All right big guest today it's legendary Ian Anderson of Jethro Tull. He's a very well read and intelligent guy. And I guess I missed the mark on his spiritual beliefs, because I didn't know the words he was saying, but I later did Google them and he has some very interesting takes on that and a whole lot more. We're gonna discuss the new album, recording the guitar solo for aqualung touring with Led Zeppelin and how he deals with fans nowadays. So it's a short interview, but
it's packed with great stuff. So enjoy it Hi, and welcome to the show.
Okay, welcome to where we're, I'm missing somewhere. All right away. All right. Well,
yeah, so you've got a new record out. And it's funny, I'm just having this discussion with my friend yesterday about a movie star that retired in her 40s. Now you must clearly have enough money to retire. Have you ever thought about just retiring? You must be doing this for the love of the music, right?
Well, I'm doing it because frankly, I don't have anything better to do. I've had a I've had a very few jobs in my life, none of them I particularly want to do again. So this this stage in my life, this is all I've got. I had to give up thoughts of being a British Airways jet captain, because I would have had to have retired. Nine years ago, if I was the pilot of a Boeing triple seven, working for British Airways, then 65 It would have been, you know, thank you, and
good night. If I was a professional tennis player, I probably would have been over. Goodness me, you know, probably 40 years ago, right? Same is about if I was a Formula One racing driver if I was that lots of things, you know, life would have been finished by now. But luckily, I chose to be a musician. So you know, we have that distinction of dying with our boots on like John Wayne in a black and white Cowboy Western, you know, we go on until, you know, that shootout
at the final. Outside the outside the bar in main streets of some cowboy town, we we die a romantic and glorious death. That's what musicians get to do. Some of them of course, mysteriously died at the age of 27. But happily, I'm way past that threshold. Yeah. And that, that I survived 27. And, and I'm 74. And still okay, so perhaps I have an realistically two or three more professional years left to me.
Well, yeah, so you're still creating, and this is amazing. So the new records called zealot gene. And I'm told this is a reference to some particular world leaders, maybe six or eight that have some scary policies. So is that is that correct on that?
Well, the title track I mean, that the zealot gene that is a song really about social media and extreme views and politics and, and, and society manifesting themselves on Twitter and Facebook and other social media. But it's an outlet for people who want to get crazy and be hurtful and damaging and divisive with others. But that's not the topic of the whole album. The whole album is based on a series of songs, each one about a different strong human emotion.
And they said then, initially with a list of words to describe strong human emotions, where it's like, anger and greed and jealousy, retribution, and some nice stuff, like love and compassion, and tolerance and companionship, and my list of words was the focus for the I suppose the the, not necessarily in the titles, but was the subject matter of each individual song. And that, that is the way that it began back in
2017. And then, you know, when it came to working on a new album, in on January, the first of 2022, when I started work, it it was a starting point was to sit down and structure something on the page in terms of a concept or theme, something I would write a bunch of material about and, and with that template of simple ideas I set out to join the dots together and and come up with the the ideas for 12 different songs.
And that is at the point now where I haven't come back from Portugal yesterday doing concerts, and it'll leave the week before that I'm now for the next three weeks able to start progressing that and working on some demos to send to the band with a view to recording at odd points during this year when we're not actually on tour.
Well, that's exciting. Well, so one of the songs I was gonna ask you about, that's cool that you say each song is an emotion because that's exactly what I was thinking. When I heard the song mine is the mountain, because it starts off almost with like a Halloween demonic vibe. But then the the vibe, I feel like it changes. And the lyrics are really cool. I feel like the first line might be from the Bible. Can you explain the motions behind that song?
