Review of Marillion's Fugazi

Released 1984

"The thief of baghdad hides in islingtown now, praying
deportation for his sacred cow. A legacy of romance from a twilight world. The dowry of a relative mystery girl."

Having spent many hours rooting around in second hand record shops for albums released when I was but a child, it was something of a novelty to look forwards to Marillion's second album hitting the shops. Marillion were despised and ridiculed by the mainstream music press, famously derided as unoriginal Genesis wannabees with little talent beyond mimicry. However Script For a Jester's Tear sold very well, leading to their lengthy residency at the Marquee Club and a strong reputation as a formidable (if not overtly pretentious) live band on the wider circuit. Opening the Reading Festival in 1983 with a circa twenty minute version of the (at the time) unreleased Grendel, a vast sprawling epic with a huge nod to Supper's Ready, displayed levels of indulgence not seen for many years on stage.

It was highly enjoyable to follow current exponents of prog rock sensibilities in the face of bemusement from the majority of my contemporaries.

The review of Fugazi in Kerrang! wasn't as emphatic as their first album. In fact it wasn't particularly kind at all, quoting 'difficult second album syndrome' and questioning their subsequent appeal and staying power. I saw this as puff and bluster: a band couldn't fall so awfully from grace in the course of a couple of years and a couple of albums, surely.

I was impressed that the same artist had been employed for the cover of this second album providing a strong sense of continuity; there was a theme of isolation common to both albums - the 'bed-sit' land referred to in Chelsea Monday on the first album was present once more. A bedraggled figure with more than a passing resemblance to Fish lay sprawled on a bed amidst much chaotic detritus. The jesters outfit was in evidence, as were other familiar motifs: the rainbow and the crow. LP's by Pink Floyd and Peter Hammill lay scattered on the floor as unambiguous acknowledgements of the tortured soul's heritage. This wasn't going to be a fun record clearly.

Having recently seen Apocalypse Now, I was impressed by the (almost) direct lifting of part of the lyric of Assassing from the film. I was less impressed by the drum sound; it was very much rooted in the general trend of more popular music in the mid-eighties; the drums were bought much further forward in the mix and much less subtle than I would have expected. Hmmm, a rocky start.

I wasn't taken too much by the next two tracks either. Both were very light, had pop inflections being quite insubstantial and very much at odds with much of the first album. The primary instrument in evidence was Fish's voice. His cynical invective was taking on the role of the doomed adolescent poet, very much the tragic jester.

Having spent most of this first listen wearing an unfortunate frown, I realised with Emerald Lies and She Chameleon that something was creeping up on me, raising the hairs on the back of my neck. There was a 'coldness' and a clarity to the production that was in perfect harmony to the anguish of Fish's words. Whereas the first album was often quite lush and ornate, there was pain and pity echoed by a more sparse but symphonic guitar sound; providing a terrible tapestry of aching and pleading, which slowly drew me in.

This was an album which you would switch off if your parents walked in; so personal and indulgent and self pitying and yet so tangibly desperate and brilliant in it's execution, you couldn't possibly justify or identify with it's pomposity and misery. And yet, to hide beneath the headphones, safe from the world, wallowing in it utterly, was, what we now call a guilty pleasure.