What does it sound like?:
1974’s Warchild was never in my top five Tull albums, although it does certainly have some good songs – I felt it was rather an inconsistent set overall though, one that didn’t fully realise its potential or live up to expectations. Ian Anderson has decided to create an alternative version of the record, or perhaps it’s a sequel, appearing on vinyl only. This uses the associated recordings from the sessions that didn’t make the final cut, which have been newly sequenced by the man himself. Some of these dribbled out in subsequent years on various compilations, and the whole lot appeared on the fortieth anniversary box set reissue in 2014, remixed by the venerable Steven Wilson of course. So to be clear there’s nothing previously unreleased here, and this release seems to be a way of making these songs available on vinyl for the first time for the completists who collect such things. The songs themselves, which fans will already be familiar with, are fine overall, and in fact some of them would have been better suited to the original album that those finally selected for inclusion. Much delayed – it was originally slated for release in January 2022 – it’s an interesting alternate look at how the record might have turned out in perhaps a parallel universe, but it’s really only for the most diehard Tull fan who wants every release, as good as the music itself is.
What does it all *mean*?
The band was in such a prolific run of form in this era that they always seemed to have an album’s worth of top drawer songs surplus to requirements and left to languish in the vaults.
Goes well with…
Pondering that cover artwork!
Release Date:
24 November
Might suit people who like…
Tull completists. The Steven Wilson remix of Broadsword has also been given a standalone vinyl and cd release.
I already have all the tracks so I won’t be buying it (and very good they are too) but I do like Warchild a lot, at the time seen as a change of direction after the proggy phase of Thick as a Brick and A Passion Play. And the cover art is great!
What Twang said…
Warchild remains one of my favourite Tull albums (probably due to my age when I first heard it – see threads passim) – but I have all the tracks and don’t feel the need to duplicate them on LP format.
One of my fave Tull albums, too. Amazing to think that, fresh off
the back of two No. ! albums in the US, they were one of the biggest
bands in the world at that stage
Saw them tour this album at Birmingham Odeon 39 years ago last Monday.
Remember the date so well because it was the night before the Birmingham
pub bombings and me and my mates had a few pre-gig drinks in the Tavern
in the Town where nine people died and scores of people got seriously injured
less than 24 hours later.