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Rating:
The moment came to follow up the beautiful "Songs From The Wood", and Jethro Tull decided to continue down the path they had just embarked upon. In 1978, "Heavy Horses" was released, with a strong folk backbone, where sudden bursts of the band's typical hard rock and acoustic touches worthy of their best years flare up. Perhaps a tad below its predecessor, it is nonetheless a beautiful and very rich work.
The first track, "...And The Mouse Never Sleeps", is characterized by a very effective flute riff and a very tight rhythm culminating in an obsessive chorus. A cough, and here opens up the green England, in all its rural spaces: Ian Anderson's mandolin takes us into "Acres Wild", where the singer expresses his feeling of "omnipotence" ("I'll make love to you in all good places"), a concept that already appeared in "Minstrel In The Gallery", in the concluding "Grace".
Another change of register for what might be the hardest song in the work, "No Lullaby": Barre's guitar captures very well the unrest of the lyrics... "Keep your eyes open"! It is followed by a very diverse trio, of rare quality: the beautiful "Moths", with very incisive flute and guitar; "Journeyman", a properly Tullian track, more straightforward and less immediate than the previous, but of great charm (highlighted by Glascock's bass); "Rover", more catchy and ironic.
After the white duck, we get the brown mouse. And what a mouse!! "One Brown Mouse" is one of the best tracks on the LP, with great rural beauty, Evan's keyboards, and, in my opinion, a beautiful singing. A worthy prelude to what will come. "Heavy Horses", the title track, opens with another spot-on riff by Barre and bursts into a wonderful and poetic voice-piano dialectic, until the powerful chorus ("Heavy horses, move the land under me"). Then a violin opening (the guest is Darryl Way, yes, or maybe still, I don't know, from Curved Air) gives chills and leads to the grand finale. Fantastic. It closes with "Weathercock", beautiful in its arrangement (important is the contribution of the sixth Tull, David Palmer, who was still a man at the time) and in its progress driven by the skilled Barlow's drumming.
I know I haven't delved much into the album’s themes, but I honestly don't think I'm capable, Anderson's English is certainly not mine. I'll end with some advice: if you decide to buy this jewel, go for the remastered edition, with the two bonus tracks, "Living In These Hard Times" (one of the most complex lyrics in history: "You know what you like, and you like what you know: but there’s no jam for the tea"... wow!!) and especially the absurdly beautiful "Broadford Bazaar", acoustic and with a whistle that sends shivers down your spine.
Great Tull, as always.
Tracklist Lyrics and Videos
02 Acres Wild (03:25)
I'll make love to you in all good places -
Under black mountains, in open spaces.
By deep brown rivers that slither darkly,
Through far marches where the blue hare races.
Come with me to the Winged Isle -
Northern father's western child.
Where the dance of ages is playing still
Through far marches of acres wild.
I'll make love to you in narrow side streets,
With shuttered windows, and crumbling chimneys.
Come with me to the weary town -
Discos silent under tiles
That slide from roof-tops, scatter softly
On concrete marches of acres wild.
By red bricks pointed with cement fingers
Flaking damply from sagging shoulders.
Come with me to the Winged Isle -
Northern father's western child.
Where the dance of ages is playing still
Through far marches of acres wild
03 No Lullaby (07:55)
Keep your eyes open and prick up your ears,
Rehearse your loudest cry.
There's folk out there who would do you harm
So I'll sing you no lullaby.
There's a lock on the window, there's a chain on the door,
And a big dog in the hall.
But there's dragons and beasties out there in the night
To snatch you if you fall.
So come out fighting with your rattle in hand, thrust and parry. Light
A match to catch the devil's eye, bring a cross of fire to the fight.
And let no sleep bring false relief from the tension of the fray.
Come wake the dead with the scream of life, do battle with ghosts at play.
And gather your toys at the call-to-arms and swing your big bear down
Upon our necks when we come to set you sleeping safe and sound.
It's as well we tell no lie to chase the face that cries.
And little birds can't fly so keep an open eye.
It's as well we tell no lie, so I'll sing you no lullaby.
It's as well we tell no lie to chase the face that cries.
And little birds can't fly so keep an open eye.
It's as well we tell no lie, so I'll sing you no lullaby.
Keep your eyes open and prick up your ears,
Rehearse your loudest cry.
There's folk out there who would do you harm
So I'll sing you no lullaby.
There's a lock on the window, there's a chain on the door,
And a big dog in the hall.
But there's dragons and beasties out there in the night
To snatch you if you fall.
So come out fighting with your rattle in hand, thrust and parry. Light
A match to catch the devil's eye, bring a cross of fire to the fight.
And let no sleep bring false relief from the tension of the fray.
Come wake the dead with the scream of life, do battle with ghosts at play.
And gather your toys at the call-to-arms and swing your big bear down.
Upon our necks when we come to set you sleeping safe and sound.
It's as well we tell no lie to chase the face that cries.
And little birds can't fly so keep an open eye.
It's as well we tell no lie, so I'll sing you no lullaby.
04 Moths (03:27)
Oh the leaded window opened
but you moved the dancing candle flame
and the first moths of summer
suicidal came, oh suicidal came.
