Jethro Tull – «Жақсылықтың шыңы» альбомы туралы

Crest of a Knave is the sixteenth studio album by British rock band Jethro Tull, released in 1987. The album was recorded after a three year hiatus caused by a throat infection of vocalist Ian Anderson, resulting in his changed singing style. Following the unsuccessful electronic rock album Under Wraps, Crest of a Knave had the band returning to a more hard rock sound. The album was their most successful since the 1970s and the band enjoyed a resurgence on radio broadcasts, appearances in MTV specials and the airing of music videos. It was also a critical success, winning the 1989 Grammy Award for Best Hard Rock/Metal Performance Vocal or Instrumental in what was widely viewed as an upset over the favorite, Metallica's And Justice for All. The album was supported by "The Not Quite the World, More the Here and There Tour".

Even though Doane Perry had been a member of Jethro Tull since 1984, he only appears on two tracks, with Gerry Conway, who had played on the 1982 album The Broadsword and the Beast, playing on four. The remaining three tracks feature a drum machine. Keyboardist Peter John Vettese had left the band in 1986, and Ian Anderson contributed the synth programming. The album sleeve only lists Anderson, Martin Barre and Dave Pegg as band members. Barre remembers this production as being "the album where a lot of things were of my invention. There are still chunks of the music where lan very much knew what he wanted, but I think my input was far greater on that album than on any other". The cover was designed by heraldic artist Andrew Stewart Jamieson. The single "Steel Monkey" had the cover designed by art director John Pasche. This album was released simultaneously on LP and on CD, but the vinyl edition did not feature the songs "Dogs in the Midwinter" and "The Waking Edge". Both tracks appeared on vinyl as B sides to the singles. The album back cover shows in the credits that the album was "Recorded just round the corner from the kitchen in the room behind the door which used to be painted white but isn't any more". And also: "Martin would like to thank Paul Hamer (Hamer Guitars). Ian and Dave would like to thank almost everybody else."

The album relied more heavily on Martin Barre's electric guitar than the band had since the 1970s. The style of Crest has been compared to that of Dire Straits, in part because Anderson no longer had the vocal range he once possessed (the result of recent throat surgery). Ian Anderson later stated about the musical style of the album: "'Steel Monkey' was based around a sequencer riff, and it didn't have any flute in it. So it was yet another atypical Jethro Tull song that was a radio hit. By comparison, both 'Farm On The Freeway' and 'Budapest' are very typical Tull songs. 'Budapest' is the kind of song I like to write because it embodies a lot of different nuances which I think are subtly joined together. It sort of moves from classical to slightly bluesy to folk, and it just slips between them and you don't see the stitching."

Crest of a Knave explores various themes in its lyrics, as Anderson often does. The song "She Said She Was a Dancer" shows that Tull's frank treatment of sexuality was unabated. The album contains the popular live song "Budapest", which depicts a backstage scene with a shy local female stagehand. "Farm on the Freeway" on the other hand profiles a farmer who has lost his land through eminent domain, and who now possesses only his truck. "Mountain Men" became more famous in Europe, depicting a scene from World War II in Africa and the Falklands War. Ian Anderson referred to the battles of El Alamein (WW II) and also South America (1982), drawing historic parallels of the angst that women left behind by their warrior husbands might have felt.