Ian Anderson: This Was and Always Will Be

David Schultz

2008-09-23

Flute solos, Johan Sebastian Bach covers and a devotion to medieval chamber music hardly seem like the characteristics synonymous with classic rock success, much less those upon which an English blues band from the Sixties would ultimately base their legacy. For Ian Anderson and Jethro Tull, taking unconventional approaches to the familiar has always served to single them out, to some as anachronistic objects of derision but to many more as purveyors of a distinctive style that no other band can come close to reproducing. On their early albums, This Was, Stand Up and Benefit, they embodied the British-inflected blues, with the release of Aqualung, they emerged as classic rock titans, they give birth to the era of the prog-rock concept album with Thick As A Brick before presiding over its demise with A Passion Play and with Minstrel In The Gallery, established them as masters of the baroque-inspired jam. While difficult to point to any bands that are their direct descendent, Jethro Tull’s influence spreads throughout the progressive rock minded bands of today as well as to any group daring to incorporate the flute into their sound.

For close to forty years, Ian Anderson and Martin Barre have fronted Jethro Tull and at the present time the band is rounded out by Doane Perry, who has pretty much manned the drums for Tull since 1984, and newcomers David Goodier (bass) and John O’Hara (keyboards). No longer shaggy maned and slightly less wild-eyed, Ian Anderson remains Jethro Tull’s most recognizable face and voice, the silhouette of his one-legged flautist stance as identifiable with the band as the ruby red lips and tongue are to The Rolling Stones and the confederate flag to Lynyrd Skynyrd. Prior to Tull’s recent tour of America, Anderson spoke to jambands.com from the west country of England about the bands 40th anniversary and shared his views on the effects of downloading music through the Internet, the upcoming Presidential election and the possibility of a Jethro Tull residency.

Depending on when you start counting, this year marks Jethro Tull’s 40th anniversary, a true milestone. To commemorate their 20th and 25th anniversaries, Tull released box sets chock full of unreleased studio tracks and little-heard live recordings. To celebrate the four decades that have passed since the release of This Was, Jethro Tull’s phenomenal 1968 debut, they have released a double CD set consisting of the original mono mix of the album, a remixed and remastered studio version and assorted live tracks culled from the vaults of the BBC. In addition to the double CD reissue, Tull will be releasing Jack In The Green, a DVD compilation of German performances with a focus on a concert from The Broadsword And The Beast tour. This month will also see the American release of a double DVD documentary that is essentially the Jethro Tull story. “It features interviews with the band members past and present, people who were involved in Jethro Tull’s formation and career and lots of live performances,” explains Anderson, impressed with the impressive scope of the project. “It’s really one for the fans; a look at the story of Jethro Tull from the very beginning. Of course, even in 350 minutes of running time over 2 DVDs, I’m sure a lot of people will complain, ‘Well, you didn’t talk about this’ or ‘We didn’t see that.’ It’s hard to fit in 40 years of activity into even 350 minutes of documentary material. The makers of it have done their best and we’ll see how people like it.”

Not one to shy away from speaking about the past, Anderson responds to questions about Jethro Tull’s 40th anniversary with measured excitement for their upcoming American performances. “It’s been forty years since Jethro Tull began at the Marquee Club in February of 1968 and we are concentrating this year on reenergizing some of that very early period of Jethro Tull’s repertoire,” explains Anderson. “Those who saw Jethro Tull when we first landed in Boston in 1969 will probably find when we play in Boston that there are quite a few songs that they might have seen Jethro Tull play on that first occasion. We’re not exclusively representing that era of Jethro Tull but there’s an emphasis in the set list of material from the first three or four albums and a smaller scattering of things from later decades. It seems fitting in an anniversary year like this to revisit some of the really early work that made a few people sit up and take notice.”

In early August, Jethro Tull did pass through the Nikon at Jones Beach Theater in Wantagh, New York. True to its promise, the show featured revitalized versions of “Serenade To A Cuckoo,” “Dharma For One” and “A Song For Jeffrey” from This Was, a gorgeous rendition of “Sossity, You’re A Woman”/”Reasons For Waiting” and of course, potent readings of “Thick As A Brick,” “Aqualung” and “Locomotive Breath.” Playing before still images of the band taken over the last four decades, the briskly paced show also included slightly ironic offerings of “Living In The Past” and “Too Old To Rock And Roll (To Young To Die)” and healthy doses of Anderson’s wonderful wit and inimitable flute. Prior to “We Used To Know,” Anderson related a tale of playing the song back in the 70s when a young band known as The Eagles opened for them. He gathers that they must have heard them play the song because he believes “Hotel California” to be a fine homage to the Benefit era song. Sure enough, the descending chord changes to the Tull classic sound quite similar to those accompanying Don Henley’s trip down a dark desert highway.

