Grilling Season Opens

As a wrap up to an already-event filled yesterday, we hauled the grill out and cooked up some sausages, peppers, onions, and mushrooms. Thus, the grilling season has officially begun.

Dinner was served in the backyard.

Deb's hammock was set up, and while I was lounging there after dinner, an eagle - or possibly a very large buteo - circled the skies above me.

To finish off our Earth Day celebration, Justin and I planted a Tiarella wherryi (Wherry's Foamflower - Google image search) down in Bank Island, along the driveway.

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As Earth Day is actually today, we may spend some time putting down some organic fertilizer for the lawn, or perhaps just lounging around in the hammock.

Recently Heard: Bursting Out

Bursting Out: Jethro Tull Live

And yet another live album from the guy who allegedly doesn't like live albums. I had this on tape, and pretty much wore it out. In fact, I think that tape was the first Tull recording that I owned. The mixture of both broad musical textures - rock at one moment, folk at the next - and instruments - distorted rock guitar and glockenspiel, amongst many others - really came to help shape what I believe a band should be capable of doing. At the time I was first listening to this - and for years after - I considered a five piece band ideal: two guitars, bass, drums, and vocals. Although the need for more meaningful lyrics and more dynamics were a core concept, it would take many years before it sunk into my head that what I really wanted as far as musicians was more along the line of the multi-instrumentalist, if not the all out small orchestra.

Anyway, listening to this on disc the other night, lying back on my bed, brought back memories of listening to the tape, something I did, for the most part, while lying on my bed. There are a number of favorite Tull tunes on here, both those that get radio airplay and others which I was introduced to with this recording. Jack in the Green is probably my favorite Tull tune of all time (although two tunes not on this album - Cold Wind to Valhalla and Dun Ringill - often battle for that first place). Skating Away on the Thin Ice of the New Day probably single-tunedly (like handedly, except musically so) took care of the aforementioned lesson learned, as it has the entire band picking up other instruments.

My reviews generally tend to be overly positive - even when I don't like something, I try to get some good out of it, and these reviews do come out of my own collection - but I will say there is something I do not like about the spiffy new remastered edition: there's a couple of words in the stage banter that are bleeped out. I find this exceedingly annoying. You can tell what the f*cking words are, so what the h3ll benefit do you get from disrupting the d@mn thing with bleeptones? Other than that, the sound is noticeably better than I remember it being on tape. Just seems a shame to have the censorship on an album like this. Fine, if you do a Teletubbies live album and Tinky Winky starts cussing, than bleep it out - that is marketed to kids, after all. This is intended for adults. Besides, I don't even think they bleep out "bastard" and whatever else Ian said on television anymore.