Invisible Brand

Three decades after its definitive hit ‘Living in the Past’, Jethro Tull is still pulling in big audiences on tours throughout the world. Flute-playing lead man Ian Anderson and lead guitarist Martin Barre are the mainstay talents in a band that has sold in excess of 50 million albums. IB Editor Steve Chipperfield interviews Martin Barre to find out what today’s marketers can learn from the Jethro Tull experience. Amongst other things, he discovers there’s a passion for the product and a huge respect for the customer behind the band’s enduring success.

Martin, can we start with a few basics. How long has JethroTull been going, how many albums have you recorded, how many gigs have you performed?
Believe it or not, we’re in our 36th year. Albums…hmmm…more than forty I think.

And gigs?
No idea. Let me think a moment (scratches at beard, puzzles and reflects)… must be approaching 4,000. God!

I’m interested in the brand image and identity. Let’s start with the name – how did you settle on JethroTull?
MB: (laughs) Not very scientifically. In the early days we used bookers to get us our gigs. If we didn’t go down well they’d try and book us again under a different name. Jethro Tull was the first one to gain a rebooking, so that was it.

And the visual identity – your logo – have you managed that carefully over the years?
Not really, although we have certainly changed it. You have to move on, to refresh everything from time to time.

It seems to me you have an iconic identity too – the image of Ian Anderson standing on one leg playing the flute?
Yes. It has some limitations, but it works for us in the same way that you know the green circle up ahead will probably turn out to be a BP station.

Did you make a conscious decision from the outset to differentiate yourselves musically, or in other ways, from the rest of the rock scene?
Yes, when we started there were loads of blues bands all playing the same stuff and it was obvious that most would not make it.We wanted to draw on a lot of influences and refused to stay with one specific area of music – that may have made it harder to identify with us but, on the other hand, the use of the flute was a novelty that undoubtedly worked both sonically and visually.

And what about in the way you packaged and presented yourselves?
We worked incredibly hard on every aspect of our act.We were one of the first bands to discover the importance of packaging the product, of concept albums. ‘Thick as a Brick’ (1972) has been cited as one of the most important album covers in pop history.We staged over-the-top shows with pyrotechnics, huge production budgets, back projection and so on.That’s all a given now but it hadn’t been done before.

Over the years, how much have you relied on managers and promoters for the success of the band, and how much upon yourselves?
In the early days we were signed to Chrysalis. But we soon realised that an external manager can’t work; it’s an intrusion.To be effective, a manager needs to be part of the band, part of the music.We also realised that we had more experience than a lot of the people who went into management.There’s so much idiotic wastage in the music industry – we could never hope to be viable as a band or a business if we went about things the way they do. So we do everything – and I mean absolutely everything – ourselves to get it right.There’s no great mystery about it; it’s mostly common sense and hard work.
What’s coming across is a very strong set of beliefs or values about your product – what are they?
Musicality is at the heart of what we do and we do that as well as we can. (Laughs) But we don’t get too earnest about it, not in public. In part, our stage act was designed to send up the pretentiousness of so much rock and pop. We originally saw ourselves as rock meets Monty Python.We don’t just perform to our audiences; our act is all about involving them and creating rapport.We have a great affection and respect for our audiences and we believe they deserve the best we can give them. You obviously care a great deal about the quality of the musical product. How do you ensure its consistency when so many band members – you and Ian excepted – have come and gone over the years? (Shrugs) You just work at it.We put in the hours until we know it’s right.

At what point did it occur to you that Tull had gone beyond being just another band – was becoming some kind of brand or institution?
Only with hindsight.We were working so flat out we were completely unaware that we had become, well according to Rolling Stone anyway, one of the top touring bands in the world. Looking back now at us playing Shea Stadium and Madison Square Gardens I can see we had arrived in some way. Fortunately none of us realised it at the time or it would probably have derailed us.

