Jethro Tull - BBC Sessions, Volume 4: In Concert, Madison Square Garden, New York City, 10-9-1978

Here's another album of Jethro Tull performing for the BBC. Like Volume 3, it's a BBC concert.

I didn't previously post this because most of it has been officially released as the album "Live at Madison Square Garden 1978." But then I thought what the hell, I want to present a full version of all the good stuff the band did for the BBC, and this is still from the band's best years. Besides, some songs from this concert were not included on the official live album, but I have them here.

Earlier in the year, the band released the album "Heavy Horses." The year before that, they released the album "Songs from the Wood." If you look at the crowd-sourced rateyourmusic.com, those are two out of the band's three best rated albums of their career (at least as I write this in 2025). So the band was doing great at the time. Their fortunes would decline in the early 1980s, however.

Although most of this on the official album, a couple of songs are not: "Pibroch (Cap in Hand)" and "A Single Man." They probably weren't included due to space limits of CDs. The official album without them is 78 minutes long, which is about as long as CDs get. This version is from a bootleg, but in terms of sound quality, it essentially sounds exactly as good as official live album.

At the time, only part of the concert was broadcast by the BBC, for the TV show "The Old Grey Whistle Test" instead of for radio. About 50 minutes was included on the TV version, from "Heavy Horses" through "The Dambusters March." Before "Locomotive Breath," lead singer Ian Anderson announced that the concert was almost over, saying "See you again next year." I thought that was odd, given that a fair number of songs were played after that. But then I realized he must have known how long the BBC broadcast portion would last, and he was saying that for people watching on TV. A couple of songs later, he told the audience to relax, that the broadcast was over.

This album is an hour and 14 minutes long.

01 Sweet Dream Fanfare [Instrumental] (Jethro Tull)
02 Sweet Dream (Jethro Tull)
03 One Brown Mouse (Jethro Tull)
04 Heavy Horses (Jethro Tull)
05 talk (Jethro Tull)
06 Thick as a Brick (Jethro Tull)
07 No Lullaby (Jethro Tull)
08 Pibroch [Cap in Hand] - Songs from the Wood (Jethro Tull)
09 Quatrain [Instrumental] (Jethro Tull)
10 Aqualung (Jethro Tull)
11 talk (Jethro Tull)
12 Locomotive Breath (Jethro Tull)
13 The Dambusters March [Instrumental] (Jethro Tull)
14 A Single Man (Jethro Tull)
15 talk (Jethro Tull)
16 Too Old to Rock 'n' Roll, Too Young to Die (Jethro Tull)
17 talk (Jethro Tull)
18 My God (Jethro Tull)
19 Cross-Eyed Mary (Jethro Tull)

https://bestfile.io/en/slAa9gLAKRXFCsP/file

The cover photo of lead singer is from Madison Square Garden in 1978. But I'm not sure if it's from this exact concert, since the band played there three times in October.