On episode 6 of Past Prime, Matty & Steve gather their twenty-sided dice and Ren Faire costumes to revisit Jethro Tull's 1999 album slash website advertisement, "J-Tull Dot Com." Nearly thirty years after "Aqualung" and over a decade after the Heavy Metal Grammy winning, "Crest of a Knave," Ian Anderson and company returned with what would become the final Tull studio album. Our co-hosts try to unpack a band that has been simultaneously more enduring, more successful and weirder than any Rock band in music history. Over fifty years, Jethro Tull released several number one albums, many top ten albums and outsold Yes and Genesis combined. In search and in honor of the band's legacy, Matty and Steve try to find some middle-aged connection with Anderson's "Prog Flute Bangers" from 1999. Underneath the trill of the woodwind and the flash of Martin Lancelot (really his middle name) Barre's guitar, they discover a very literate songwriter, with indisputable vision and craft. As to what it all means and whether he is sincerely singing about woodland creatures, fjords and semi-feral cats, however, is beyond Matty & Steve's comprehension. They discuss whether any musician has ever "owned" an instrument the way Anderson owns the flute. They wonder what other bands are most likely to be played at Renaissance Fairs. Matty confesses that, as a teen, he assumed Jethro Tull was a man's name and that he was some sort of rail-riding, hobo genius. Steve, meanwhile was forever saddened by his experience seeing Tull live in upstate New York in the early 1990s, in a one eighth full arena. In their middle-aged search, the hosts find some grace and affection but very little insight into the meaning of Tull.

To read more about Jethro Tull's "J-Tull Dot Com" check out the full essay at Past Prime.