LIVING WITH THE PAST
Jethro Tull
•Prog Folk
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Live, released in 2002 Songs / Tracks Listing 1. Intro (0:22) - Ian Anderson (concert and bamboo flutes, vocals, acoustic guitar, harmonica, mandolin) plays on all tracks and to frenchie for the last updates Edit this entry |
Buy JETHRO TULL Living With The Past Music
![]() | Living in the Past EMI Europe Generic 2003 | $5.40 $3.72 (used) |
![]() | Living With The Past & Nothing Is Easy Live At The Isle Of Wight 1970 [2 CD] Eagle Records 2014 | $15.75 $9.46 (used) |
![]() | Living in Past Reissued Capitol 1999 | $7.60 (used) |
![]() | Living In The Past Chrysalis Records | $199.99 $3.99 (used) |
![]() | Living In The Past Parts 1 & 2 Single Chrysalis | $9.49 (used) |
![]() | Living With The Past+Noth EAGLR 2017 | $16.51 |
![]() | Living in the Past Limited Edition · Remastered Toshiba EMI Japan 2004 | $95.00 $53.68 (used) |
![]() | Living With the Past by Jethro Tull Eagle Vision | $58.94 |
![]() | Jethro Tull 45 RPM Living in the Past / Christmas Song Chrysalis | $5.00 (used) |

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JETHRO TULL Living With The Past ratings distribution
(115 ratings)
Essential: a masterpiece of progressive rock music(16%)
Excellent addition to any prog rock music collection(51%)
Good, but non-essential (25%)
Collectors/fans only (6%)
Poor. Only for completionists (2%)
JETHRO TULL Living With The Past reviews
Showing all collaborators reviews and last reviews preview | Show all reviews/ratings
Collaborators/Experts Reviews
PROG REVIEWER

PROG REVIEWER

My Sunday Feeling from This Was 1968
Roots to branches from Roots to Branches 1995
Jack-in-the-green from Songs from the wood 1977
The habanero reel from The secret language of birds 2000 (Ian Anderson solo)
Sweet dream from Living in the past 1969
In the grip of the stronger stuff from Divinities: Twelve dances with God (Ian Anderson solo)
Aqualung from Aqualung 1971
Locomotive Breath from Aqualung 1971
Living in the past from Living in the past 1969
Protect and survive from A 1980
Nothing is easy from Stand up 1969
Wondering aloud from Living in the past 1969
Life's a long song from Living in the past 1969
A Christmas song from Living in the past 1969
Cheap day return from Aqualung 1971
Mother goose from Aqualung 1971
Dot com from Dot com 1999
Fat man from Stand up 1969
Some day the sun wonâ??t shine for you from This was 1968 (Original line up)
Cheerio from Broadsword and the beast 1982
You see they are all great songs from Tull's past. The lot of them (and I can't emphasise it enough) played in a magnificent way. If you have never been to a Jethro Tullâ??s concert before and you want to know what it's like, just buy this record and next time Tull is on tour again, youâ??ll be the first in the row. I will, cause I don't want to miss a concert like this, by no means.
PROG REVIEWER

There are 21 tracks of vintage Tull on this CD spanning their entire career. A haunting version of "Roots To Branches" puts the spotlight on ANDERSON's mystical and magical vocal style that no one could ever duplicate. I can attest to the magnetic personality of ANDERSON on stage, as I witnessed it myself. I found the version of "Living In The Past" one of the most interesting tracks on the CD. It's a wonderful use of the all-around talent in this group. The keyboards change the entire mood of the number, and ANDERSON as always is up for the challenge, and he does a fine job of shaping his vocals around the music of the ever changing classic tune. "Fat Man" is a great tune as well; ANDERSON plays his miniature guitar wistfully and sings as if he means every word right from the heart, in his very own whimsical dry British humor kind of way. These are but a few of the highlights on a disc that is literally full of them. For long time fans a special treat is offered, the 1968 original lineup reunite on the close of the CD with "Some Day The Sun Won't Shine For You" and "Cherrio." It harkens back to their roots when they were a blues based band.
There have been a lot of "Best Of" and repackaged JETHRO TULL CDs issued, this is one that stands on its own for originality. It offers old and new fans alike a unique blend of different versions of their songs over the course of TULL's amazing run of successful albums. A DVD with the same name and cover is available for those that enjoy the visual experience to accompany the music.
SPECIAL COLLABORATOR Honorary Collaborator

