SONGS FROM THE WOOD

After the mainstream sounding TOO OLD TO ROCK N ROLL album, IAN ANDERSON once again modified the JETHRO TULL formula to give it a more traditional earthy sound. IAN ANDERSON left the LONDON hustle for the simple pleasures of the beautiful English country side and it definitely shows on SONGS FROM THE WOOD. Welcome to the world of mandolin, whistle, lute, pipes,bells and other well traditional musical instruments.

Nevetheless, this is not a pure folk album; this is strongly folk oriented of course, but the hard rock with the riffs of ol' MARTIN BARRE is still well represented on tracks such as the great title track, the catchy HUNTING GIRL with great guitar licks. But in between the guitar mayhem always appear the pastoral soud of an acoustic guitar with nice flute playing when it's not a mandolin.

Of course the acoustic ''country'' songs outnumber the fast ones like JACK IN THE GREEN which feature only IAN ANDERSON, his acoustic guitar and flute. Nothing prog on this title, trust me! A song definitely from the woods! the same goes for the upbeat CUP OF WONDER, kind of sing-along song that could be heard in some pub or old tavern in some small English village.

You even can go back in time with the cute VELVET GREEN sounding like a march with its definitive medieval athmosphere! i feel like being in a old castle with a minstrel entertaining the court of the duke. THE WHISTLER keeps the same spirit that prevail on this album: a typical energetic , nice acoustic driven tune with a lot of mad flute all over the place.

PIBROCH (cap in hand) is the most out of place song on this album; not the song by itself, but mainly its heavy guitar intro which is replayed twice more in the middle of the song and one more time at the end; kind of anachronic considering the athmosphere of the album...and even these 2 guitar parts don't fit this otherwise nice song with a great melody and beautiful proggy arrangements except these parts

Also it's worth noticing that IAN ANDERSON voice sounds..country as well, deeper, harsher than usual, nothing as clear as A SMALL CIGAR for example, but i guess it matches the spirit of this recording.

This is not an album i listen often too! This is a good album with its own personality, but as i said it's good, but not great for me!

3 stars define a good album, right?so....

3 STARS

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