Minstrel in the Gallery

Minstrel in the Gallery Artist: Jethro Tull
Label: Capitol
Category: Music


Average customer rating: 4.5 out of 5 stars
Format: Original recording reissued
Media: Audio CD
Number Of Discs: 1


UPC: 094632108227
EAN: 0094632108227
ASIN: B000008H1W


Release Date: 2000-09-12

Minstrel in the Gallery


Related Categories:

General General
Categories | Alternative Rock | Styles | Music
General General
Categories | Rock | Styles | Music
Progressive Rock Progressive Rock
Categories | Progressive | Rock | Styles | Music
General General
Categories | Hard Rock & Metal | Styles | Music
Hard Rock Hard Rock
Categories | Hard Rock & Metal | Styles | Music
Pop Rock Pop Rock
Categories | Pop | Styles | Music
Album-Oriented Rock (AOR) Album-Oriented Rock (AOR)
Categories | Classic Rock | Styles | Music
General General
Categories | Classic Rock | Styles | Music

Tracks:

  1. Minstrel In The Gallery
  2. Cold Wind To Valhalla
  3. Black Satin Dancer
  4. Requiem
  5. One White Duck/0 10 = Nothing At All
  6. Baker St. Muse: Pig-Me And The Whore/Nice Little Tune/Crash-Barrier Waltzer/Mother England Reverie
  7. Grace

Similar Items:

  1. Benefit
  2. Stand Up
  3. Songs from the Wood
  4. Warchild
  5. Too Old to Rock: Too Young To Die

Customer Reviews:

5 out of 5 stars One of J-Tull's Finest.......2006-02-17

OK, this is the Minstrel in the Gallery release to go after. Do not, I repeat do NOT buy the re-release with the bonus tracks. None of them do a thing but hurt this great release.
Not only does this contain one of the group's best-written, best-known songs, Minstrel in the Gallery, but it's got much more. Be it Requiem (one of the finest acoustic songs in the band's catalogue), Cold Wind to Valhalla (a myth-influenced winner, at least in my book), or Baker St. Muse (One of their finest extended pieces), this album has some great music. Pick it up!

5 out of 5 stars The best Tull album of all.......2004-04-01

Jethro Tull's music is so complex and indiosyncratic that 1) it is impossible to classify or even characterize; 2) it is rather an "acquired taste;" and 3) at its best, not only do you never get tired of it, but it gets better with every hearing. This disc is all of those things in spades. This is one of the 7 or so Tull albums I owned and played incessantly back in the mid-70s. Recently, when my turntable finaly reached the point that I couldn't patch it up any more, there were very few albums of that vintage that I bothered to replace with CDs, but this one was at the very top of the list. As much as I love Tull, on reflection I realize that many of the other albums were mixtures of some real gems and quite a few clunkers. This one is uniformly superb, and not just because it is a fairly coherent "concept album." In particular, the mixture and balance of the various contrapuntal sounds, including the string section as well as the famous quirky flute and the usual rock instruments, is outstanding, and this stage in the evolution of the lineup surrounding Anderson and Barre (Barlow, Hammond-Hammond, Evan) was the one with the best synergy. Anderson's vocals and nonsensical-yet-profound lyrics were never better, the quality of the flute playing is by far the best, and the flute is integrated into the overall flow of the songs as it rarely was elsewhere. While the title track and One White Duck probably got the most semi-popular play back when it was released, to me it might be Cold Wind to Valhalla and Black Satin Dancer that wear the best now. Baker Street Muse remains an amazing example (even better than the epic Thick as a Brick) of an extended, medley-type assemblage that somehow clearly hangs together. My only regret is that I am somewhat reluctant to introduce these gems to my nearly-teenage daughters because they might listen a bit too closely to the words! They also might well, like most people, have to have the patience to listen about 10 times before getting over the quirky rhythms and the not-always-hummable melodies and beginning to appreciate how great this stuff really is. In my middle age I recently had the same experience with the Shostakovich string quartet #8, so I know how it feels.

5 out of 5 stars "Valkyrie maidens cry".......2002-08-13

This album is a "5", I don't even have to think about it. I agree with another review, that at first this sounded like something that didn't make much sense. But this is one of those albums that doesn't necessarily sound great right from the start. You have to give it time to "all come together", and when it does (on about my 5th listen) you know you are hearing something spectacular. After the medieval beginning to the song "Minstrel in the Gallery" comes drum rhythms and guitar stuff that is incredible. There are unique rhythms in portions of some of these songs that can take some time to get the hang of. After it all sinks in the whole thing comes together. "Cold Wind to Valhalla" is easy to follow right from the start and some of the others. "Black Satin Dancer" has a different sound that takes some getting used to but to sum it all up; This is Jethro Tull's best album. That's my opinion, but I have heard nearly all the others and as good as they are, nothing compares to this one.

5 out of 5 stars Jethro Tull Rocks.......2002-07-28

After "Aqualung" and "War Child" were such huge successes, I was worried that Jethro Tull had, as Frank Zappa phrased it, gone commercial. "Minstrel in the Gallery" corrected that notion. "Minstrel in the Gallery" returns Tull to their original self-defined genre.

