Most veteran musicians will eventually confront the harsh reality of no longer dwelling in the days of their youth. The notes a singer once reached with ease are now a massive strain, if accessible at all. Coming up with new songs that are anything other than thinly disguised reworks of what has come before becomes at best a chore and ofttimes an impossibility. Add to these the knowledge that their audience has long since stagnated and wishes nothing more than a nostalgic romp through the soundtrack to their glory days when they were the young lions on the prowl. The result is veteran artists being sorely tempted to tune all instruments down a half-step or more, load up the tour bus, and grab the paycheck by trotting out a show of nothing but the hits with which to satiate the faithful.

Or, you could be Ian Anderson. The singer/songwriter/flutist and unquestioned focal point for the past five decades-plus of English progressive rockers Jethro Tull could, at age 74, easily mail it in and do nothing other than perform “Aqualung” and “Thick As A Brick” for the umpteenth time whenever the mood strikes to pick up a nice paycheck. Instead, he has dusted off his band’s name after 19 years of solo work, rounded up the current assemblage of lads, and released a brimming with brio album titled The Zealot Gene.

Anderson has long been a thinking person’s rocker, laying atop his musical mix of muscular electrified English folk riffs and fondness for jagged yet melodic exploration of avant-garde musings a lyrical bent for examining life with a fusion of hard-bitten cynicism and philosophical, quiet affection for humanity’s segments that are at best ignored and far more often derided by the self-proclaimed social elite. While progressive rock itself has been out of fashion since the latter 1970s, Anderson via Jethro Tull has maintained an unwavering willingness to keep pushing forward regardless of might be clogging the pop charts this week.

On The Zealot Gene, Anderson uses various Scriptures as launching points for his lyrical observations. While not a Christian, Anderson has at least a healthy respect for the faith, thus instead of lampooning his inspirations embodies the reason why, after five centuries, the King James Version remains the world’s most-used English Bible, for it was translated not only as Scripture but also as literature with poetic lilt and grace. Back to Anderson; while at times the lyrical Scriptural origins are unmistakable, such as when a surly Old Testament God in “Mine Is the Mountain” ends His commentary with an ironic “for God’s sake leave me alone,” there is a compassionate portrait of party girls in “Sad City Sisters” that embodies Anderson’s grace-filled view.

Anderson’s voice has understandably lost much of its upper range, but there is sufficient room for fully expressive vocals even with his cautious approach. There is a stateliness in Anderson’s singing, giving the album a dignified, gentlemanly feel.

Musically, the album is vintage Tull without being Aqualung Part II. The riffs are far more often than not acoustic and chordal; while the more rock-oriented tunes are meaty, the album’s overall tenor invites reflection amid the anthems.

At an age when he could easily rest on his rock royalty laurels, Ian Anderson and Jethro Tull have produced a work worthy of sitting alongside staples of every classic rock collection such as Songs From the Wood plus the aforementioned Aqualung and Thick As A Brick. The Zealot Gene will doubtless leave an autotune-drenched current generation puzzled. But for the faithful (no pun intended), it is a welcome demonstration that Jethro Tull is nowhere near its expiration date.