Thick as a Brick

Background

Jethro Tull's frontman and songwriter Ian Anderson was surprised by the critical reaction to their previous album, Aqualung (1971), as a "concept album", a label he firmly rejects to this day. His response was to "come up with something that really is the mother of all concept albums". Taking Monty Python as an influence, he began to write a piece that would combine complex music with a sense of humour, with the idea it would poke light-hearted fun at the band, the audience, and the music critics. The music would also generally satirise the progressive rock genre that was popular at the time.

Anderson has also stated that "the album was a spoof to the albums of Yes and Emerson, Lake & Palmer, much like what the movie Airplane! had been to Airport" and later stated that it was a "bit of a satire about the whole concept of grand rock-based concept albums". Although Anderson wrote all the music and lyrics, he co-credited the writing to a fictional schoolboy named Gerald Bostock. The humour was subtle enough that some fans believed that Bostock was real. Reviewing the 40th anniversary reissue, Noel Murray suggested that many listeners of the original album "missed the joke".

Recording

The group ran through two weeks of rehearsals using The Rolling Stones' basement studio in Bermondsey. The group had not intended to record a single continuous piece, but it developed organically in the studio; the band came up with individual song segments, then wrote short pieces of music to link them together.

Recording started in December 1971 at Morgan Studios in London. Unlike previous albums, where Anderson had generally written songs in advance, only the initial section of the album had been worked out when the band went to record it. The remainder of the suite was pieced together in the studio. Because Anderson had not finished writing the suite, he got up early each morning to prepare material for the rest of the band to learn that day. The lyrics were written first, with the music then constructed to fit around them. Anderson recalls the album took about two weeks to record and another two or three for overdubs and mixing.

The group remembered the recording being a happy process, with a strong feeling of camaraderie and fun, with everyone keen to play practical jokes on each other, and show a sense of humour. They were fans of Monty Python, and this style of humour influenced the lyrics and overall concept. Guitarist Martin Barre recalls the whole band coming up with various ideas for the music. Some parts were recorded in a single take, with every band member having important inputs into the music, including significant contributions from keyboardist John Evan.

Musical style

Thick as a Brick was viewed by some critics as Jethro Tull's first progressive rock album, contrasting with the group's earlier work. The album has a variety of musical themes, time signature changes and tempo shifts – all of which were features of the progressive rock scene. Although the finished album runs as one continuous piece, it is made up of a medley of individual songs that run into each other, none of which individually lasts more than a couple of minutes. Parts of the suite blend classical and folk music into the typical rock music framework.

The album prominently features flute, acoustic and electric guitars and Hammond organ, which had been used previously, but the instrumentation includes harpsichord, xylophone, timpani, violin, lute, trumpet, saxophone, and a string section—all uncommon in the band's earlier blues-inspired rock.

Cover

The original LP cover was designed as a spoof of a 12x16-inch (305x406 mm) 12-page small-town English newspaper, entitled The St. Cleve Chronicle and Linwell Advertiser, with articles, competitions and adverts lampooning the typical parochial and amateurish journalism of local English newspapers. The record company, Chrysalis Records, complained that the sleeve would be too expensive to produce, but Anderson countered that if a real newspaper could be produced, so could a spoof one.

Jethro Tull's official website states about the mock-newspaper: "There are a lot of inside puns, cleverly hidden continuing jokes (such as the experimental non-rabbit), a surprisingly frank review of the album itself [written by Anderson under a pseudonym], and a little naughty connect-the-dots children's activity." The "newspaper", dated 7 January 1972, also includes the entire lyrics to "Thick as a Brick" (printed on page 7), which is presented as a poem written by Bostock, whose disqualification from a poetry contest is the focus of the front page story. This article claims that although Bostock initially won the contest with "Thick as a Brick", the judges' decision was repealed after a multitude of protests and threats concerning the offensive nature of the poem, furthered by allegations of the boy's psychological instability. In addition to this, the front cover includes another short article where Bostock is investigated as the father of his 14-year-old friend Julia's child, although this has been cropped out of many renditions of the cover. The inside of the paper features a mock review by "Julian Stone-Mason BA", a pseudonym of Anderson's.