In returning to remix and remaster This Was, Anderson didn’t have to tax his memory with respect to the music. “I’m pretty familiar with all of Jethro Tull’s recordings,” he explains. “From month to month and year to year, I’m listening to most of the albums because we’re always changing the set list and dusting off some old material so I’m pretty familiar with all the albums. This Was was last remastered a few years back when digital technology allowed us to remaster it in a higher standard from the original master tapes. Interestingly enough, those old master tapes going back to the 1/4” and the 4-track ½” tapes, they’re actually in much better condition than some of the stuff from the later Seventies. The old tape from the late Sixties was much heavier duty. They made tapes much much thinner in the Seventies, the latter part in particular; it’s much more fragile, has much less oxide on it and is far more prone to falling to pieces than some of the early stuff. The irony was we got pretty good results from the This Was material, indeed even from the 7 ½” per second mono BBC radio tapes. They were still in better condition than a lot of the stuff that came from the 70s and into the 80s when tapes stock was not as sturdy as it has been.”

For the 40th anniversary reissue, Anderson worked with the original Abbey Road tapes from 1968, noting that the remixing was made for difficult “because everything is on four tracks. You don’t have all the options because certain things are already bundled up: the bass guitar is on the same track with the vocals or the bass is on the same track with the rhythm guitar,” he explains. “You can’t separate out most of the instruments. So you’re trying to make the compromises in the mix just as had to be made when the album was recorded in the first place with only four tracks available. Back in the days of Sgt. Pepper and the first Pink Floyd album or the first Jethro Tull album, 4-tracks were all we had. 8-track came along the year after and 16-track within a couple years after that. By the time we made the Aqualung album we were recording on 16-track and things had evolved a huge amount in just the three years since we started.”

Anderson is quite taken with the advances in recording technology, which has progressed significantly since the recording of This Was. “Apart from the music that you can steal from the Internet without paying for it even on legitimate download operators like iTunes, the vast array of music available these days is tremendous,” he marvels. “Quite often when I go to research some music, I’m amazed by the depth of availability on iTunes. They have obscure old blues albums and artists that I thought no one else had ever heard at the flip of a button.” Amazed as he is for the wealth of music to be found online, Anderson is not impressed with the ability to acquire mp3s without cost. “We just have to remember that its only 99 cents for something that may bring you listening pleasure for years to come. It would be rather nice to pay for it and continue to support the music industry that nurtures new artists as well as old artists. If we don’t pay for the music that we listen to, we can’t really have much expectation of there being money spent on developing the artists of tomorrow. It’s not about lining the pockets of Sir Paul McCartney or Mick Jagger,” says Anderson. “It’s about paying money that’s invested by record companies, publishers and everybody in the management and promotion – the money that gets paid from recordings in order to develop the artists of the next decade and beyond. We’ve got to have a moral standpoint on this one and think of not only keeping people in work and providing the jobs that the music industry has generated over the years but also in investing in the artists who have yet to make their first record.”

While not exactly a populist position, Anderson’s opinions come from his decades as a performing artist who’s earned a living from record sales as well as concert tours. He wouldn’t quibble with the fact that it’s been quite some time since he was a starving musician. Anderson considers for a moment whether the abundance of available music on the Internet might result in wider exposure of a young band’s music which results in increased attendance at their live shows. “Perhaps they do,” he says before dismissing the possible benefits. “Let’s remember, you don’t have to pay for the 10 or 15 seconds of music that you get to listen to on Amazon.com or on iTunes or on any of the other download specialists when you audition - as the Americans are fond of saying - a piece of music before deciding whether or not to buy it. I don’t accept any argument for taking music and not paying for it from the Internet. I think that it’s a cheap shot. It may be that you go and listen and buy a ticket for a band of which you downloaded some music for free from the Internet. I still feel that that band - in order to get the point where they have enough money to even rent a tour bus and put their amplifiers on the stage - we owe them, whoever they might be, the right to be paid for what they’ve created. If we don’t pay them for making the record, we’re denying them the one economic resource that allows them to go out and tour. It’s all right for bands like Jethro Tull. We can go out and tour and make big profits. Our costs versus our gross income produce a large percentage of profits on which we pay our taxes in various countries of the world. Most bands, particularly when their starting off, aren’t that fortunate. They’re obliged to sometimes pay to be the opening act on a tour or play for virtually nothing and they depend on selling CDs by whatever way they can or downloads from the Internet to put a little bit of money into paying for the cost of the tour bus. It’s not every band that makes money out of touring. You may go see your live act play in your local venue but chances are they’re losing money every time they step out of their front door to play a gig until they get to a certain critical mass where their income per show exceeds somewhere in the range of $15,000. It’s impossible to imagine a band going out with the shoddiest of tour buses and playing venues without a talent fee in excess of $15,000 and of course, you don’t get that playing in the clubs,” instructs Anderson, his words becoming slightly impassioned but his demeanor remaining, as always, pleasant. “Putting it in perspective: stealing from the Internet is stealing from the Internet. You’re stealing out of the mouths of babes and I don’t think that it’s a fair thing to do. Steal from Paul McCartney; it’s not going to hurt him. It’s not going to hurt me particularly if you steal from me. I do think the downloading of new young artists’ material without paying for it is probably the least attractive thing you can do. We need to support new music and new artists and we should pay them for the work they do.”