The 2002 Jethro Tull live album represents the perfect EQUILIBRIUM between the two other important releases Bursting Out (1978) and A Little Light Music (1992). Living With The Past is the squaring of the circle! both extrovert and introvert, electric and acoustic, with, as always, a great contribution from all the musicians: Martin Barre, in addition to his mythic guitar riffs returns to play flute very well in the beautiful Fat Man, historic folky song from the 1969 Stand Up album, now taken from the 2 Meter TV session (Holland), October 19th 1999. From this session you can listen also to Dot Com (from the J-Tull's 1999 omonimous album).sadly there's no Najma Akhtar singing!
The SURPRISE in Living With The Past is the 1968 line-up REUNION! The song is Some Day The Sun Won't Shine For You, from the 1968 This Was album, with vocal duo by Mick Abrahams, the first JT guitarist, and Ian Anderson, bass by Glenn Cornick and drums by the great "old" Clive (Bunker)! The first half of the album is from the Hammersmith Apollo concert of November 25th 2001: good Intro that fades into an excellent My Sunday Feeling, the best live version and one of my fav JT live tracks ever! Then Roots To Branches, the stunning opener from their 1995 album (peaked at n° 20 in the UK charts). The Habanero Reel is a wonderful "Caribbean" song from the marvellous 2000 Ian Anderson' solo album The Secret Language Of Birds, with that nice joyful lyrics: ".cool in the corner Tom Cat sitting.". After this, another classic one: Sweet Dream, in all its great pompous vein! In The Grip Of Stronger Stuff is an interesting classical instrumental track taken from the 1995 Ian' solo album Divinities. The first part of the live album finishes with an unespected medley Living With The Past/Protect And Survive, this last from the album A (1980). sadly with no vocals! After a great live Paris's exhibition of Nothing Is Easy it's the turn of the acoustic sessions: Wond'rin Aloud and Life Is A Long Song recorded both in January 2002 with a nice string quartet. A Christmas Song, Cheap Day Return and Mother Goose recorded in Zurich in the (nowadays) far 1989, featuring Dave Pegg on mandolin and bass guitar.
At last, an excellent live album! Great musicianship!
PROG REVIEWER

SPECIAL COLLABORATOR Crossover & JR/F/Canterbury Teams

The recordings here are from different venues, played between 1999 and 2002, with a short interlude from 1989, with Anderson, Martin Barre and David Pegg playing in a dressing room. There is also one track from a 2002 reunion of the This Was band. I'd like to here more from that concert.
The songs are extremely well performed, and Anderson has rearranged and transposed some of the songs to make it easier on his tired voice. While the songs are taken from all different periods of Tull's history, going all the way back to the first album, and including Anderson's solo albums, they mostly shy away from the more difficult (and more prog) material.
For fans of the folkier side of Tull, this is a must. If I were rating it for my own personal pleasure, 4 stars. As a prog album, only 3.
PROG REVIEWER

There's an eclectic (and generous) selection of material here. The track list draws not only from the usual Tull standards ("Aqualung", et al) but also on some unexpected rarities ("My Sunday Feeling", off the very first Jethro Tull album) and a few Ian Anderson solo cuts, nice to hear in a full band format.
But it's an unbalanced collection, to say the least, resembling a Frankenstein hybrid of songs compiled from several unrelated and very different live projects which (sadly) aren't available separately. The first half of the CD is from a then recent '01 gig at London's Hammersmith Apollo (with an encore from Paris), all of it played with admirable but almost lifeless professionalism. Compare the running time of some of these live versions against their studio counterparts: in many cases they vary by only a few seconds, proof that not only the same notes but also the tempos of each song were being reproduced verbatim on stage.
Next is a pair of unplugged Tull classics, played alongside a string quartet in the comfort of Anderson's country estate. All very nice, but why choose to re-interpret two songs ("Wond'ring Aloud" and "Life Is a Long Song") that in their original form already featured acoustic arrangements with a string section? Why not try something a little more radical, like a completely unplugged "Minstrel in the Gallery" or "My God"? (I will say that this section works better visually: see the companion DVD)
After that are several (likewise acoustic) dressing room 'rehearsals' and a few TV performances, including the token contemporary Tull song: there's always one or two in every set, in this case the title track of the band's then-current studio album "Dot Com". Arguably these are the best selections here, being more relaxed and informal. But I think it's fair to say that "A Christmas Song" is fast becoming another of those overplayed Tull chestnuts, although in this setting it benefits from the lack of all those sappy studio strings.
And finally there's the only real surprise in the entire package: a reunion of the original 1968 Jethro Tull line-up, with Anderson joined by old stalwarts Mick Abrahams, Clive Bunker, and Glenn Cornick. The quartet was reformed to play a one-night stand for old time's sake in a small London pub, which sounds like a great idea until you realize the entire event (a total of three songs) was staged for the camera, with a small audience of extras pretending to be a background crowd of 1968 bar hoppers.
Only one excerpt (a very blue "Some Day the Sun Won't Shine For You") is included here, and once again it seems a missed opportunity. Why not stage a genuine reunion gig, and record the result? Like the rest of the album (the Hammersmith Apollo show; the Zurich dressing room stuff; the string quartet material) it could have been expanded and released on its own considerable merits, instead of having its impact diluted by cramming one sample into an already schizophrenic disc.
Maybe a better title for the CD, and its DVD cousin, would have been "Stuck in the Past". In the immortal words of George Santayana (clearly a big fan of Jethro Tull): "Those who can't learn from the past are doomed to repeat it..."
Latest members reviews
Living With The Past takes a few listenings to get used to. First off, Ian's range is not what
it used to be...at all, so listening to it is kind of awkward at first. Secondly, the replacement
of real instruments with MIDI is a bit of a downer because of the energy it lacks. But after
those tw
... (read more)
Report this review (#35145) | Posted by | Friday, June 3, 2005 | Review Permanlink
This is not Tull in their prime , but nonetheless is an excellent CD. With a back catalogue of
such classic material the CD just flies by. The playing is excellent and what the current Tull
lineup lacks in stage presence is more than made up by their musicianship.
... (read more)
Report this review (#16895) | Posted by platform | Thursday, August 5, 2004 | Review Permanlink
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