Order the latest issue of Uncut online and have it sent to your home! Originally published in Uncut's March 2018 issue of Uncut “Jeffrey just looked the part,” remembers Ian Anderson today. “He always had that rather enigmatic, strange, slightly detached, rather arty aspiration. There was so...
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ELLIS: I remember being on the set while the were doing the recording, and Ian rushing over with Mick Jagger in tow, and them sitting down with me, and Mick saying, “We’re gonna take the whole thing on the road, and do a concert tour with all the bands, and we want Tull to be involved.” I said, “Sounds great”, but it never happened.
BUNKER: After the Circus, Tony phoned me up and said, “Do you wanna come and see my band?” They were called Earth. I went to see them, and there was this banner behind the stage that said, ‘Ex-Jethro Tull guitar player, Tony Iommi’ – I thought that was brilliant! [laughs] That was just before they turned into Sabbath.
ANDERSON: I think we played “Jeffrey” onstage a few times back then, but it was long forgotten for many, many years.
HAMMOND: I can’t recall playing “Jeffrey” – I think that it would have had to have been sometime in 1970 or ’71 if we did so.
ANDERSON: Of course, Jeffrey got a couple more songs along the way which mentioned his name. But they’re not really songs about Jeffrey – when you’re coming up with characters and ideas, it’s a very painterly thing. Putting people into a landscape is more interesting than simply portraiture or landscape painting. I like context with people, I like to put people in a place where they can interact, a context that explains a little about them. And though “A Song For Jeffrey” is lyrically simplistic and not one of my finest moments, it has a directness. From 1970, Jeffrey enjoyed five glorious years of playing with Jethro Tull, but he knew he didn’t belong in that world, so he went back to being a solitary painter. He finally held the first exhibition of his work, just recently in a gallery in Lytham St Annes. All these years later, finally, he came out and said, “I’ve been doing a bit of painting!”
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FACTFILE
Written by: Ian Anderson
Performers: Ian Anderson (vocals, flute, harmonica), Mick Abrahams (guitar), Clive Bunker (drums), Glenn Cornick (bass)
Produced by: Terry Ellis and Jethro Tull
Recorded at: Sound Techniques, Chelsea, London
Released: Late 1968
Charts: UK – / US –
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TIMELINE
1963
Anderson, Hammond and John Evan form The Blades in Blackpool
1967
Anderson moves down to London, and Jethro Tull are formed in December
June 1968
The quartet enter Sound Techniques studio to record their debut album, This Was, released in October
1970
Jeffrey Hammond joins Tull as bassist