The contents of the newspaper were written mostly by Anderson, bassist Jeffrey Hammond and keyboardist John Evan. While some of the pieces were obviously silly, such as "Magistrate Fines himself", there was a lengthy story entitled "Do Not See Me Rabbit" about a pilot in the Battle of Britain being shot down by a Me-109 fighter. The overall layout was designed by Chrysalis' Roy Eldridge, who had previously worked as a journalist. Most of the characters in the newspaper were members of the band, their management, road crew, or colleagues; for instance, recording engineer Robin Black played a local roller-skating champion. Anderson recalls that the cover took longer to produce than the music.

The satirical newspaper was heavily abridged for conventional CD booklets, but the 25th Anniversary Special Edition CD cover is closer to the original, and the 40th anniversary boxed version contains most of the content from the original newspaper.

Live performances

Following the release of the album, the band set out on tour, playing the entire album with some extra additions that extended the performance time to over an hour. For example, the flute solo of the midsection of Thick as a Brick was extended with Anderson improvisation, that contains "Boureè" and "God Rest You Merry, Gentlemen".

Before the band started a performance, men wearing capes would appear and begin sweeping the floor, counting the audience and studying the venue; after a few minutes, some of the men revealed themselves to be members of the band and began to play. During some shows, the entire band stopped mid performance when a telephone rang on stage, which Anderson would answer, before carrying on performing. At some points, news and weather reports were read halfway through the show and even a man dressed head to toe in a scuba diver outfit would come onto stage and pass by as the band performed. The humour caused problems when performing in Japan, where audiences responded to the changes with bewilderment. Barre recalls these first live performances being "a terrible experience" as there was a lot of complex music with a variety of time signature changes to remember.

Anderson performed the entire album live on tour in 2012, the first complete performances since 1972. In August 2014, Anderson released the CD/DVD/Blu-ray Thick as a Brick - Live in Iceland. The concert was recorded in Reykjavík, Iceland, on 22 June 2012 and featured complete Thick as a Brick and Thick as a Brick 2 performances by the Ian Anderson Touring Band. Some of the humour and stage antics were maintained, specially the telephone ringing in the middle of the song, replaced by a cell phone and a Skype call.

Critical reception

Thick as a Brick was originally scheduled for release on 25 February 1972. It was held back a week to 3 March following production problems relating to the 1972 miners' strike.

Contemporary reviews were mixed. Chris Welch of Melody Maker praised the musicianship of the band and the improved ability with the flute by Ian Anderson, writing also that "the joke at the expense of a local newspaper wears thin rather rapidly, but should not detract from the obvious amount of thought and work that has gone into the production of Thick"; he described the music as a creative effort where "the ideas flow in super abundance" but that "needs time to absorb" and "heard out of context of their highly visual stage act ... does not have such immediate appeal". Tony Tyler in his review for New Musical Express generally appreciated the construction of the suites and the arrangements, but he had doubts about the album's possible success. He called Thick as a Brick "Jethro Tull's own stand-or-fall epic after the lines of Tommy" and "an assault on the mediocrity and harshness of lower-middle-class existence in '70s Britain". Ben Gerson in Rolling Stone magazine called Thick as a Brick "one of rock's most sophisticated and ground-breaking products". Going further, the reviewer stated: "Martin Barre's guitar and John Evan's keyboards especially shine, and Ian's singing is no longer abrasive. Whether or not Thick As A Brick is an isolated experiment, it is nice to know that someone in rock has ambitions beyond the four- or five-minute conventional track, and has the intelligence to carry out his intentions, in all their intricacy, with considerable grace." Rolling Stone's Dave Marsh gave it 2 out of 5 stars in The Rolling Stone Record Guide, judging it had "relatively undifferentiated movements". American critic Robert Christgau crushed the album calling it "the usual shit: rock (getting heavier), folk (getting feyer), classical (getting schlockier), flute (getting better because it has no choice)".

Modern reviews are very positive. AllMusic reviewer writes that "Jethro Tull's first LP-length epic is a masterpiece in the annals of progressive rock, and one of the few works of its kind that still holds up decades later." Jordan Blum of PopMatters thinks that the album "paved the way for modern progressive rock" and "today, it represents not only a pinnacle achievement for Jethro Tull, but also a concrete example of just how adventurous and free artists used to be." Record Collector reviewer writes that "today, free from the irrelevant context of misdiagnosis and derision that dogged it on its original release, the album sounds like nothing less than an Olympian feat of composition and musicianship." According to Modern Drummer reviewer Adam Budofsky, "that it remains so elevated in progressive rock fans’ hearts and minds forty years later is a testament to its quality."