Over the years, Anderson has often joked about the increasing number of reissues and greatest hits packages he’s asked his fans to purchase. While Anderson’s present focus is on remembering the past, it begs the question of whether there will be any new Jethro Tull music in the near future. “There is no plan for there not to be,” discloses Anderson. “During the last couple years, as you can imagine is the case with middle-aged and elderly gentlemen, there are medical issues that crop up. Unfortunately, from time to time, people have had to plan for some surgery or some period where they need to have some general overhaul,” he says, obliquely referring to Martin Barre’s relatively recent shoulder surgery. “There’s also the possibility that next year one of the musicians may have to take six months off to have some remedial surgery for a longstanding injury,” he reveals. “People who do what we do, whether its strumming the guitar, bashing the drums or holding the flute, there’s a lot of damage that comes along with that. We get work-related injuries and so far, fingers crossed, it hasn’t happened to me. It did briefly in 1996 but apart from that occasion, I’ve been okay,” says Anderson, alluding to his successful battle with deep vein thrombosis. “Bands are made up of people and sometimes we have to work around the medical realties.”

The realities of aging have affected Tull’s touring plans along with their recording ones. “These days we have to schedule a lot of our tours and activities a year ahead. Right now, we’re talking about specific dates about one year ahead in the USA as well as in Europe. It’s always possible that someone might not be available to do it. We have to have a backup musician in mind if somebody other than me gets sick or for whatever reason can’t do it,” he explains. “You really do have to think ahead. There are commitments you make once you announce concerts that you have to stick with. If it did happen to me it would be a cancellation. With all respect to the other guys, they’re all replaceable – not easily - but there are other musicians I know I can pick up the phone and hopefully they will be available if someone for whatever reason can’t make a show. These are realities of not just getting old but the realities for any musician at any age. That’s happened to us a number of times in the last two years,” he says before bringing it back to the issue of new music. “The opportunities to go into the studio have tended to disappear because those periods of time usually get eaten up by somebody’s illness, recuperation from illness or somebody’s commitment to do some other work with other artists. We all have things we do outside of Jethro Tull.”

While many equate Ian Anderson with Jethro Tull, without Martin Barre, Owen Wilson’s rant from Armageddon about people who mistake Jethro Tull for a person might not have been so funny. Barre joined Jethro Tull nearly forty years ago, replacing Mick Abraham after the release of This Was, making his and Anderson’s one of the longest running relationships in rock and roll. “There’s a lot of loyalty, friendship and support,” says Anderson explaining the pair’s longevity together. “We’re not close in the sense that we do things together. We’ve always had different interests and different personalities. Right from the beginning, Martin’s had his own life, his own circle of friends and I’ve had mine. We tend to survive as a couple, musically speaking, because of those differences and separate interests. If we had been too close, we would have come to blows or found it hard to carry on,” says Anderson, bringing to mind the reported volatility between Roger Daltrey and Pete Townshend and Keith Richards and Mick Jagger. “We have a healthy rather separate relationship. I think that’s probably the best way to be in a musical group. You don’t get too close to the people around you because the intimacy you enjoy musically speaking when you’re on stage together or even on tour together is pretty intense. Being on stage with other musicians, it’s like two hours of sex. It’s exhausting, especially for old chaps like me. We keep a degree of separation which is a healthy thing to do when you have to combine that with the intensity of the experience that you have on stage together. Perhaps in some ways it’s a little bit like a marriage – to have all that stuff that you really enjoy together but sometimes it’s the minutes apart that are also important. Whenever Jethro Tull are off the road for a while or off doing some solo projects and we get back together again there’s a sense of kinship and spirit within the band and that’s good. You just don’t want to overdo it. You can spoil the broth by overboiling it. A gentle simmer is better.”

