfocused." The vocals aren't over-emoted and the music isn't guilty of cheesily-inducing an emotional payoff where none is warranted. If anything, the integration of the music with these lyrics is played a little too close to the vest: more variation in texture and tempo (especially in the first half of the album) would better dramatize the narrative. Also, the music can be a bit too bouncy to best complement the very dark subject matter. And the less said about "The Hare Who Lost His Spectacles" — a comic interlude that may have been interesting on stage but which flops on record — the better. Considering the great scope of Ian Anderson's ambitions with A Passion Play, I must view the album as something of a failure. But because I do really like the music and because the lyrics are abstract enough to tune out if need be, I still think this is a very good album overall. Certainly, it is one of the highpoints of ensemble playing in Jethro Tull's catalog. review by Matt P. — 2-5-05 —