Thick as a Brick began as a joke — a deliberate parody of the concept album, credited to an eight-year-old poet who never existed — and ended as one of the greatest progressive records ever made. Released in 1972, a single unbroken piece of music wrapped in a fake newspaper, it went to number one in America.

The short version

Thick as a Brick (1972) is the fifth studio album by Jethro Tull, recorded at Morgan Studios and produced by Ian Anderson. It consists of one continuous composition of some forty-three minutes, divided in two only because a vinyl record has two sides. The line-up is Anderson, Martin Barre, John Evan, Jeffrey Hammond-Hammond and new drummer Barriemore Barlow. Its sleeve is a twelve-page mock local newspaper, and it topped the American chart.

A joke taken seriously

Aqualung had been called a concept album everywhere except by the man who wrote it. Ian Anderson’s response was mischievous: if the world wanted a concept album, he would take the idea to an absurd degree. The lyrics were credited to himself and to Gerald Bostock, a fictitious eight-year-old prodigy stripped of a poetry prize after using unsuitable language on television. His disqualified poem, printed inside the sleeve, is the album’s text. The music came together at extraordinary speed: Anderson wrote a new section each day, brought it to the rehearsal room, and the band built it onto what they had done the day before. Recording took about a fortnight. The cover, Anderson likes to point out, took longer than the record.

The sound

This is the first Jethro Tull album that is progressive rock from beginning to end. Themes appear, submerge and resurface across forty-three minutes; time signatures shift without warning; acoustic pastoral gives way to hard rock riffing and back again. Ian Anderson plays flute, acoustic guitar, violin, saxophone and trumpet; Martin Barre answers on electric guitar and, remarkably, lute; John Evan moves between organ, piano and harpsichord. Jeffrey Hammond-Hammond’s bass is nimble and funky, and Barriemore Barlow, arriving on his first Tull record, drums with a fluency and force the band had never had. Dee Palmer’s orchestral passage adds a final touch of grandeur.

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The songs

There is only one song, and it is the album. It opens on an acoustic guitar figure and Anderson’s wry, conversational vocal, the flute dancing lightly behind, before the band crash in and the piece begins its long, restless journey. There are marches, funk workouts, medieval interludes, drum solos, whistling wind and returning refrains, and the same melodic material keeps circling back transformed. The second side opens on a line that echoes the first, and the whole thing closes exactly where it began. Later reissues broke it into named sections for convenience, but it was conceived, and should be heard, whole.

Reception and legacy

Critics in 1972 were divided; some suspected Anderson had grown too pleased with himself to notice the joke had escaped. Everyone else bought it. Thick as a Brick went to number one in the United States, reached the Top 5 at home, and remains among the most admired albums of the genre: Rolling Stone ranked it seventh among the fifty greatest progressive records, and the readers of Prog magazine placed it fifth. The mock newspaper, complete with crosswords that buyers dutifully filled in, is now almost impossible to find intact. Forty years on, Anderson revisited his invented poet on a sequel album, imagining what became of Gerald Bostock.

The verdict

Thick as a Brick is essential Jethro Tull and essential progressive rock, and one of the few side-long epics that genuinely justifies its length. It is funny where the genre is usually solemn, melodic where it is often merely clever, and it rewards the attention it demands. Come for the famous opening minutes, stay for the whole forty-three, and hear five musicians build a monument to something they were trying to send up. The joke is on everybody, and the album is magnificent.

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