JETHRO TULL
Benefit (Chrysalis/EMI)
Reviewed by DJ Johnson

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By the time of Benefit's recording in 1970, Jethro Tull was no longer the same band that had made the excellent blues-rock debut, This Was. Singer/acoustic guitarist/flutist Ian Anderson had emerged as the dominant personality, blues guitarist Mick Abrahams had left the fold and Martin Barre had taken his place with a completely different style that was much sharper-edged. Listening to his guitar parts today, you'd have to say he was playing heavy metal while Anderson and the others were playing a strange form of British Isles folk. That was almost 33 years ago, and we know how it came out, so there's no sense pretending they weren't on to something big there. However, if you're looking for the power of Aqualung, the technical arrangements of A Passion Play or the precision of Thick As A Brick, you're probably going to open this one and find the cake wasn't quite baked yet. Anderson hadn't figured out that he was the disheveled character known as Jethro Tull yet, though that would happen the following year with the breakthrough Aqualung album. It's interesting listening to the band figuring things out, though, and there are a few great songs, especially "The Cry You A Song" and "Play In Time," the latter of which features the genesis of that amazing guitar/flute interplay that Barre and Anderson would become masters of. This is a remastered edition that sounds very nice indeed, and the four bonus tracks are actually better songs than most of the main tracks. "Witch's Promise," "Singing All Day," "Just Trying To Be" and the UK mix of "Teacher" were apparently recorded before Benefit - something I just learned myself and something that comes as a big surprise, since they are, for the most part, far better written, more fully realized songs than the others. Ah, the mysteries of rock and roll. Again, a year later it all became a moot point when Aqualung exploded onto the radio waves.

© 2002 - DJ Johnson