Is "Aqualung" A Concept Album?

Discussion in 'Music Corner' started by Slokes, Sep 27, 2009.

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  1. Slokes

    Slokes Cruel But Fair Thread Starter

    Location:
    Greenwich, CT USA
    I always thought Jethro Tull's Aqualung was a particularly successful example of a focused concept album, with the concept being about this guy, "Aqualung", whose scuzzy nature raises questions about man's claim to any kind of valid spiritual path. The songs seem to me to be interlinked around this idea as featured in the "Aqualung" character.

    Yet on the latest edition of Thick As A Brick on CD, there is a lenghty interview with Ian Anderson where the man declaims any such intent, and expresses surprise critics saw Aqualung as a concept album. Thick As A Brick is a total concept album, he says. Aqualung is just a collection of songs.

    Is Anderson having a laugh playing devil's advocate here? Or is he sincere? Do others see Aqualung the way I do, as a series of musical meditations built around a single unifing theme? Or is it just like he says, a bunch of songs?

    Much interested in any feedback (and apologies if I missed this being discussed before)...
     
  2. Uncle Al

    Uncle Al Senior Member

    Location:
    Long Island, NY
    I always thought side 2 had a theme (organized religion vs. spirituallity), but side 1 seemed pretty hodpodge to me.
     
  3. yesstiles

    yesstiles Senior Member

    I think Ian would confess to it being a "half-a**ed" concept album. Great one though.
     
  4. Slokes

    Slokes Cruel But Fair Thread Starter

    Location:
    Greenwich, CT USA
    Thanks guys, useful feedback and appreciated!
     
  5. jblock

    jblock Senior Member

    Location:
    Connecticut
    In The Complete Lyrics book Ian explains each song separately and doesn't refer to any of it as a concept album.
     
  6. tootull

    tootull Looking through a glass onion

    Location:
    Canada
    Up to me

    Sure seems like a religion based concept album to me.

    :shh: Let's not make Ian Anderson too mad...he might write another "Thick As A Brick". "Anderson has disputed, almost resented, the assessment seeing the record as "just a bunch of songs." The labeling lead the band to really give the critics a concept album with the following studio release "Thick as a Brick.""

    http://www.j-tull.com/discography/aqualung/index.html
     
  7. Holy Diver

    Holy Diver Senior Member

    Location:
    USA
    Killer album no matter what it is. Try to play Mother Goose on guitar. Bad tune!
     
  8. JA Fant

    JA Fant Well-Known Member

    Agreed-

    killer album, no matter...
     
  9. vinyl diehard

    vinyl diehard Two-Channel Forever

    My views as well. I thought it was kind of interesting how he titled the first side Aqualung and the second side My God. The second side does hold a thread of consistency (for the most part) throughout the songs. The liner notes also adds weight of the idea that this could have been a concept album base around the themes discussed.
     
  10. bRETT

    bRETT Senior Member

    Location:
    Boston MA
    The notes on the LP cover pretty much explain what the "concept" is. But the first side (after Cross Eyed Mary) doesn't conform to any theme other than the songwriter's lkife at the time.

    Oddly he's also denied that Under Wraps is a concept album when it pretty obviously is.,
     
  11. tootull

    tootull Looking through a glass onion

    Location:
    Canada
    Don't tell Ian Anderson

    :shh: This taken from the album makes it look like a concept album:
     
  12. :righton: I think if it looks like a duck, sounds like a duck and acts like a duck -its a duck! -or in this case, a great concept album :D
     
  13. FrankenStrat

    FrankenStrat Forum Resident

    Ah, the vagaries of my youth. I bought the album when it first came out and found the album schitzophrenic in nature. I adored the first side but absolutely loathed the second. It had nothing whatsoever to do with religious points of view, I just didn't like the songs on side two.
     
  14. vconsumer

    vconsumer Unapologetically 70s

    Location:
    Minnesota
    Anderson composed all of the songs on Aqualung, so they all reflect one man's point of view. I wouldn't say that makes it a concept album.
     
  15. user19351

    user19351 Active Member

    It is whatever Jann Wenner says it is...he says it is a prog/concept album rendering the band unworthy of consideration as one of rock's most successful, diverse, interesting groups.

    I disagree with him, but until Jann and the other "ultra-cool" voters that used to get beat up in high school get off of their high horses and accept that rock and roll didn't end with Carl Perkins, it is a crappy, proggy, concept album.

    Actually, I'm being too hard on Jann. He actually does like one concept album. It is an album about being poor, angry, British, and unable to sing or play. It is an album by the Sex Pistols. The general concept is "we're so angry that we don't care that we suck."

    Tongue firmly in cheek...I actually like the Pistols, I simply chuckle at how quickly a band gets in if the voter assigns some arbitrary street cred to the intentions of the artist. Ian Anderson, by his own admission, was just as motivated by getting laid as any other artist, he just happened to work hard and become a good performer and songwriter. He also is penalized for writing about subjects beyond drinking, screwing, and driving fast in hot rods.

    AC/DC gets points for re-writing the same song and lyrics for years because it is simple 3-chord rock, while Tull is actually penalized for trying not to make the same album twice. It makes one scratch his/her head, especially when the back catalog has at least 5 or more outstanding records.

    I love the Aqualung album.
     
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