Thick as a Brick

On Thick as a Brick, released 3 March 1972, Jethro Tull took a pot shot at the very concept of the “concept album” and accidentally crafted one of the most defining progressive rock statements of the decade. Designed as an elaborate spoof, the album masquerades as a musical interpretation of an epic poem written by eight-year-old fictional prodigy Gerald Bostock. What unfolds instead is a dense, whimsical, and astonishingly coherent 40-plus minute suite that wraps satire, musicianship, and theatrical excess into one LP-length opus.

Recorded in late 1971, the band approached the album less like traditional songwriters and more like absurdist architects, stitching together disparate segments into one continuous narrative flow. Ian Anderson, inspired by Monty Python and infuriated by critics labelling Aqualung a concept album, leant hard into parody, yet the music is anything but throwaway. Switching time signatures like socks, Thick as a Brick channels everything from baroque folk to symphonic hard rock. Flutes flutter above harpsichords, guitars duel with glockenspiels, and organ swells bleed into martial drum rolls. Somehow, it all works.

While the original UK release came wrapped in a fake newspaper, complete with articles on poetry scandal and small-town scandal. It’s the album’s ambition that earned its cult status. Initially misunderstood, it has aged into a holy grail for prog disciples. What began as a clever pastiche now stands shoulder-to-shoulder with the very records it set out to lampoon. Not many concept albums can say that.