HEAVY HORSES

This album is an all time classic for me and it's packed onto my solar powered eplayer for when the babyfaced jester in North Korea starts playing his chess games with the West. "and the Mouse Police never sleep" Good opening track with a good ending - what is that a cat coughing up a hairball right at the end of the track? Good hard folk rock. "Acres Wild" - about copulation in wide open spaces - an interesting track that I enjoy. I do find that a lot of the time Anderson has copulation on the brain throughout his career. Nice folksy rock. "No Lullaby" - A hard rock in folk tradition of what I would call an anti-lullaby of hard truths sung to a child. Strong track. "Moths" beautiful Tull track about moths and lemmings and humans and copulation. "Journeyman" - not brilliant but not bad - workman like track. "Rover" - another good track about dogs, roving and human roving. "One Brown Mouse" - a discussion with a pet mouse in a cage, on face value - nice folksy track. "Heavy Horses" - A giant of a track which I find it to be very sad indeed. Tribute to the work horses that once did a lot of the heavy farm labour in England. There is a thread in the forum section which deals with "has prog ever made you cry", or something like that. This track has to be a very strong contender when it comes to inspiring emotion in a listener. The music is very strong and apt throughout the track depicting the strength of the work horses at their prime as well as the sadness as they were put out to pasture in favor of mechanised farming. The beauty of beholding a Clydesdale up close and the sadness of having to put an animal like that down. "Weathercock" - Stunning Mandolin use in this track - an upbeat folk pastoral track. "Living in these hard times" (bonus track) - very good lyrics about pregnancy and hard times - enjoyable catchy folk rock track. "Broadford Bazaar" (bonus track) - very pleasant track to round of a brilliant album.

There are a lot of references to animals/creatures throughout this album. The music is very tight and well constructed and is a mix of rock, traditional folk and pastoral as well as medievil music. The album rating, for me, is a no brainer and I happily award this 5 stars.