Forgotten Gems : BENEFIT by Jethro Tull

After the success of their second album Stand Up from 1969, Jethro Tull began work soon on a new album. They traversed towards progressiveness on Stand Up while their debut This Was, was mostly blues based. The success of their peculiar brand of prog-folk-rock with added flute (brilliantly performed by Ian Anderson), hit the market well and I suppose they thought that the trend of the day, the rise of the prog scene, meant they needed to go down that road.

I am happy they did, because this is the most intricate and complex of all of their early, classic albums, up until the realease of Bricks (the last of the greats imo). At the same time there is an ever present ability to bring a good hook in, and that means all the tracks, except a few of the last ones. There are brilliant tempo shifts, sudden breaks, which I have always liked... and actually was a great inspiration for Iron Maiden's style. Ian's vocals are sort of introvert and melancholic, not upfront and in your face as the next album, the great Aqualung, would sport.

This is the kind of album that just grows and grows, and I find myself reaching for it more often than the other ones. It seems all the tracks gells together to some coherent unity of sounds, instead of standalone tracks, and in my experience, that is a sign of quality. Ian's style of singing here is the last effort on the true old type folk-prog, before he turned slightly more rock oriented on the next efforts. It is a completely unique experience this band and particularly their sound here... a sort of bridge between very early and classic Tull.

The original mixes of Tull early albums have always been a bit sloppy, so when remastered collectors editions appeared a few years back, with superior sound, it was a no brainer to get hold of this. The three discs holds everything one could want including non album singles, unissued tracks and lots more. A real treat. Highly recommended release.