Well, with the list of words that I began with, for the songs I, I suddenly had the idea that I'd seen all those words, prominently displayed in various parts of the of the Christian Bible inside did a then internet search to see examples of those words in biblical text, which served as a comparison, you know, for writing songs that, for the most part, were set in the present day. But, you know, I could I could just draw on as analogies or metaphors, certain biblical
similarities and examples. But perhaps the one song that is clearly set in a biblical context is minus the mountain. And that is, indeed a song sung from the viewpoint of, of the Christian God. We're, in fact, the Jewish God. And I kind of
kept it in that context. Because I'd, I wrote a song in 1971, called My God on the aqualung album, which again, was, I suppose, pleading for some sympathy for the idea of the, the, the deity feeling a little bit put upon a little bit demanded of and so in those who follow the, the traditions of Christianity are used to the idea of prayer, of worship, the idea that we want something from God, we want not to catch COVID, and we want to be healthy, so that we can go with our buddies
and watch the football game on Saturday, you know, we're wanting something and and I don't really believe in intervention is God I'm, I'm, I think quite an intensely spiritual person. And I have a huge esteem for Christianity, indeed, for other religions, too. But my own feeling is I don't, I don't, I don't believe in the idea of having to wish for things and, and in some way trying to buy those things by through the act of worship. And so I'm, you know, a little bit
cynical about that. And I think I try and walk that narrow line between being disrespectful to religion, and trying to point out that there are many things that we, we seem to accept and buy into in terms of our practice, of religious worship, which are maybe just a little bit unrealistic, and a bit, a
bit presumptuous. So my, my idea of the Godhead, the spiritual oneness of, of humanity, and everything that exists is closer to the world of pantheism, or perhaps de ism, but not really in terms of the the modern, or the past form of Christian worship, which, as I say, I have huge respect for, but I don't
practice it myself. And yet, you know, the weird thing is, some people The weird thing is I spend many, many, many 1000s of pounds a year doing, doing fundraising concerts for the church in the cathedrals, not only in the UK, but elsewhere in Europe, it's something that I, I have an enormous sense of reverence for is the is the places of worship, even though when I go in them, and draw people into those places to participate in Christmas concerts, as part of the Christian Christmas tradition, I
am not. I am not doing it with a sense of prayer and worship in the way that perhaps some others might do. But I still think there's an enormous value of bringing people into that spiritual sense of being together in the church and cathedrals are a great place to do that. You know, as soon as you walk through the door, it's you, you hush your voice, you calm down, you enter into some kind of a spiritual communion with whatever it is you may not
know the name for it. You may not have a real consciousness about it, but it is something that I think manifests itself for the better. And so I encourage people to go to churches and cathedrals and sit quietly and contemplate their navels, whether they're Christian, or Hindus, or Jews or Muslims, you know, all are welcome. And all are welcome at my Christmas concerts.
So what would you call yourself then an atheist or an agnostic or not?
Well, I just told you what I call myself A pantheist okay, it's okay. It's words you're familiar with because
I'm not just Google. Okay, okay. Oh, that's an interesting
day is not an atheist. No, I'm someone who has a great spiritual belief. And I do have a huge belief in the idea of a, of a oneness, which is what people call God. Okay, but it's just my way of recognizing that and acknowledging it or not, not quite the ways of the Christian tradition
right. Now, that makes sense. That's a cool song. But the other one that I was gonna ask you about was Shawn asleeping. Because it's a cool riff and you play the riff on guitar and flute. So when you write a song like that, you write it on the guitar or the flute, you always write the same way or do you write it on different instruments because you play obviously, several instruments.
When I think that particular song I was playing the guitar when I decided the the chords and the the riff, but you know, it varies from song to song, sometimes things come up as a, you know, as a flute line, and a flute plays, it's a monophonic instrument doesn't have to can't play chords, or two notes at the same time, it just simply one note. So it's a little ambiguous when it comes to the harmonic implications of
what you play. But that can be quite fun when you come up with something that sounds nice as a melody or a riff. And then you have to work out what's going to go with this, you know, what, harmonically speaking, where do I go? What other notes will work
with that? So it's a combination really, of working, sometimes writing things when the guitar sometimes writing things that begin with a melody or even begin with the lyrics and then I have to try and find the melody that works with those lyrics, which is not usually too hard.
Because writing lyrics, you know, there is when you write some words, they have rhythm, they have cadence in the way that you speak that, you know, they don't, they're not all on the same level, I bet they go to, you know, they rise and fall as human speech does. And that is the beginning of melody, you know, you have a sense that something will rise and fall in the way that you you enunciate
those words. And if you write verse, it has rhythm, it has a meter, which implies, again, tempo, and it implies something which you can ultimately reduce to a drum pattern, if you've not been put it in those terms. So the act of writing the words first, sometimes the melody comes quite quickly afterwards.
The worst thing is trying to write words, having written the detail of, of a melody and chords, and recorded perhaps a backing track and then thinking, what's the song going to be about, it's too late to train, the train has already left the
station. And whatever you do, trying to catch up will be a somewhat difficult experience and a feeling of perhaps, it being a rather artificial one, because it doesn't flow in the organic way that you do when you try to come up with a title, words and music kind of all at the same time. That's the nice way to work. Yeah.