And the new breeze chattered
in its May-bud tenderness
sending water-lilies sailing
as she turned to get undressed.
And the long night awakened
and we soared on powdered wings
circling our tomorrows
in the wary month of spring.
Chasing shadows slipping
in the magic lantern's light -
creatures of the candle
on the night's light's rite.
Dipping and weaving, flutter
through the golden needle`s eye
in our haystack madness, butterfly stroking
on a spring-tide high.
Life`s too long (as the lemmings said)
as the candle burned and the moths were wed.
And we`ll all burn together as the wick grows higher
before the candle`s dead.
Oh the leaded window opened
but you moved the dancing candle flame.
And the first moths of summer
suicidal came, oh suicidal came,
to join in the worship
of the light that never dies
in the moments reflection
of two moths spinning in her eyes.
05 Journeyman (03:57)
Spine-tingling railway sleepers ---
Sleepy houses lying four-square and firm
Orange beams divide the darkness
Rumbling fit to turn the waking worm.
Sliding through Victorian tunnels
where green moss oozes from the pores.
Dull echoes from the wet embankments
Battlefield allotments. Fresh open sores.
In late night commuter madness
Double-locked black briefcase on the floor
like a faithful dog with master
sleeping in the draught beside the carriage door.
To each Journeyman his own home-coming
Cold supper nearing with each station stop
Frosty flakes on empty platforms
Fireside slippers waiting. Flip. Flop.
Journeyman night-tripping on the late fantasic
Too late to stop for tea at Gerard's Cross
and hear the soft shoes on the footbridge shuffle
as the wheels turn biting on the midnight frost.
On the late commuter special
Carriage lights that flicker, fade and die
Howling into hollow blackness
Dusky diesel shudders in full cry.
Down redundant morning papers
Abandon crosswords with a cough
Stationmaster in his wisdom
told the guard to turn the heating off.
06 Rover (04:16)
I chase your every footstep
and I follow every whim.
When you call the tune I'm ready
to strike up the battle hymn.
My lady of the meadows ---
My comber of the beach ---
You've thrown the stick for your dog's trick
but it's floating out of reach.
The long road is a rainbow and the pot of gold lies there.
So slip the chain and I'm off again ---
You'll find me everywhere. I'm a Rover.
As the robin craves the summer
to hide his smock of red,
I need the pillow of your hair
in which to hide my head.
I'm simple in my sadness,
resourceful in remorse.
Then I'm down straining at the lead ---
holding on a windward course.
Strip me from the bundle
of balloons at every fair:
colourful and carefree ---
Designed to make you stare.
But I'm lost and I'm losing
the thread that holds me down.
And I'm up hot and rising
in the lights of every town.
08 Heavy Horses (08:59)
Iron-clad feather-feet pounding the dust
An October's day, towards evening
Sweat embossed veins standing proud to the plough
Salt on a deep chest seasoning
Last of the line at an honest day's toil
Turning the deep sod under
Flint at the fetlock, chasing the bone
Flies at the nostrils plunder.
The Suffolk, the Clydesdale, the Percheron vie
with the Shire on his feathers floating
Hauling soft timber into the dusk
to bed on a warm straw coating.
Heavy Horses, move the land under me
Behind the plough gliding --- slipping and sliding free
Now you're down to the few
And there's no work to do
The tractor's on its way.
Let me find you a filly for your proud stallion seed
to keep the old line going.
And we'll stand you abreast at the back of the wood
behind the young trees growing
To hide you from eyes that mock at your girth,
and your eighteen hands at the shoulder
And one day when the oil barons have all dripped dry
and the nights are seen to draw colder
They'll beg for your strength, your gentle power
your noble grace and your bearing
And you'll strain once again to the sound of the gulls
in the wake of the deep plough, sharing.
Standing like tanks on the brow of the hill
Up into the cold wind facing
In stiff battle harness, chained to the world
Against the low sun racing
Bring me a wheel of oaken wood
A rein of polished leather
A Heavy Horse and a tumbling sky
Brewing heavy weather.
Bring a song for the evening
Clean brass to flash the dawn
across these acres glistening
like dew on a carpet lawn
In these dark towns folk lie sleeping
as the heavy horses thunder by
to wake the dying city
with the living horseman's cry
At once the old hands quicken ---
bring pick and wisp and curry comb ---
thrill to the sound of all
the heavy horses coming home.
09 Weathercock (04:02)
Good morning Weathercock,
How'd you fare last night?
Did the cold wind bite you,
Did you face up to the fright
When the leaves spin from October
And whip around your tail?
Did you shake from the blast,
And did you shiver through the gale?
Give us direction, the best of goodwill,
Put us in touch with fair winds.
Sing to us softly, hum evening's song,
Tell us what the blacksmith has done for you.
Do you simply reflect changes
In the patterns of the sky,
Or is it true to say the weather heeds
The twinkle in your eye?
Do you fight the rush of winter,
And hold snowflakes at bay?
Do you lift the dawn sun from the fields
And help him on his way?
Good morning Weathercock, make this day bright.
Put us in touch with your fair winds.
Sing to us softly, hum evening's song.
Point the way to better days we can share with you.
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