With more than twenty studio albums to their credit, Jethro Tull has the breadth of catalog and devoted fan base to take up residency like The Allman Brothers Band or Phil Lesh & Friends and perform a historic run of shows. “The idea has crossed my mind,” relates Anderson. “I have a rather simplistic approach to being a traveling musician. I like to come into town, have some lunch, go to sound check play the show and leave town early the next morning. The idea of playing two shows in the same venue - let alone ten or twenty - it’s really hard for me,” he says, crushing the hopes of any Tull fans hoping for a Grateful Dead-like career retrospective residency in the near future. “I just like the kind of one night stand approach to performing and playing. I like to get in there and get out. If I’m still in the same town at 8:00 the following morning, I’m feeling a little strange. So that’s really not going to work. There have been occasions when we’ve played a couple of nights in a particular town at the same venue and we’ve changed the set list to some or even a greater extent for another show. Generally speaking, it’s not my way of doing things. I’d rather get on with the next one and a new sea of faces.” Since a large majority of Tull fans possess an encyclopedic knowledge of the band and their music, a residency, while not only being something new for the band, a three or four night run of shows in a single city would likely draw an insane amount of interest. “Perhaps so, but it would be two or three nights too long for me,” he say, quite matter-of-factly. “I’m afraid I’m just one of those people who like to leave town before the newspapers come out.”

One achievement that Jethro Tull is famously known for is their 1989 Grammy victory over Metallica for Best Hard Rock/Heavy Metal Performance for Crest Of The Knave, a predominantly acoustic album. “It will be remembered but for all the wrong reasons though,” laughs Anderson. “I think the award was given to us by the 5000 voting members of the Academy of Recording Artists not for being a heavy metal band but for being nice guys who had never won a Grammy before. I’ve always said if there was a category in the Grammy awards for Best One Legged Flute Player, I’d win it every year,” he boasts, tongue firmly in cheek. Metallica was quite vocal about their Grammy defeat taking out some of their frustration on the innocent Tull. Whatever tension that may have existed has long since faded. “Metallica were very generous once they did win the Grammy. They thanked everybody; their wives, their families, their pets, the fans and Jethro Tull for not putting out an album that year. It shows that the darkest of dark metal bands do at least have a little sense of self deprecating humor which is always good to see.”

Nearly twenty years later, where is the Grammy? The question itself makes Anderson laugh. “Interestingly enough, I did find it after about 10 years,” he says. “I hadn’t seen it for a long time. It showed up when someone was doing an insurance valuation. They came across it in a drawer somewhere in the far corner of the house. It made its appearance again but I don’t know what’s happened to it since then. It’s disappeared again,” he laughs. “It’s somewhere here in the house It’s very nice to have these things but you don’t necessarily have to show them off to the neighbors, he says with an understated modesty. “While it’s nice to have awards and acknowledgements from people, it doesn’t mean you have to wave them around to let people know how clever you are. I’m perfectly secure with myself. I don’t really need to impress myself by having these things on display.”

At the time that I spoke to Anderson, Barack Obama had just passed through England, “hobnobbing” with various high-ranking politicos as part of his whirlwind tour through the country. As Anderson is extremely eloquent and knowledgeable on more than just music, we digress into a little political discussion, centered on Europe’s interest in our upcoming election and the Democratic candidate’s appeal overseas. “It’s very much the case, for instance, in Germany 75% of the population want to see Obama become President of the United States,” offers Anderson. “In a number of countries in Europe I would say his profile is very high, considerably higher than John McCain and much higher than the current administration. In the eyes of most people, outside the 30-something percent that give Bush some kind of an approval rating in the U.S., they don’t think he’s done that great a job. Obviously this is an important time and an important election that is being viewed very seriously around the world. America, we hope, is going to have a rekindled part to play in the ideal of the future, in terms of major issues – not only lead the war against terrorism or rather the fight against terrorism but also on subjects like climate change and the economic issues facing people in many countries right at the moment and sometimes in the future.” After pausing for a second to reflect, he continues. “Yes, it’s being eagerly anticipated and very much watched and discussed and pretty much headline news in the papers in Europe. For instance, Obama came over here and I think people were aware that he was grandstanding a little bit and showing off for the media but on the other hand, how else is he going to get people’s attention in this competitive world. I think he did, on balance, a pretty good job and we’ll see what happens from here on in.”

