Following two albums,
Thick As A Brick and
A Passion Play, featuring only two songs, one on each side side of the LP,
Warchild is a "back to the time when we had more than two tracks on a release"-album. Picking up the progressive style where they left, and even adding several elements to it, this ends up as a terrific album.
The sound and production has changed slightly, because of the different approach in the use of strings and keyboards. The keyboard has been toned down, and the string-arrangements have made their triumphant return. This gives this album a different feeling to it, and makes it a much easier album to listen to than the previous two. But the feeling and progressive sound are most definitely still there. But instead of being a long track, as on the before mentioned albums, we have 10 nice tunes, that each represents something different.
A nice mixture of odd songs like
Warchild, with its weird rythm in the chorus, to more acoustic songs like
Skating Away., with its wide use of instruments. Not that
Skating Away. is the only track where Tull uses a lot of instruments. That phenomenon occurs on almost every track. Even so, Tull never forgets that in a good rock tune, you need guitars.
Back-door Angels being an excellent example of just that. You are stunned, when this mainly acoustic track evolves into a progressive funk/rock track. From one great rock track, Tull continues in the same vein with
SeaLion. The riff in this song is easier to remember compared to many of the other songs.
As on Aqualung, the mood, tempo and not the least the style, changes on each track making it easy for the listener to fully absorb all the impressions, you undoubtedly get listening to this album. The mix between rock songs, and the mid-tempo acoustic songs, and the occasional progressive outburst, sure makes this album fun listening too.
Favorite Tracks: Back-door Angels, SeaLion, Skating Away.
Written by
Ulrick Thursday, April 3, 2003
Show all reviews by UlrickRatingsUlrick: 8.5/10Members: No members have rated this album yet.
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