What truly is progressive music? Each month BraveWords will aim to dissect that answer with a thorough overview of the current musical climate that is the prog world. Old and new, borrowed and blue. A musical community without borders. So watch for a steady and spaced-out array of features, current news and a buyer’s guide checklist to enhance the forward-thinking musical mind. So, welcome to BraveWords’ monthly column appropriately titled, Between A Rock In A Prog Place.
In this month’s column, Jethro Tull‘s Ian Anderson discusses the new Tull LP, Curious Ruminant, including why the band issued three albums in rapid succession, and the meaning of the album’s curious title.
Impressively, Curious Ruminant is Tull’s third album since 2022.
Well, it’s been not necessarily a particularly busy time, because in the last three albums, part of the original one was recorded back in late 2017, but it didn’t get completed at the time because we had so many shows, and then COVID came along, which meant an even bigger delay before I finally finished the album in in 2022. And the next album, released in 2023, came fairly quickly, and that was RökFlöte, which was the 2023 album that gave me a little time before I had to do something else. Which I started work on in May of last year.
And so during May, June, July, I was writing and recording, and mixing and mastering in August, and doing all the artwork for the booklets and everything else. So I delivered that at the end of August. And then the surround sound mixing was done by another engineer after that. But it seems like three albums in just over three years, but in fact, it’s a slightly bigger spread than that, when you actually look at the time scale and the and the sequence of recording.
But having the time to do it is the most important thing. You know when you’re touring as a musician and you spend a lot of time away from home, then when you do get home, you don’t necessarily want to just immediately pick up instruments again and start doing more music. You want to have a few days without music, just to regain your equilibrium and sanity, in a music free world, just for a little while. So having started in May last year, then the momentum began to build very quickly, and the whole process of writing and arranging and recording developed with growing pace and vigor.
And at the end of it, I went back to being on the road for the latter part of last year, and had to forget about what I’d been recording, because it takes something like nine months to a year from finishing an album, delivering it to a record company, to actually having it appear to be available, because of the enormous time lag in producing vinyl. In mastering and manufacturing vinyl, it’s typically a waiting time of about a year. And managed to shorten out a bit this time around and last time around by I think probably some other artists failing to deliver on schedule and managing to jump the queue a little bit, and get that a slightly earlier slot. But nine months is still a long time to wait when you finish a project to hearing the reaction of people who are able to buy it.
Also, let’s discuss the album’s title track.
Well, ‘Curious Ruminant’ kind of sums up the nature of the album. Most of these songs are, lyrically speaking, a little more personalized in the sense that I’m talking about my own feelings and my own viewpoint on a variety of subjects. Whereas usually I’m more of an observational writer. I don’t endow most of my work with any demonstration of my own personal views. But this time around, I thought I will let that come out. A lot more ‘I’s’ and ‘me’s’ – those pronouns appear rather more than they do in most Jethro Tull music of the passed 56 years or something. So, it’s a little more personal in terms of lyrics and it’s about my process of learning something every day, I try to absorb some knowledge. I like every day to feel that I’ve learned something I didn’t know yesterday, and the learning about it, taking that data in to the cranial hard drive, then it’s quite useful to then think about what you’ve learned, and try and put it into the context of your own life and times. And so that’s my daily activity: is to learn something new and then think about it.
So, ‘curious’ in the sense of having curiosity, and ‘ruminant’ in the sense of a person who is contemplative, who thinks things through. We have a phrase, ‘Chew the curd,’ which derives from the animal ruminant, who eats grass and other vegetarian meals, and then partially digests it, throws it up, and has a second helping. As I’m not that kind of a ruminant, but I am happy to use the general phrase to chew the curd, to think something over. And sometimes it’s to talk it over, because chewing the curd might be something you do in company, and you talk things through together and in a way, as a songwriter, you are, perhaps at the time of doing it. It’s a one way conversation, but you are inviting other people to have a reaction to what you write and to respond in the in their own ways, in their own time and in their own minds.
So, I think ‘Curious Ruminant’ sums up essentially what the album is about. Oddly, ‘curious ruminant’ does not appear in the lyrics of the title track. It came only later that I decided to call it that, and immediately thought, ‘Well, that will be an umbrella title for all the songs on the album.’ So, it became an album title without necessarily implying that it’s a concept album, which it isn’t. It’s rather like the Aqualung album is a collection of songs, some of which kind of hang together in a in a sibling fashion.
Between A Rock And A Prog Place News Blast
To mark the 20th anniversary of The Black Halo, Kamelot has issued an extensive deluxe box set, which is limited to just 500 copies worldwide and is chock full of all sortsa goodies – and can be ordered here. UK prog vets Solstice return with a new LP next month, Clann, which in case you were wondering, is already available for pre-order.
Also arriving next month will be the latest album from the prog duo McStine & Minnemann, entitled III, with its video for the track “Survive” available for viewing below. And another UK-based prog band, IQ, will be issuing their first new album in six years, Dominion, which also can be pre-ordered.
Toronto proggers Derev issue their debut LP, Troubled Mind, this month, and with the album’s press release suggesting that “it is recommended for fans of Opeth, Dream Theater, and Porcupine Tree,” it may be right up your stylistic alley – have a view/listen below. Big Big Train return this month with a new digital EP, Scop, which is a companion release to accompany the re-issue of the band’s third studio album, Bard.
US-based instrumental proggers Sometime In February issue their latest album this month, Where Mountains Hide, and you can enjoy a guitar play through of the track “Phantom Sea” from Tristan Auman here. And finally, Haken will be offering up a new concert recording from London, Liveforms: An Evening with Haken, on May 9th, but can indeed be pre-ordered.
March 2025 New Albums
March 7
Hats Off Gentlemen It’s Adequate- The Uncertainty Principle
Jethro Tull- Curious Ruminant
Karmakanic- Transmutation
Sacrosanct- Kidron
March 14
Coheed And Cambria- Vaxis–Act III: The Father of Make Believe
Envy Of None- Stygian Waves
Kamelot- The Black Halo [20th Anniversary Box Set]
Steven Wilson- The Overview
March 21
Big Big Train- Scop [digital EP]
Sometime In February- Where Mountains Hide
March 26
Derev- Troubled Mind
March 28
IQ- Dominion
Nospūn- Ozai
Classic Clip
Jethro Tull has been issuing albums for 57 years. And as earlier noted, this month sees the arrival of their 24thstudio effort overall. So, how about we take a gander back at a simply ferocious reading of ‘Nothing Is Easy’ from the Isle of Wight Festival in 1970, when the lads were quite young/energetic pups?
Source: bravewords.com
