AQUALUNG

It´s not easy to write a review on such legendary album. The fact that hundreds of other people here in PA have left their remarks about the album already doesn´t help much either. However, before anyone start to ask if I do even know this CD I decided I should give my impressions about it. Aqualung is probably Jethro Tull´s most famous and iconic album. It made a huge impact in the 70´s and it was a international success, including Brazil, my country. it was the first ever JT LP I ever heard and probably the first I saw too (at school when I was 15, I believe). However, after all these years and having recently purchased the 25th anniversary edition, I can´t say it is JT´s best. I give this honour to Thick As A Brick. However, it still an outstanding work. And a must have for any prog lover.

The strength of this CD is based primarely on three tracks: the title track, Cross-eyed Mary and Locomotive Breath. Those three are classic, first rate prog songs that should be the envy of any songwriter. No need to comment about such well known works. They are simply perfect, breathtaking tunes and I just can´t get enough of those. More than three decades later and I still hear them with much pleasure. However, the remaining stuff on the album is hardly in the same level. Mother Goose is a nice acoustic piece with funny lyrics and My God has some interesting musical experiments that are a bit unsual for the JT style of the time. It´s quite progressive, but not necessarily good or too pleasant. The anti-christian lyrics sound a bit forced and naive by today´s standards. The music is not really that good to make us forget the words to appreciate them just for the melodies. But they are not bad either. It was the first labum to feature John Evan as a permantent member and he does add a lot of textures with his excellent keyboard playing.

The recording production was not the best and even Ian Anderson admits that. The 1998 remastered did very little improvement as far as I can say. It was a major disappointment, considering some outstanding remastering work I´ve seen lately. The bonus tracks are several, but don´t really add much. Lick Your Fingers Clean is the only song that is really new to me, while the quad version of Wind Up doesn´t differ much from the original one. There is a 13 minute interview with Ian Anderson from 1996 commenting about the album (oddly enough, maybe the most interesting bonus feature here). The three last bonus tracks are from a 1998 BBC session (Song For Jeffrey, Fat Man and Bourneé) and those are only for hardcore fans.

Rating: 4 stars. Maybe 4,5 for its historical importance.