Top 40 #2: Inside by Jethro Tull

Year: 1970
Record: Benefit
Written by: Ian Anderson...you know, the person whom most people think is named Jethro Tull. The flute player and guy with the beard.

Inside

I wrote a poem about this not too long ago, as it is the song that got me interested in Tull. I was driving down College St. in front of the public library when I first heard this song, and was instantly smitten. For that, this song has brought me two things in most unequal measure:

1. Happiness
2. Grief

First, the happiness.

What grabbed me about this song was the flute hook. So happy and jaunty, it set off everything nicely. Also the lyrics about Counting Lambs and Sheep. Who the hell writes songs about that? This should have warned me about Tull, in that Anderson writes lyrics that veer between fun, obtuse, obscene, decadent and inscrutable, sometimes within one album (Thick as a Brick, Passion Play). This song stands for being in some place that is happy and secure, about not worrying about the past or future but reveling in the present for all its wonders.

Sitting in the corner feeling glad
Got no money comin' in but I can't be sad
That was the best cup of coffee I ever had!
And I won't worry 'bout a thing because we've got it made
Here on the inside outside so far away

But in reality it is not important for what it says but what it is, a gateway piece of music to my own rock and roll shame. I love Jethro Tull's music, and that may mark me as an incorrigible dick. What Ian Anderson does is engage my inner 12 year old struggling to be witty or at least witty while proving Tom Lehrer's dictum that "When correctly viewed, everything is lewd." In Tull's case, you don't really have to look to far. From the opening lines of "Aqualung" (Sitting on a park bench/Eyeing little girls with bad intent) to the despicable rock star in "Pied Piper" (I've a tenner in my skin tight jeans/You can touch it if your hands are clean) to eager farmer confronted with the gentry in "Hunting Girl" (Boot leather flashing the spurnecks the size of my thumb/This high born hunter had tastes as strange as they come) Tull is filthy and silly at the same time.

Or, who writes songs about their cats? "Look out little furry folk, it's the all night working cat!" Tull's songs bring me no end of joy because of the humor and musicianship. One thing that I have learned about music is that it is like wine. If you like it, it's good. I feel absolutely no shame in liking the song "Call Me Maybe" because it is catchy as fuck. I'm old enough to realize that now, where I was not in a place for this wisdom when I heard "Inside" sandwiched in a 4 song set along with "Cross Eyed Mary", "Bungle in the Jungle" and "Fat Man". Before I heard this song in the long gone Alabaster Disaster, I listened to in many ways what was expected of me regardless. Now, even though I still appreciate the Ramones, I don't really like their music much anymore. I'd rather listen to the Clash from that era, or perhaps the Dead Kennedys. Why? It says something to me. That is the point of everything. If it does not speak to you, then don't do it. Inside started that realization, and none too late.

This leads me to Grief.
I have taken more shit for liking Tull than for being a fan of the Pittsburgh Pirates. More people mock me for this than anything else. Lie to your boss? Steal a lollipop from a six year old out in front of the 7/11? Violate a toddler with a plastic goldfish? All of this pales in comparison to liking Tull. They are the best example of "the dinosaur era of self-indulgent Progressive Rock". They put out........CONCEPT ALBUMS! Their songs are too long, the time changes too rapid. Their sense of humor is awful and bordering on sexist, you swine!

 Add in the fact that you are a know-it-all-prick when you correct some clown who describes Jethro Tull as a "he" or point out that Tull, like Led Zeppelin, was better on acoustic numbers, and you have a fat shit burger to eat. C'mon, a fucking flute?????!!??!?!?!? They won a Grammy when Metallica should have won! For a heavy metal album!

Well, chief, that was 26 years ago or something, we all know the Grammys are meaningless pieces of gold plated douchebaggery and that Metallica is the one band in the observable universe that should not have given two fucks about winning a Grammy. Jethro Tull's frontman shows One Of The Great Truths In Life.

Ian Anderson, now 66, no longer needs to play to make money. But he does. He signs autographs after shows (mine is on my bookcase upstairs) and seeks out new Tull fans opinions about the music and readily mocks himself and gives roughly $400,000 a year to charity. He is an example that life is best enjoyed while doing something you love. He writes songs that he wants to write, not what Rolling Stone wants or what record company asshats want. Isn't that the whole damn point of being a rocker? Isn't that the whole point of being alive?