THIS WAS

Jethro Tull's somewhat immature debut album is a very long shot from Aqualung and Thick As A Brick (and indeed from almost everything the band did after that). Ian Anderson's flute and vocals are already recognizable here, but apart from that there is very little here to relate this music to what came later. This is basically a straightforward Blues Rock album and it would be stretching it quite a bit to even call this proto-Prog.

This Was sounds very dated to me and, unlike on the next album, none of the tracks stand out here. Prog fans should begin with Aqualung and ignore the band's three first albums at least until they have acquired most or all of the band's post-Aqualung output, most of which is better than these early albums. Still, this is not bad music as such, and for me as a big fan of the band this can certainly be interesting for historical reasons and even moderately enjoyable in its own right.

Recommended for fans and collectors, but absolutely not the place to begin

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