Given the vagaries of International politics, I ponder whether the rest of the world’s desire to see Obama elected would in some fashion work against him. “It’s something that all the pundits here are talking about,” counters Anderson. “There could be a negative result from Obama going missing from America on a crucial week. On the other hand, when you look at how McCain has been doing in recent weeks his star is waning fast and he gets grumpier and crankier as the days go by. (At the time of the interview, McCain’s poll numbers were quite low. His numbers have surged since). I can look at John McCain and think, ‘Wow. He’s even crankier and grumpier than I am,’” says Anderson with a low chuckle. “I feel a certain if temporary kinship with John McCain because I like a guy who’s grumpy. I like a guy who speaks his mind and can sometimes lose the plot a little bit. Unfortunately, neither I nor John McCain would probably make a very good President of the United States. But it’s not up to me to judge,” he says with his voice rising in that distinctive Ian Anderson manner. “I think part of McCain’s popularity was that he was a new broom, someone who disagreed with many of the things done and said by the current administration and was one who had a degree of separateness from the Washington party apparatchik,” says Anderson of the Republican candidate. “I think McCain’s strong point is that he seems to have Republican credentials but with an independent soul, not one who would be bowed and cowed by the traditional hierarchy of the Republican Party. That’s probably what won him the nomination: that degree of independence, that he wasn’t an old school Republican. Whether he’s new school anything is what we have to keep our eyes and ears open for to find out if he has something to offer behind the rhetoric and the war veteran stance which unfortunately as he sort of learned from John Kerry doesn’t necessarily win you a Presidency.”

The discussion then moves on to the general populace’s apparent distaste for politicians who blindly toe the party line. “A lot of people who probably wouldn’t have voted the last two times around are going to go out and vote in this election,” opines Anderson. “I think there will a much bigger percentage of black people and a much bigger percentage of younger people going out to vote then on the previous couple of occasions. There should be a demographic change in the voting habits of America which should probably play into the hands of Obama more than McCain. One can understand that the Republican Party is a little bit nervous about new voters. Obama is hardly what we’d call a radical liberal. He’s a pretty tame guy in terms of what you might have and McCain is slightly to the left of what you might call a typical Republican,” suggests Anderson before offering his more personal take on partisan politics. “My pal Tony Snow, who sadly is no longer with us, was a staunch defender of the Bush line in his days as Press Secretary of the White House. He was someone who defended the Republican Party regardless of his boss; a real staunch Republican and I admired and respected him for it even if politically speaking we were often arguing opposite sides on issues like climate change. Tony and I didn’t come to blows but we got fairly passionate in our arguments. Sadly, I never got to find out whether Tony had ever come around to accepting climate change before he died. We didn’t talk about that in the months leading up to his death. It somehow seemed a bit cattish to reawaken ideological arguments with a man fighting against terminal cancer,” he says with poignancy entering his voice.

“I’m an American taxpayer but not a voting citizen of the United States. So I have to leave it up to you guys, just as the Germans, French and the Italians do. It’s interesting times and the world is watching. My message to the American people isn’t to vote for John McCain or for Barack Obama or even for Hillary Clinton next time since it looks like she’ll take another crack at it. My message is simply - vote because you can’t afford to be one of the 40% of the people who sit on their behinds and can’t be bothered to go to the polls. Democracy is what young men and women have fought and died for in Afghanistan and Iraq. If anything we owe it to them to use our democratic right to show the rest of world how democracies work. That’s my message. Hanging chads notwithstanding,” he adds with a laugh.

Article from Jambands.com. Click here for original article.

Jethro Tull celebrates 40th anniversary at Wolf Trap

The following article was found in the Fairfax Times.

By Eileen M. Carlton

Jethro Tull was first the name of a man, an agrarian engineer in England who invented the seed drill in the 18th century.

Then Jethro Tull became both plural and singular, poetic and disharmonious, simplistic and complex, and a band that has meant and continues to mean many things to many people.

And, like the Rolling Stones, Jethro Tull is still on tour and in the process of evolving - even after or maybe because of four decades of riding the heady and capricious locomotive of musical stardom.

Ian Anderson, 60, was one of the band’s founders and remains its lead singer and its spokesman.

Anderson also makes it clear on The Official Jethro Tull Web site that being the spokesman is not a task he enjoys.

His attitude is a personification of the lyrics from Tull’s “Lost in Crowds.”

“So, who am I? Come on: ask me, I dare you.
So, who am I? Come on: question me, if you care to.
And why not try to interrogate this apparition? I melt away to get lost in this quaint condition.”

