Benefit - Jethro Tull ‎/ Pop Classic / Audio CD

Name: Benefit - Jethro Tull ‎/ Pop Classic / Audio CD / 5998490701208
SKU: 5998490701208
Price: 9.99 USD
Availability: InStock

UPC 5998490701208

Product Details:

Format: CD, Unofficial Release

Country: Hungary

Genre: Rock

Style: Folk Rock, Prog Rock

Description:

Benefit is the third studio album by the British rock band Jethro Tull, released in April 1970. It was the first Tull album to include pianist and organist John Evan – though he was not yet considered a permanent member of the group – and the last to include bass guitarist Glenn Cornick who was fired from the band upon completion of touring for the album. It was recorded at Morgan Studios, the same studio where the band recorded its previous album Stand Up however the band experimented with more advanced recording techniques.

Frontman Ian Anderson said that he considers Benefit to be a much darker album than Stand Up, owing to the pressures of an extensive U.S. tour and frustration with the music business.

Editorial Review:

Benefit was the album on which the Jethro Tull sound solidified around folk music, abandoning blues entirely. Beginning with the opening number, "With You There to Help Me," Anderson adopts his now-familiar, slightly mournful folksinger/sage persona, with a rather sardonic outlook on life and the world; his acoustic guitar carries the melody, joined by Martin Barre's electric instrument for the crescendos. This would be the model for much of the material on Aqualung and especially Thick as a Brick, although the acoustic/electric pairing would be executed more effectively on those albums. Here the acoustic and electric instruments are merged somewhat better than they were on Stand Up (on which it sometimes seemed like Barre's solos were being played in a wholly different venue), and as needed, the electric guitars carry the melodies better than on previous albums. Most of the songs on Benefit display pleasant, delectably folk-like melodies attached to downbeat, slightly gloomy, but dazzlingly complex lyrics, with Barre's guitar adding enough wattage to keep the hard rock listeners very interested. "To Cry You a Song," "Son," and "For Michael Collins, Jeffrey and Me" all defined Tull's future sound: Barre's amp cranked up to ten (especially on "Son"), coming in above Anderson's acoustic strumming, a few unexpected changes in tempo, and Anderson spouting lyrics filled with dense, seemingly profound imagery and statements. As on Stand Up, the group was still officially a quartet, with future member John Evan (whose John Evan Band had become the nucleus of Jethro Tull two years before) appearing as a guest on keyboards; his classical training proved essential to the expanding of the group's sound on the three albums to come. Benefit was reissued in a remastered edition with bonus tracks at the end of 2001, which greatly improved the clarity of the playing and the richness of the sound; the four additional tracks are "Singing All Day," "Witch's Promise," the elegant, gossamer-textured "Just Trying to Be," and the original U.K. mix of "Teacher." Written and recorded prior to Benefit, they're all lighter in mood than the material from the original album, adding some greater variety but fitting in perfectly on a stylistic level.

Tracklist:

1	With You There To Help Me	6:24
2	Nothing To Say	5:16
3	Inside	2:51
4	Son	2:55
5	For Michael Collins, Jeffrey And Me	3:56
6	To Cry You A Song	6:16
7	A Time For Everything?	2:47
8	Teacher	3:50
9	Play In Time	3:51
10	Sossity; You're A Woman	4:42

More Details:

Artwork [Graphic Presentation By] – Ken Reilly
Bass – Glenn Cornick
Design [Cover] – Ruan O'Lochlainn, Terry Ellis
Drums – Clive Bunker
Engineer – Robin Black
Executive-Producer – Terry Ellis
Guitar – Martin Barre
Photography By – Ruan O'Lochlainn
Piano, Organ – John Evan
Producer – Ian Anderson
Vocals, Flute – Ian Anderson
Written-By – Ian Anderson

About the Band:

Jethro Tull are a British rock band formed in Blackpool, Lancashire, in 1967. Initially playing blues rock and jazz fusion, the band later developed their sound to incorporate elements of hard rock and folk to forge a progressive rock signature. The band is led by vocalist/flautist/guitarist Ian Anderson, and has featured a revolving door of lineups through the years including significant members such as guitarists Mick Abrahams and Martin Barre, keyboardists John Evan and Dee Palmer, drummers Clive Bunker, Barriemore Barlow, and Doane Perry, and bassists Glenn Cornick, Jeffrey Hammond, John Glascock, and Dave Pegg.

The group first achieved commercial success in 1969, with the folk-tinged electric blues album Stand Up, which reached No. 1 in the UK, and they toured regularly in the UK and the US. Their musical style shifted in the direction of progressive rock with the albums Aqualung (1971), Thick as a Brick (1972) and A Passion Play (1973), and shifted again to hard rock mixed with folk rock with Songs from the Wood (1977) and Heavy Horses (1978). After an excursion into electronic rock in the early-to-mid 1980s, the band won its sole Grammy Award with the 1987 album Crest of a Knave. Jethro Tull have sold an estimated 60 million albums worldwide, with 11 gold and five platinum albums among them. They have been described by Rolling Stone as "one of the most commercially successful and eccentric progressive rock bands".

The last works as a group to contain new material were released in 2003, though the band continued to tour until 2011. Anderson said Jethro Tull were finished in 2014; however, in September 2017 he announced plans for a tour to commemorate the fiftieth anniversary of the band's first album This Was. The compilation 50 for 50 was released in 2018.

The reformed group—now billed as "Ian Anderson and the Jethro Tull band"—still performs live, and has announced tour dates into 2020. The current band line-up includes musicians who have been members of Anderson's solo band since 2012.

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