So and then, and you're writing and producing an even I was funny, I was reading the comments on Aqua long on YouTube last night. And they said that people are saying that's one of the best guitar solos of all time. Now, clearly, you're not writing the guitar solo. But when you're producing, how do you get the guitar solo? And you do give Martin or whoever the new guitar player is? Do you give them a time limit? Or do you tell them an emotion the song is about this?
Or do you just say, go off and do whatever you want to do?
Well, when the song was written, it was written and arranged in a very specific way. So by the time Martin came to plays guitar solo, there were a set number of bars that he had to fill in. And he he had a completely free hand as to what he played in that improvised solo. And I remember vividly recording that because I was sitting in the control room, and Martin was just getting ready to do the take of that of that performance. And we were just
about to run the tape. And behind me, I was aware that somebody had entered into the control room and it was Jimmy Page, Led Zeppelin. And, and the tape started rolling and Martins was just waiting for that cue to play his guitar solo. And when he saw Jimmy Page standing behind me, and Martin actually played that guitar solo with Jimmy Page watching and going, Yeah, come on margin. Yeah, he
said, I think he said he had to do the tape because if he didn't get it one or two takes he's like, it might have been a flute solo than
Well, that's it. Yeah. So a lot of you know that. Sometimes pressure can be a good thing in that way.
Right? Well, you guys did shows with Led Zeppelin. What was that? Like? That must have been amazing to play with. I've never seen those. Those guys live. Obviously I'm too young. But
well, it was always an illustrative experience working with other great musicians and different actors over different periods of time. But I think in you know that they were a year ahead of us in their experience. performing in the USA, so they were already pretty big, when we were there opening act. And, you know, I certainly learned some things about performance and the dynamics of Led Zeppelin, which were very strong, very profound in the way that they played.
And, and something of the swagger, I suppose that was obvious, particularly from Robert Plant and, and to a degree from Jimmy Page. So in terms of their performance, in in that very emotional and very aware way, the swaggering the, the, the rock guard kind of approach, it was something that I thought, well, I can pick up something from there, but I have to do it in my way. My my chest, my bare chest was not as pretty
as robbery. My vocal capabilities were hugely inferior to his so I knew I could never be that kind of a singer and do it that sort of a way. But then on the other hand, Robert Plant couldn't play flute and, and so you know, I had certain certain assets that I could develop on stage. And as far as I know, Robert Plant never got around to wearing the codpiece. And Tice at least not
in public. What he did in the privacy of his own home, of course, is that business entirely but right, you know, we all evolve in different ways, and then learning from others as part of what we do, but it's a good idea to, to learn what not to do. Absolutely, it's to learn
what to do. So I, I think many of the many of the acts that I've seen over the years, particularly in those early formative days, it was about, about realizing that I couldn't do that I shouldn't do that I wasn't possessed of that talent or ability. So it focuses you on concentrating on the things you feel you can do to develop as a musician and as a performer. So being with Led Zeppelin was was
very illustrative. And they certainly, you know, they certainly had a great time on tour they loved they were very gregarious, they like to have parties and meet lots of girls and, and, and we're pretty active in that regard. But I think I, I think after i The second time, I turned down the opportunity or the offer to go to a Led Zeppelin after show party, I think they decided that I was not made of the same sort of stuff. Like me again. So I, you know, I just don't like
parties and crowd people. And the whole group B thing was just, you know, just so. So silly. Really, I don't find I don't find that kind of a world attractive. I'm, you know, I'm a solitary guy. And when it comes to relationships, I think it's really got to be something you you win on a one to one basis, not something that you take advantage of just because it's there, like a crate of beer in the corner of the of one of the road cruise hotel room.
Right. So then how do you deal with fans? Because I heard you say that even at the airport with a mask on and a hat fans will recognize you. So how do you deal with that when fans are kind of mobbing you?
Well, I tried to tell myself to be polite and say thank you, it's very nice to see you. Thanks for coming along. And but, you know, right at the moment in these COVID years is not a great idea to be up close and personal and posing for selfies. So I'm, like trying to discourage people from from getting close. Because it's not just a question of my becoming
sick. It's a question of, if I'm sick, I put everybody out of a job for two weeks, you know, the band and crew, we're all in that same position, we owe it to each other to be super careful. And and so far, you know, since last end of last August, we've been on quite a few tours and a whole bunch of different countries and each one with its own different rules and regulations. And so far, only one of the band has had COVID and happily caught it over Christmas when we didn't
have any shows to do so. And he being much younger, didn't suffer unduly having had his vaccinations and, and his booster dose. So he got off lightly. But there are three of us amongst the band and crew who are clinically more vulnerable.