To alleviate some of the boredom he associates with being interviewed, Anderson compiled a lengthy and comprehensive list of questions he does not want to be asked “ever, ever again.” Since he also gives lengthy and comprehensive answers to these questions, a reporter may find it difficult to know where to start.

Nevertheless, Anderson did grant an interview, calling from his home in Wiltshire County just southwest of London to talk about his upcoming concert Aug. 6 at Wolf Trap and to express grave concern, not only about the global environment but also about the political situation in Great Britain and the United States.

The music

Anderson said he did not have any formal training in music but learned by listening to Muddy Waters and Beethoven.

While he is adept at several instruments, Anderson is credited by many for giving the flute a prominent place in the rock music scene.

Perhaps his most well-known recording was “Aqualung.” Anderson pointed out that up until this album, he had “tended to write songs that were more for the band.”

“This was mostly me and it was an album of great musical contrast,” Anderson said. “It epitomizes that approach to writing rock music. You try to make it varied in terms of light and shade, the drama, the contrast.”

Anderson indicated that this willingness to break the rules, to travel up and down unexplored harmonies and lyrics is the key to a philosophy he believes all musicians should embrace.

“I think perhaps, maybe the legacy of Jethro Tull is that we serve as an example to young musicians today,” Anderson said. “You don’t have to take the mainstream approach. You don’t have to be driven by the constraints of the media ... to succumb to pressure. Jethro Tull has something that shows that once in awhile you can buck the system and sell a bunch of records.”

He made the following comments on today’s music on his Web site:

“Endless recycling of '60s and '70s musical influences fill the charts these days.”

“Since the mid-70s, the [musical] development has been more technological rather than musical.”

“Nothing really changes; nothing is really new.”

“Techno and rap? Just nursery rhymes with attitude. Nice ideas but going around in small circles.”

The politics

The question that gave Anderson the opening he needed to discuss his political concerns was about Charlie, the entity in “Locomotive Breath,” the entity who stole the train that won’t stop going.

“I’m just talking about the almighty,” Anderson said. “I’m talking about the almighty train controller, the one who sets the timetable, who gave birth to the universe and the spinning globe, and we’re spinning right along with it and no way to get off. It’s a metaphor for the crazy drive that seems to exist in the world today for more and bigger; especially when they are talking about the global economy. ...They are like lemmings heading for the great abyss.”

The list of problems that Anderson wants to see fixed and, in fact, help fix them, includes overpopulation, global warming, the earth’s food supply and the dependency on fossil fuel.

He indicated he was ahead of his time, writing the first songs about climate change in 1974.

Anderson said the current U.S. presidential candidates are in for a rough ride, that whichever candidate wins the coming election, his term of office probably would not yield great success and re-election would not be in the cards. He also leveled harsh criticism of politicians in both the United States and Great Britain.

But the specifics he discussed in the interview, he said, will not find their way into his lyrics. Anderson makes it clear he does not want to bash people over the head with his beliefs.

“I don’t write songs that are headlines,” Anderson said. “I like the message to be a little more embedded, a little more subtle. ... I don’t think the job of a musician is really to be arguing the specifics of political opinion.”

The biography

Drawing from Anderson’s answers to the most frequently asked questions, one learns that the band began performing in February 1968, first in Luton, north of London, and then getting its big break at London’s famous Marquee Club on Wardour Street in Soho. Despite rumors to the contrary, the band has never disbanded “even for a moment.”

Tull performs more than 100 concerts each year. The current band members include lead guitarist Martin Barre, drummer Doane Perry, pianist/accordionist John O’Hara and bass guitarist David Goodier.

Anderson prefers to live in the present and the future. He wants his music to be “a little bit timeless and not rooted in a particular music fashion.”

In recognition of his talent, Anderson was award the MBE, or Member of the Order, by the British government early this year. He joins such notables as Paul McCartney in being a knight and having the title of “Sir.”

As for his life offstage, he has been married to his wife, Shona, for 23 years. He has two children, James and Gael, both “at university.” His household also includes five cats, two dogs, horses and chickens. He lives in an 18th-century English country house with a recording studio and 400 acres of wheat, barley and trees about 100 miles west of London. He has had a second home in Scotland, the country of his birth, since 1978. It is in the highlands of Scotland that he has also established a salmon farm that employs about 250 people.

Anderson’s hobbies include growing a wide variety of hot chili peppers and the study and conservation of 26 species of small wildcats. He collects mechanical watches and vintage Leica and other cameras.

