Jethro Tull are an English rock band formed in Luton, England, in 1967. Initially playing blues rock and jazz fusion, the band soon incorporated elements of English folk, hard rock and classical music, forging a signature progressive rock sound. The group’s bandleader, founder, principal composer and only constant member is Ian Anderson, a multi-instrumentalist who mainly plays flute and acoustic guitar and is also the lead vocalist. The group has featured a succession of musicians throughout the decades, including significant contributors such as electric guitarist Martin Barre ; keyboardists John Evan, Dee Palmer, Peter-John Vettese and Andrew Giddings; drummers Clive Bunker, Barrie “Barriemore” Barlow and Doane Perry; and bassists Glenn Cornick, Jeffrey Hammond, John Glascock, Dave Pegg and Jonathan Noyce. The band achieved moderate recognition in the London club scene and released their debut album, This Was, in 1968. After a line-up change which saw original guitarist Mick Abrahams replaced by Martin Barre, the band released a folk-tinged second album, Stand Up, in 1969. Stand Up, which reached No. 1 in the UK, gave the band their first commercial success, and regular tours of the UK and the US followed. Musical style shifted in the direction of progressive rock with the albums Aqualung , Thick as a Brick , and A Passion Play , and shifted again to contemporary folk rock with Songs from the Wood , Heavy Horses , and Stormwatch . In the early 1980s, the band underwent a major line-up change and moved into electronic rock with the albums A , The Broadsword and the Beast , and Under Wraps . The band won their sole Grammy Award for the 1987 album Crest of a Knave, which saw them returning to a hard rock style. Jethro Tull have sold an estimated 60 million albums worldwide, with 11 gold and five platinum albums. They have been described by Rolling Stone as “one of the most commercially successful and eccentric progressive rock bands.“Their last works as a group to contain new material prior to their hiatus were J-Tull Dot Com and a Christmas album in 2003, although the band continued to tour until 2011. Both Anderson and Barre have continued to record and tour as solo artists. Anderson said in 2014 that Jethro Tull had come “more or less to an end”. The current group, now billed as “Ian Anderson and the Jethro Tull Band”, includes musicians who were part of Jethro Tull during the last years of its initial run as well as newer musicians associated with Anderson’s solo band, without Barre’s involvement. Jethro Tull released The Zealot Gene in 2022 following a gap of 19 years, and released their 23rd album, RökFlöte, in April 2023.
