INTERVIEW: Relive the memories of Jethro Tull, in book form
Photo: Ian Anderson is the creative force behind Jethro Tull’s 50th anniversary book. Photo courtesy of Travis Latam, Windsor / Provided by press page with permission.
The legendary rock ‘n’ roll band Jethro Tull have been redefining music for the past 50 years, and in celebration of their coveted anniversary — an anniversary rarely arrived at by rock bands — Ian Anderson and Rocket 88 Books have recently released The Ballad of Jethro Tull. The coffee-table tome, which is meant to be read and experienced rather than gawked at, tells the unique story of the rock band in more than 200 pages.
Included in the classic edition of the book, according to its official website, are illustrations, more than 200 photographs and an MP4 download of Anderson’s poetic recitation of “The Ballad of Jethro Tull” and “Marmion,” the latter by Sir Walter Scott. Those who purchase the signature edition of the book, which is limited to 500 copies, will also have an original art print by Peter Klucik, a 7-inch vinyl record of the two poem recitations by Anderson, a hand-made clamshell box and an autograph by Anderson. As of press time, the signature edition was sold out.
Recently Hollywood Soapbox profiled Anderson on the occasion of a 50th anniversary tour celebrating Jethro Tull’s contributions to music. Readers can check out that interview here.
Anderson jumped on the phone again to talk about the new book project and whether he’s nostalgic for the early years of his career — when picking up the flute was a revolutionary music act for a rock musician. Here’s what he had to say …
On the impetus for creating The Ballad of Jethro Tull book …
“It was the commercial inspiration of the publishers who had recently done a book about Foreigner and a few other ones before that, and they thought, well, Jethro Tull, 50th anniversary, we’ll capitalize on that. So from my perspective somebody else was going to do the bulk of the work. All I had to do was provide my portion of all the interviewing and the final editing and proof-reading.
“So it took many hours of my time, but it wasn’t as if I had to do it all by myself from start to finish. Indeed the services of Mark Blake were sought and contracted to do the actual interviews with me and the other band members and associates who provided their take on the early years of Jethro Tull. So Mark Blake is the writer, not me. He has a long track record as being a U.K. music business journalist writing for many different well-known periodicals and music papers. He comes with quite a good track record of paying attention to detail and making sure he researches all the facts, so at the end of it all, it’s all pretty accurate. But there’s no scandal, no drugs and a sprinkling of rock ‘n’ roll because we’re not that kind of a band.”
On whether the band was influenced by drugs in the early years …
“I don’t think you can put down the longevity of Jethro Tull to having skewed the use of drugs or embraced them. It’s just a work ethic and common-sense attitude to being on the road, to getting an early bed, to rising with the sun and jumping on an airplane or into a bus and heading off to the next place. It’s all pragmatic. It’s just about common sense, rules of survival, and it doesn’t help if you get locked into that rather self-destructive lifestyle, from which a lot of people temporarily recover in older age, but still seem to die or suffer from ill health pretty early on in their lives, and that’s rather sad to see. Whereas such old people like me and Martin Barre, our guitar player for most of the time of Jethro Tull, we’re still active today because I guess we were naturally cautious about lifestyle and things that could perhaps come to haunt us in later life. Into our 70s we’re still pretty active without too much medical care and attention. Paramedics are not on the technical rider.”
On the selection of ‘Marmion’ by Sir Walter Scott …
“The piece by Sir Walter Scott, ‘Marmion,’ is a piece that I’ve been reading at Christmas concerts for a number of years. It’s of that era I suppose when British, or Scottish in this case, literature was evolving into something that was embracing a lot of elements of traditional culture, but presenting them again for a new generation, as indeed Sir Walter Scott did in the years that he was alive. I think in a way I try to echo the sentiments of his very epic poem, ‘Marmion,’ from which it is just a tiny extract that I recorded with a piece that I wrote especially for the book called ‘The Ballad of Jethro Tull,’ which attempts to put together with a musical backdrop of the relevant pieces of music over our careers. It attempts to put it all together with a slightly Sir Walter Scott-esque rendition and cramming 50 years into three minutes or less.”
On whether he’s nostalgic for Jethro Tull’s past …
“I’ve always had a sympathy for those people who do have nostalgia. It’s nice to have in small measure, but if it rules your life, if you keep looking back into times gone by resolutely and you don’t want to embrace change, I think that ultimately is a pretty negative state to be in, which I wrote about back in 1976 on the song ‘Too Old to Rock ‘N’ Roll, Too Young to Die.’ That’s what predicated that song lyric.
“It was about someone who refuses to embrace change and is locked into a comfortable safety blanket of his own past and doesn’t really want to embrace the modern world. Back then, of course, I was talking more about fashion and culture. Today I’d be talking about the kind of person who doesn’t do email or doesn’t know how to check online if they’re booking a flight, so times change. But the same need that some people have to refuse change and to keep stuck in the past, that’s not a good thing.
“I have a healthy respect for nostalgia. ‘Remember the time when,’ which often is the subject of some post-concert trip back to a hotel in a van when the band and crew talk after a beer, tend to talk about, oh, remember we did this or we saw that. It’s nice to have, but it just occupies a teeny little part of my life. And I’m not really naturally a nostalgic person, but I think I enjoy nostalgia when it’s on a personal level and I’m in that kind of a mood, a reflective mood. But it doesn’t happen everyday, and if it does occur on a day, it’s usually a few minutes of nostalgia. And then I move on because I remember I have another U.S. phoner in the next 20 minutes, and that shakes me out of my reverie.”
On his decision to incorporate flute playing into his rock music …
“It was just something different. It was something that wasn’t being replicated elsewhere. There were other flute players at the time, but in the world of jazz and classical music, but certainly not in blues and certainly not in rock music. It felt, whilst not being revolutionary, at least it was different. And I wanted to put my stamp on the musical world in 1968 in London by not doing what everybody else did, and there were a lot of great guitar players back then. Of course, there were wonderful guitar players like Jeff Beck, Eric Clapton and, of course, Peter Green of Fleetwood Mac, who was very much a contemporary of ours, but to be another small fish in a big pool didn’t really appeal to me.”
On how he started the songwriting process for each song …
“I like to start from a different point every time. I think the worst thing is if you have a process; it becomes a bit like a factory production line. Then it will become repetitive, so I’ve always rather liked the idea that you go to work from a different direction every morning, a bit like a dilettante office worker. You spend the night somewhere else, and you arrive having taken a different route. That’s something that’s still with me today.
“I try not to have a modus operandi in terms of writing music. It’s good if you start the process by doing something different. Straightaway you can divide it down the middle. Do you start with the music, or do you start with the words? Or do you and try to conjure them both up more or less simultaneously, and if you’re going to play the music, do you use a guitar or a monophonic instrument like a flute. Or, do you try and hack something out on a keyboard as a starting point? It’s good to not do it the same way every time.”
By John Soltes / Publisher / John@HollywoodSoapbox.com
The Ballad of Jethro Tull is now available from Rock 88 Books. Click here for more information.