The future

Anderson indicated on his Web site that while he may cut back on the number of concerts a year, he will never willingly stop making music and performing:

“When I wake up in the morning, I am a musician, not a farmer or fish salesman. That’s what I pay other people to do. I just like eating smoked salmon from one of the most beautiful parts of the world. Death may beckon but retirement does not. ... Which will go first: the eyes, ears or the hands? Fear of boredom in old age is my greatest concern.”

As ever, Anderson incorporated this philosophy in his music, “Life is a Long Song.”

“Life's a long song

But the tune ends too soon for us all.’

Contact the writer at ecarlton@timespapers.com

Click here for orginal aticle

KKZX 98.9 Ian Anderson Interview

Thanks to the people from the offical Jethro Tull Website for posting an interview with Ian Anderson on KKZX 98.9. Ian talks about the release of the Jack in the Green DVD, the 40th tour, and future plans.

Get the interview here or visit the Official Jethro Tull Website.

Happy birthday Jethro Tull, still packing them in after 40 years

Under the radar of the media, the band are embarking on an anniversary tour. Ian Anderson explains their success

John Bungey

If the czars of musical fashion had their way, Jethro Tull would have ceased to exist decades ago. Tull music is a fanciful melange of prog rock, metal and folk, laced with classical lite and a smattering of Monty Python whimsy. The White Stripes they are not. The band haven't had a Top Ten single since 1970 and their most famous song (Aqualung) portrays - perhaps rather too sympathetically - a pervert on a park bench. Oh, and their oeuvre is almost entirely undanceable.

And yet ... Ian Anderson and his troupe are currently embarked on a globe-straddling 40th anniversary tour, packing out the enormodomes of America en route. In the febrile world of pop, where the average NME-endorsed hipster crashes and burns after a couple of indie hits, the Tull are a ruggedly reliable stock, playing 70-plus gigs every year and quietly flogging 60 million-plus albums. Celebrity fans range from Nick Cave and Stephen King to Geoff Hoon and Russia's President-elect.

So, in the face of near-total media indifference in their homeland, how has Anderson, 60, contrived such a successful career? Culled from a meeting at his discreetly splendid Wiltshire pile, amid his 400-acre farm, here are a few tips to success the Jethro Tull way.

Have a unique selling point

Amid a scrum of sweaty boogie bands heading from the provinces to London in 1967 only one had a man playing flute. On one leg. “It made us stand out,” says Anderson. This delicate instrument didn't stop them playing very loudly on occasion and in 1989 they beat Metallica to the first Grammy for heavy metal. “Yes, everyone was slightly surprised at that.”

Put on a show

“In 1972 we were one of the first bands to do a production tour with some theatricality. It was really just Alice Cooper and us. Back then you didn't have huge video screens. That came in '75 and again we were one of the first with a system called Tullivision.” Theatricality included making an entrance in rabbit suits and hiring Pan's People.

Just say no

“I never touched drugs. The guy sitting next to me at art college in Blackpool had needle marks down his arm. I remember saying, ‘Oh, what's that?' I knew there were perils out there from an early age. Around the time of the Isle of Wight Festival in 1970 they were dropping like flies - people we shared a stage with - Janis Joplin, Jim Morrison.

“We did the last night of the festival with Hendrix, almost his last show - the moment he appeared on stage you could tell he was not a happy bunny.”

Don't give up

“The closest I've ever been to thinking ‘This is enough' was on the tour for Thick as a Brick [famously bonkers 1972 concept album] in America. By then I was playing quite a lot of acoustic passages. Trying to cope with screeching, hooting people who think they're at a football game I found deeply unpleasant. Having 10,000 people whistling is completely overpowering.” The band's response in America was to turn up the riffs - hence that Grammy.

Don't follow trends

When punk came along, Jethro Tull opted to go folkie with Songs from the Wood. “We'd seen all that [punk] before. It was no surprise. We'd played alongside the MC5 in 1969, who were the prototype. They didn't spit; the bass player used to have a shit on stage. Every night. In the same number. Offstage they were just like a bunch of kids from next door and rather in awe of us.”

Become a global brand

Rock'n'roll isn't just London and New York. “I've always liked the idea of playing in places that shaped the era that I grew up in. It was important for me to visit the Eastern Bloc in the 1980s, so too India, Israel - and South America with its history of communism and fascism. People forget how subversive rock music was once considered. I've had people come to me with their albums in Chile and they've said: ‘If I'd been found with this I'd have gone to jail.' Or even worse: ‘I had a friend who had a copy of Aqualung and we never saw him again.'”

