Storm’s A Coming…
Jethro Tull were given their name (that of an 18th-century agriculturist) in 1967 by Dave Robson, a booker at the Ellis-Wright agency, who dealt with the young band. If they had not been booked into the Marquee club soon after this christening, Ian Anderson, who didn’t particularly like the name, reckons that it would have been changed again. But as he was the group’s frontman, the writer of almost all of their material and the one who engaged most in the business side, he himself went on to become synonymous with the name, to the extent that some people actually referred to him as Jethro Tull. In the States in the mid-70s, this was even shortened by some to the both inappropriate and rather over-familiar ‘Jet’.
Many had noted that the figure in the cover painting of Tull’s 1971 album bears more than a slight resemblance to the band’s singer, flautist and occasional guitarist, as does the depiction of Ray Lomas, the album story’s character on 1976’s . But on (1977) and (1978), Anderson was actually photographed, firstly done up to look, and then like a Victorian ostler. These bucolic images broadly reflected Anderson’s recent move to the English countryside and his practical interest in forestry and farming. He then acquired a salmon farm on the Isle of Skye.