I’m not quite sure how to put this but…sex is a huge brand ingredient in music today. Can a mature band like JethroTull continue to project sex, or sexual energy, as part of its appeal?
(Laughs out loud)What, picturing the waist lines and hairlines (the others’ of course, not mine)? No! The way the audience perceives you, well us, they’re not looking at you, but at what you’re doing. It’s the power of music that’s amazing, the power to create sadness or excitement; maybe that can be confused with sexuality.

How much of your brand appeal lies in the music and how much in the act?
They’re indivisible really. It’s certainly the entertainment, the involvement as well as the music. Believe it or not, some people will come to 20 or 30 shows in one tour. I think they need to get out more, but we’re very grateful to them.

Let’s talk about the generational aspects of what you do – how much do you set out to refresh your product to appeal to new and younger audiences?
You have to refresh your act all the time, it never stops; there’s a new generation every ten years.We haven’t set out specifically to woo young audiences – they tend to come to us.
Sometimes it’s because their parents are fans who bring them to a gig, or the kids have found our music at home and like it. Sometimes it’s because we provide a link to classic bands they’re into anyway, like Zeppelin and Hendrix.

How important is the generational issue at gigs? Are you resigned to playing the golden oldies?
Not resigned to it but you have to keep in mind that the younger audiences are more interested in hearing us perform, say Aqualung, than the old ones who’ve heard it loads of times.We tend to play about a third new material, a third classic tracks and a third mid period.

Have you tried to define your music more narrowly as time has gone on?
We think very hard about what we play but we’re still eclectic because we have a relationship with our core audience that allows us lots of room to manoeuvre.They like us and trust us enough to let us try new things.
Can we turn to the business management side of things? Who looks after the Jethro Tull brand? How do you take commercial decisions?
Ian (Anderson) and I run the business side. There is a big commercial imperative – has to be or we wouldn’t still be around.We aim to play to the largest and most diverse audiences and to offer very good quality in every way. So we design and organise the production of all our own merchandise.When we travel to the third world, South America, for example, we keep ticket prices as low as we possibly can and we do the same with merchandise. In the States and Europe audiences are more affluent and this gives us the financial base to enjoy the fun of playing, say, India or China.

How important is it to maintain communication with your fans?
Hugely so.We have a long standing tradition that we make ourselves as accessible as possible. Obviously the website is an important ingredient but we attend fan club conventions, do meetand- greets after the shows and always make ourselves available to sign autographs.As I’ve said before, we have huge respect for our fans – Your customers Exactly.

How do you define your core audience?
(Thinking aloud) In the UK they’re middle class…white wine drinkers…go to an expensive restaurant every two weeks.They like a wide range of music…listen to Radio 2 and Classic FM…listen to CDs at home…don’t go to many concerts. In the States? Younger…go to a lot more gigs…less conservative.

Does that mean, as an international brand if you like, you need to flex your act for the local market?
Not at all, no. Englishness is a very strong ingredient in what we are – not just in the States, but even in the Far East.You have to remember too, there are no geographical boundaries in music these days – it really is a global market. It would be a mistake to present ourselves as anything other than what we are.

This might be a test of band or brand: do you think JethroTull might continue in the future without any of the current line-up?
Yes, I could certainly see that.We are a very distinctive act and, so long as the performers have the necessary musicianship and the ability to interact with the audiences, why not? What would you say are the key things you’ve done right – that have helped you to stay successful for so long? Being receptive to what people want from you. You have to listen; you need to be very aware of what people want from you and learn from your mistakes, even the smallest things. (Reflects) Especially the small things.

And what have you learned from your mistakes?
The worst thing, I suppose, was trying to follow a trend, back in the eighties, we didn’t really believe in. Everything was synthed for a while and we tried it too. People hated it. Everlasting music has to be created by real people, with real instruments.

To round things off, what lessons might a modern service business learn from the long term success of JethroTull?
(Wry look at SC) I’m not a visiting business professor, I’m a guitarist. All I can say is – stay in control of things you want done well.Work hard and take nothing for granted and never be complacent.Always try to improve on what you do and to give your audience more next year than you did last year.When you’ve done that, then at least you know you’ve done everything that’s in your control…if that doesn’t work, you just to have to accept that life’s finally moved on, I guess.