Do it yourself

“It came to my awareness early on that if you employ managers and tour managers you end up spending an awful lot more money than you need to. You'd get booked into hotels just because they had the best commission, not because they were near the show or the airport. I also got fed up with the idea that you'd have roadies to pack and carry your suitcases. You can sometimes draw from the murky depths this amazing ability to actually get on the right aeroplane yourself.” Anderson has been managing himself since the midSeventies, his wife, Shona, does the books and his son, James, is promoting the British leg of the current tour.

It helps if you started at the Marquee Club in 1968

Not much use to today's Facebook hopefuls but as Anderson points out: “Deep Purple, Fleetwood Mac, Yes, King Crimson, Jethro Tull all began there and are still working. It was an incredibly inventive era, one that perhaps we're only beginning to really appreciate now.”

Know your fans

Fans age with a band. “Whether they like it or not, Duran Duran's core audience is now 40-year-old mums,” Anderson says. But contrary to rumour, Tull fans are not all middle-aged gents in real-ale T-shirts. “We are not constricted by a particular age group. We have a lot of Asians but not many black people. It's mixed gender but not so mixed that we have a lot of gays. There are bands with a strong gay following, which makes a difference to the numbers.” Clearly all those years in tights and codpiece did not work.

Have a life off stage

Anderson famously ran a successful salmon-farming business in Scotland, now sold. Hobbies include growing hot chillis and the study and conservation of the 26 species of small wildcats in the world.

Keep it real

“I don't want to live in my stately home in the country and have Waitrose deliver to me. On Friday morning I'll be with my wife in the Toyota Prius at Cirencester Waitrose. That's part of being out there.”

Anderson doesn't travel on the tour bus, preferring to journey alone on the train. “What you encounter on the frequently dodgy streets around stations is a way of keeping in touch with British society.”

Win friends and influence people

Jethro Tull have some unlikely political fans, including Geoff Hoon. “I'm not exactly happy about his stance on Iraq when he was Defence Secretary. Still, it's hard to dislike someone who has been gushing how much he likes your stuff ... But God forbid that Tony Blair owns one of my albums.”

The Russian President-elect Dmitri Medvedev has named Tull as one of his four favourite groups. In fact they are a hit generally with the big men of Russia - except one. In 1991 Anderson was photographed with the Mayor of St Petersburg. “He seemed like an OK, urbane character but on the edge of this photo is this face, it's an evil-looking guy who is his bodyguard. He's staring at me and clearly doesn't like me. Many years later someone showed me the picture again and said, ‘Do you recognise that face on the edge of the photo?' It was Vladimir Putin in his days as a KGB minder.”

For tour dates see http://www.j-tull.com/

Click here for original article.

Ian Anderson Interview from icWales.co.uk

Tull are still reaping what they sowed in '68
Apr 11 2008 by Gavin Allen, South Wales Echo

SEMINAL folk rockers Jethro Tull are out on their 40th anniversary tour and arrive in South Wales next week. Martin Hutchinson caught up with flautist in chief, Ian Anderson, for some Q&A.

What has kept you going as a band for four decades?

“The loyalty of our fans keeps us in work and pocket money. Some artists have fickle fans but the more loyal and committed fans ensure that the work of bands like Led Zeppelin, Jimi Hendrix , The Stones and us won’t fade away.”

How do you describe Jethro Tull’s sound, folk, rock, prog?

“Someone once said that Tull is ‘Bach meets the Blues’. Our music has the discipline and formal musicality exemplified by Bach, yet there is something gutsy in it. It’s probably somewhere between heart-felt and head-felt. Actually, Bach was a brilliant improviser. I reckon if he were a musician today, he would probably be a jazz musician. Beethoven would be in a heavy rock band.”

Is it true you hate the band’s name? (The band are named after the 18th century English agricultural pioneer)

“I’ve never been mad keen on the name. It was on a list of names our agent gave us. We got a residency at The Marquee with that name and it stuck. There were other names to pick from but one of them was Candy Coloured Rain.”

Are you bored of singing the same songs?

“I prefer to live in the present and future. Some of our audience like the nostalgia bit and it’s bit of a trip down memory lane for them. For us, it’s not about playing a song which could be more than 30 years old. It’s about playing something that’s 24 hours old, since that’s when we last played it on stage.”

What will the set list be on this tour?

“About 80% of the show will come from the first three or four albums, but of course we’ll play a song or two from other eras – those songs that reflect the big picture.”

Click here for full artical from icWales.co.uk.