RARE AND PRECIOUS CHAIN

This offereing features a couple of tunes from 1995's ROOTS TO BRANCHES. The first is one of the better songs on the album, "Rare and Precious Chain". The second is "This Free Will". I will treat the second first, "This Free Will". This song always seemed to be a missing song on Tull's CREST OF A KNAVE. It reminds me a lot of "Mountain Men", and could have been the sequel (or prequel?). A decent song, not my favorite from ROOTS TO BRANCHES but better than some of the rest. "Rare and Precious" has the Middle-eastern vibe that Tull experimented with on this album. It is, IMHO, the best tune from ROOTS AND BRANCHES, and was a good single choice. Being just a single, and being that both songs are already available on the album, I can only rate this 2 stars: for collectors. Normally, "This Free Will" would get 3 and "Rare and Precious Chain" 4 stars.