Jethro Tull - Too Old to Rock ‘n’ Roll, Too Young to Die!, album review

Older Geezer Now as a Young Geezer Then on Being an Old Greaser Geezer

Not one of Jethro Tull’s best or best known, but Jethro Tull so an inherent quality if you like, in particular, the vocal of Anderson and his flute playing, which are prevalent on this album conceived as a stage musical.

There is a new Steve Wilson stereo remix so the sound quality of this is excellent. Many of the tracks are rather generic Tull fare – though as I’ve said, fine for a fan – but I do think there are a number of real gems: Quiz Kid is a Tull-rich riff opener [main song after Prelude]; Salamander has brilliant acoustic guitar and Anderson in fine folk vocal with harmonies as well as flute harmonies; Taxi Grab is another pulsing riff, adorned with great rock harmonica; From a Dead Beat to an Old Greaser is a string-stroked pretty ballad with a clear stage musical narrative, Anderson’s vocal over-dubbed to accentuate his deeper tones, and a sweet saxophone; Bad-Eyed and Loveless is gorgeous, both the acoustic guitar and Anderson at his vocal best, a plaintive affecting song, and the title song is perhaps the one people will recall, a Tull pop song with plenty of strings to lift and bounce about.

On this new re-release there are many additional tracks [alternative takes and so on] so, for example, From a Dead Beat to an Old Greaser and Bad-Eyed and Loveless get further delicate revisits which are beautiful enough to hear again.