I always get a kick out of people trying to fit Jethro Tull into any particular type of music, because they are just plain not anything. While they have elements of hard rock/metal, elements of pop, elements of progressive, elements of folk, elements of rennaisance, and even a bit of classical here and there, they are all of the above and none of the above. They just are.

The opening track, "Minstrel in the Gallery", begins with hammering and noises that make it sound as though the group is on a stage that is being prepared for a play. The song then transitions into a bard-like minstrel song, and then takes off into a hard rock song. An excellent opening song that sets you up for the things to come.

"Cold Wind to Valhalla" won't fool you. There are some violins and flavor of folk/rennaisance, but at around 1 minute and 45 seconds into the song it switches into overdrive and you realize you are listening to a solidly rock song. Excellent use of violins in this song to help the orchestration. Hard to believe that violins can be a hard-rock instrument.

You hear classic Jethro Tull in the beginning of "Black Satin Dancer", then some hard rock riffs, and you suspect what will come next in this song. And you would be right and wrong. This song is a sensual song with allusions of sexual foreplay and intense longing, perhaps even lust. Sometimes I felt some occasional elements of King Crimson, and then not. The hard rock elements intertwine with classic Tull and some occasional progressive flashes. A most excellent song.

Then you are lulled by the melancholy strains of "Requiem", as Ian Anderson and company sound more like Kansas or Simon and Garfunkel, and yet, the sound is still Tull. This song is meant to be listened to for the feel, and not for the words.

Then, as you move into "One White Duck/0^10 = Nothing at All" you realize that "Requiem" was a perfect transition between "Black Satin Dancer" and this song. I love this song, because it seems to have meaning, and seems to have no meaning, and you hover on the edge of understanding without understanding, though you think you should, and could, if you could listen a little longer and read the lyrics just one more time. But this song is, of course, classic Tull, and the lyrics do mean something, but they are art, and art is for the interpretation of the listener. Don't make too much of this song, and don't make too little. Just listen and love it.

Then, off to signature Tull, the extended, intertwined story-song, "Baker St. Muse". Here you have an intro about a muse, a very down-to-earth fellow crying out that Jethro Tull wasn't the commercial group that "War Child" seemed to make them out to be. We are in the gutter like we always were, singing about the things that haven't changed, and so on to the next part of our story...

The other songs are stories of the street, likely stories of the Baker St. Muse (aka Jethro Tull). These songs are very sexual. Today they might even get a warning label, even though there is no use of the crude words which seem so popular. There is no need, the point is well made without resorting to a limited, non-descriptive vocabulary. This group of songs finish with "Mother England Reverie", which is a protestation that the singer is just a street player, a muse, and he'll never be anything but.

The CD finishes with a wrap-up song, "Grace", which is a marvelous little epilogue that not only finishes the CD, but also asks a simple, but layered question, "Hello breakfast. May I buy you again tomorrow?" In the context of the CD the question more likely means, can we be here tomorrow, can we still do what we are doing? And perhaps, in consideration of the other songs, will anyone care.

Sometimes I think of the songs, coming after the nearly-pop success of "Warchild", as being an apology for straying from the princples of Jethro Tull's music and style. Perhaps I'm wrong. Perhaps not. Regardless, listening to the seven albums before Warchild, and then "Warchild", and then "Minstrel in the Gallery", you realize that "Warchild" was not Tull's usual music, and "Minstrel in the Gallery" put them squarely back where they once were.

Jethro Tull has never been everyman's group. Never will. They occupy a unique place in modern music that will likely never be defined. This CD is solidly at the heart of the kind of music Jethro Tull is known for making. It is among the best of Jethro Tull.

5 out of 5 stars Very Good.......2002-07-25

This is and excellent example of classic Jethro Tull. It has some fast, powerful songs, as well as some smooth, soft ones. The best comparison I can make to another album is "Every Good Boy Deserves Favour" by the Moody Blues. By this I mean(as any Moody Blues fan will probably agree) that you have to listen to this album more then once to appricate all the songs. Some of the songs, like the title track, will probably appeal to you at once. Others, like Requiem, really need to grow on you.

Music Album:

  1. 12" Collection Plus ~ Culture Club
  2. Blue Skies Forever ~ Mary Prankster
  3. Ciautistico! ~ XXL
  4. Sanctuary: Vision ~ Various Artists
  5. Slave to Love: Best of the Ballads ~ Bryan Ferry
  6. Under Cover, Vol. 2 ~ Joe Lynn Turner
  7. Spitshine ~ Crown Jewels
  8. Ball in the House ~ Ball in the House
  9. The New Song and Dance ~ Radio 4
  10. Five-A-Side: The Very Best of Ace ~ Ace

Music Album

Music Album

Music CD

Love & Other Obsessions ~ Spyro Gyra

A Funky Thide of Sings ~ Billy Cobham

Swingin With Bud ~ Bud Powell

Acoustic Masters I ~ Charles Lloyd

Swiss Nights, Vol. 3 ~ Dexter Gordon

Slow Time ~ Various Artists

Music from Uganda, Vol. 3 ~ Various Artists

Gainsbourg: Made in Japan ~ Various Artists

Tango Sur Trio ~ Julio Frade

Very Best of ~ Unicorn