THROUGH THE YEARS

This is a poor compilation for one of favourite bands. Please don't start JT with this, it will not bring you there!! A bit of an insult really.

There are some great tracks on it, simply because it is Jethro Tull - I mean Locomotive Breath will probably convert anyone.

Please don't start with this - even if you see it for £2-50 in Asda.

JT are one of the greatest bands ever, don't ruin it with this.

Go for Aqualung......

I will punish this collection with one star because the list of songs is exactly the same as the other collection form the same year (!!!). I was foolish enough to buy them both because they were both sales and I'm not so much into Jethro Tull yet. Of course I know their famous Locomotive Breath as well as (absent on this collection) Thick as a brick but I don't have any albums of this band.

So I thought I buy some collections by this band to get to know them a bit better. But who would have thought the label would do two exact similar collections. I think that's a disgrace that has to be punished. On both collections there are some live versions that might be slightly different so that's the only difference then.

Other than this I think it's quite useless. I gave the other collection 2 stars because the songs aren't all that bad but chose this one to make the statement. 1 star for this ridiculous effort.

Complations are at their best a necessity for bands and a nice way to listen to new bands for us, music lovers. But at their worst they can be an insult for the artists, and mislead curious new listeners. Through The Years is one of the worst compilations I have ever encountered. The song book of JT is that large, that it is impossible to summarize its history in 13 songs. And I don't know who selected the songs, but they are in no way representative for this wonderful band. So all signs show red for those searching for an introduction into Jethro Tull. Try Bursting Out Live, Aqualung or Heavy Horses, but stay away from this compilation!

Ha! See the ratings of this compilation! I'm not breaking the (rare and precious?) chain of one- star ratings, because this really is a disgrace as a sampler of JETHRO TULL's music. Yesterday I read the review in allmusic.com and there it was said very well: if one played in hazard 13 tracks from Tull's catalogue between 1968 and 1995, it could sound like this. It's miles away from being a Best Of collection in any sense. First, songs leap from one era and style to another in a very haphazard way. The only even slightly logical thing about the selection is that it manages to pick tracks from numerous albums. But regarding that some of those albums are clearly among Tull's weaker output, while some classics (e.g. Minstrel In The Gallery, Thick As A Brick, Stormwatch) are excluded completely, that doesn't help anything at all. I'm sure any fan would have concentrated more in the halcyon days of the seventies and would have minimized the portion of the years '82-95.

What's more striking, the tracks here are hardly anyone's favourite songs of the albums. Well, not mine at least. Maybe the editor of the compilation has his own taste... Only 'We Used To Know' from Stand Up (1969) might be an exception. Also 'Wind Up' from Aqualung is great, but so is the album in general - I personally don't enjoy 'Locomotive Breath' which is also here (though I know it has a classic status).

Actually years ago, when my few Tull albums were on vinyls, I had a cheaper- looking CD with the same track list if I remember right. I removed it quite quickly from my shelf... JETHRO TULL is a fantastic band (I've grown to love their best albums more and more over the years!) but if you decide to start with a compilation, don't choose this one.