The album reached the top 5 in the UK charts, and number one in Australia, Canada and the US, where it was certified Gold.

Prog magazine included Thick as a Brick at number 5 in their list "The 100 Greatest Prog Albums of All Time", while Rolling Stone listed the album at number 7 in their "Top 50 Prog Albums of All Time". Thick as a Brick is ranked number 2 in the user-managed website Prog Archives's top albums list, with an average rank of 4.64 stars. Geddy Lee, from Rush, put Thick as a Brick as one of his favourite albums, as did Iron Maiden's Steve Harris.

Track listing

All lyrics written by "Gerald Bostock" (Ian Anderson); all music composed by Anderson.

Differences among various CD releases

By 2012 the album received four major releases on CD: the first release (1985, which featured the two tracks combined as one), the MFSL-release (1989), the 25th Anniversary Edition (1997), and the 40th Anniversary Edition (2012).

The 40th Anniversary Edition was released in November 2012, and includes a CD, a DVD, and a book. The CD contains a new mix of the album. The DVD contains a 5.1 surround sound mix (in DTS and Dolby Digital), the new stereo mix in high resolution, and the original stereo mix in high resolution. The first pressing of the DVD/CD box contained a faulty DVD with significant audio errors. A corrected replacement edition was issued later, with only a horizontal line beneath the "album duration" note on the disc label to identify it. The album was also re-released on vinyl at the same time. This edition lists part one at 22:45 and part two at 21:07.

The downloadable version of the 40th anniversary edition splits the overall suite into eight separate parts:

1. "Really Don't Mind" / "See There a Son Is Born" – 5:00
2. "The Poet and the Painter" – 5:29
3. "What Do You Do When the Old Man's Gone?" / "From the Upper Class" – 5:25
4. "You Curl Your Toes in Fun" / "Childhood Heroes" / "Stabs Instrumental" – 6:48
5. "See There a Man Is Born" / "Clear White Circles" – 5:58
6. "Legends and Believe in the Day" – 6:34
7. "Tales of Your Life" – 5:24
8. "Childhood Heroes Reprise" – 2:56

Personnel

Thick as a Brick 2: Whatever Happened to Gerald Bostock?

On 1 February 2012, Ian Anderson announced via the official Jethro Tull website that there was to be a follow-up album, TAAB2: Whatever Happened to Gerald Bostock?. According to the Jethro Tull website, the sequel is "a full length Progressive Rock 'concept' album worthy of its predecessor. Boy to man and beyond, it looks at what might have befallen the child poet Gerald Bostock in later life. Or, perhaps, any of us."

TAAB2 was released on 2 April 2012. It describes five different scenarios of Gerald Bostock's life, where he potentially becomes a greedy investment banker, a homeless homosexual man, a soldier in the Afghan War, a sanctimonious evangelist preacher, and a most ordinary man who runs a corner store and is married and childless. The original Thick as a Brick of 1972 consists of only two long tracks comprising a single song, while Thick as a Brick 2 lists 17 separate songs merged into 13 distinct tracks (some labelled as medleys), although also all flowing together much like a single song. To follow the style of the mock newspaper on the original Thick as a Brick, a mock online newspaper was set up.

Homo Erraticus

While TAAB 2 was a follow-up about Gerald Bostock, the 2014 Ian Anderson solo album Homo Erraticus was presented as a follow-up work by Gerald Bostock. In the backstory Anderson created for the album, the now middle-aged Bostock came across an unpublished manuscript by one Ernest T. Parritt (1873–1928), entitled “Homo Britanicus Erraticus”. Parritt was convinced he lived past lives as historical characters, and wrote detailed accounts of these lives in his work; he also wrote of fantasy imaginings of lives yet to come. Bostock then created lyrics based on Parritt's writings, while Anderson set them to music.

As with the original Thick as a Brick, authorship of each song on this album is explicitly credited to both Anderson and Bostock.

Others

Car maker Hyundai used the song in one of their commercials in 2001. Ian Anderson recorded a new version specifically for the commercial to avoid having another artist do it. He does not drive a Hyundai – indeed he has never held a driving licence – calling himself a "professional passenger."

Former Gryphon Richard Harvey has covered Thick as a Brick in the special compilation The Royal Philharmonic Orchestra Plays Prog Rock Classics.