Review of Marillion's Script for a Jester's Tear

Released 1983

"So here I am once more in the playground of the broken hearts"

Although my world changed forever when I first heard The Dark Side of The Moon, my main musical interest remained classic rock and what was known at the time as the NWOBHM.
With restricted access to live music in West Cornwall and not too many knowledgeable musical contemporaries to inspire me, it fell to Kerrang! magazine to provide my window on the wider outside musical world.
One week, among the usual album reviews for the likes of Saxon, Whitesnake and The Tygers of Pang, my interest was caught by a particularily enthusiastic review of Marillion's first album: Script for a Jester's Tear.
Much was made of the the similarities with Genesis, a band at who at the time were extremely popular for making non-rock based music. Photographs of the lead singer Fish in make-up and striking daring garish theatrical poses seemed at odds to the the Phil Collins modern day fronted version of Genesis I knew. I was intrigued. The review spoke of stunning musicianship, lengthy instrumental passages and referred many times to the 'golden age' of progressive rock music.
At the time this term would have meant little or nothing to me.

I was intrigued enough to seek out the album shortly afterwards. As with the first time I held my (first) copy of The Dark Side of The Moon, I was struck by the depth of detail on the gatefold sleeve, the artistic fonts and colours used and knew once more that this was a group that was trying really hard to produce something of great quality.

Being used to the standard verse, chorus, verse, chorus, bridge, versus, chorus and largely predictable lyrics of the rest of the rock bands I was listening to, reading the lyric sheet for this bizarre album reminded me of the poetry I was studying at college.

When I first played the album I was therefore quite unsure whether it would appeal to me in anyway. The title track starts slowly with accompanied vocals, with instruments joining as the pace increases and the drama escalates. I had never heard such 'naked' vocals; the singer seemed to bare his anguished soul for all to see, regardless of how vulnerable or feminine or contrived his tales. The sense of theatre, of a an event pulling the listener in to it's tortured terrible world drew me in on the very first listen.

Playing anything else in my record collection at the time (other than DSOTM) then seemed not quite right. The depth of these two records was utterly compelling, revealing layer after layer with subsequent listens, while everything else, whilst exciting and immediate felt hollow in some way.

I now had two albums linked by, by what? I wasn't sure, but I knew I wanted more.