If we get COVID. But you know, we one big huge thing is it's it's it's the guys who were out of work for two years, they didn't have a job to go to no money coming out, nothing to pay the bill, nothing to pay the rent to pay the electricity bill to pay the food shopping bill. And so now that we're back on the road, we really really are trying to be careful not to be the one who puts everybody else down. have a job. Yeah, I
never thought of it like that that's really selfless. Well, speaking of selfless and I gotta get going. But I do like to end each episode mentioning a charity is there any charities that you've worked with or you want to give a shout out to here at the end?
Well, my my most of my charitable work is really doing doing the Christmas concerts, raising funds for cathedrals and churches to put the roof back on and repair the organ and do all the things that the the ongoing work. And, you know, I remember doing concert somewhere in Italy in a church because it had been damaged during an earthquake. And it's, these are the things I suppose I
connect with most easily. But there are a number of other charitable concerns that I support, I support a couple of charities in Israel that do do work to promote the, the living side by side of different religious and social factions supporting co education amongst, amongst Israeli Arabs, Jews and Christians. And so I've done that for quite a few years. And something I continue to do and turn my attention to, once again, as that time of the year
comes up. But, you know, there are certain things I suppose you can do when you you're paying back a little bit for the enormous luck and, and good fortune that you've enjoyed over the years. And so giving something back is, is something not just enjoyable, but it's something that feels a little bit of an obligation, and I have, I happily, I happily do
that. And it, it tends these days to be more altruistic and more to do with the world of spirituality, I suppose I'm more connected with that, and, and, and do that sort of thing, I don't donate money to the local football team, or when in fact, a lot of things that people are asking me all the time to contribute to this and that whatever, because they know I'm a slightly charitable person.
So, I have to turn so many people down over so many different topics, but the things I do mostly connected with, either with the environment, endangered animal species, and, and, and most obviously, the spiritual world of trying to do what I can to continue with the value that I think all of us can derive satisfaction and pleasure and, and something very tangible from from that rather, rather exotic and hard to pin down spiritual world, especially in these increasingly materialistic
and eclectic days where we are sidetracked so easily by a lot of other topics and interests, but the fundamental thing of, you know, friends, family, and the spiritual reality of, of belief or non belief, these are the things that you know, I suppose, occupy my more charitable urges from time to time. But, you know, my charity does not extend to taking the road drew out for dinner every day because they're a noisy bunch. And they like to talk about things that I don't particularly enjoy talking
about. So I I'm not a I'm not a guy who, quite often I think the people who suffer from my lack of charity are often the people I'm closest to. I see see them so much, that somehow you know, we have a little bit of time off. You just want to be by yourself and not, not necessarily push the social envelope too far.
Absolutely. Well, I'll let you get going. Son, I got a ton of interviews. The zealot gene is the album everyone can get it on Jethro Tull calm.
Well, you can get it on a number of platforms, physically and unload and all the rest of all they do these days. But yes, it's always worth a listen may not be your cup of tea. But you know, give it a listen.
Yeah, no, I like it. Thank you so much. Well, nice to talk to you check. All right. Let's talk again soon. Okay, cheers. Bye. Bye bye. Okay, so I googled the words that he mentioned about his religious beliefs. deism is a religious religious belief holding that God created the universe, and established rationally comprehensive moral and natural laws, but does not intervene in human affairs to miracles or supernatural revelation. So he's in between
deism and pantheism. And pantheism is the doctrine that God is the transcendent reality of which the material universe and human beings are only manifestations in involves the denial of God's personality and expresses a tendency to identify God and nature. So he believes that sounds like there's some sort of spiritual thing out there, but not necessarily a specific religion. So very, very deep, deep stuff. And if we had more time, we could delve into
it more. For now, of course, you can check out Jethro Tull's new album, the zealot gene on streaming or to have a physical copy on the band's website, I put in the show notes. And you can follow Jethro Tull on social media, even though he doesn't like social media, someone is running that account. So I'm on all the social media as well check out Instagram or Tiktok. For short clips, go to my YouTube and subscribe. You can check out all the full interviews, they're on the
playlists. And thank you so much for listening watching. Thank you to Ian and his publicist for making this interview happen. And I hope you all have a great rest of your day and remember to shoot for the moon