So What Did Become Of Gerald Bostock?

If, like me, you are of a certain age, you will remember the precocious 10 year old Gerald Bostock who wrote a poem which ultimately provided the lyrics to the Jethro Tull album 'Thick As A Brick'.

Of course in reality Bostock never existed and the concept was the brainchild of Tull frontman, Ian Anderson. Weary of hearing Jethro Tull referred to as a progressive band, Anderson decided in 1972 to create the mother of all progressive albums. 'Thick As A Brick' was the result and consisted of one piece of music split over two sides of an LP record. It was Anderson's attempt at sending up the pretentious concept albums that were being offered up by other progressive bands of the time such as Yes, Genesis and Emerson, Lake & Palmer. In actual fact, the album was actually quite good though I must say that I played the first side of the album far more than the second side. Perhaps 20 minutes of such stuff was sufficient. Anyway it proved to be popular as the album was a huge success on both sides of the Atlantic and Jethro Tull performed the complete album to packed audiences for about a year after its release. Sections of it have also been played regularly in concerts by Jethro Tull and Ian Anderson ever since.

Although 'prog rock' has taken something of a critical battering in the years since the mid 70's, April 3rd 2012 saw the release of the son of 'Thick As A Brick', 'TAAB2' in which Anderson imagines what may have happened to the life of Gerald Bostock in the intervening years. As Anderson himself explains, the album came about through the encouragement of record executive Derek Shulman. If that name sounds familiar to you that will be because Shulman was the lead singer of another rather fine 'prog rock' band, Gentle Giant.

Anderson duly went away and wrote the new album focusing on the various twists and turns that life throws at us and the decisions we make. In so doing, I think he has created a work that may make us baby boomers think about our own lives past. To quote the lyrics, the 'What ifs, maybes and might have beens.' Notwithstanding that, I believe that if you enjoy the work of Ian Anderson or Jethro Tull, or you liked the original album then 'TAAB2' is well worth a listen. Featuring Anderson mainly on acoustic guitar, there are of course examples of his trademark flute playing.

The opening track 'From a Pebble Thrown' fades in with a theme which will be familiar to those who know the original work and this is a recurring motif, linking the original with the new version. Like Bruce Springsteen's recent offering, Anderson takes a pop at everybody's current favourite target - the bankers (Banker Bets, Banker Wins) but he also deals with subjects such as war ('Wooton Bassett Town') and religion ('Give Till It Hurts'). Musically the songs swing from soft ballads to hard rocking band workouts - sometimes within the same song, 'Swing It Far' for example.

Given the current penchant for listening to music in small bites, I wonder how successful this album will be. Although, unlike the original 'Thick as a Brick', this album is made up of seventeen individual tracks, I would encourage anyone to set aside 54 minutes of their time to listen to it from start to finish. The time and effort should be worth it. This could be Anderson's best work for many years and I suspect I may be playing the complete album even more than I did the original.