Marillion

Marbles is a simply mahhvelous 13th album from Marillion, a band that continues to evolve after more than 20 years. This is the second album that Marillion funded by asking their loyal fans, or "Freaks," to buy in advance of its writing and recording. Free of external pressures from the record industry, what results is an exquisite work featuring often-understated performances.

Marillion's music increasingly defies categorization, drawing freely from the band's progressive roots along with Beatle-esque melodies and jazz- and trance-inspired grooves. In songs ranging from 2-minute interludes to 12-minute suites, Steve Hogarth's expressive voice gently caresses melodies, while Steve Rothery's lyrical lead guitar passages are reminiscent of David Gilmour and Steve Hackett. And while it’s rare to single out a bass player for props, Pete Trewavas deserves special note for providing the glue and energy that allows for Marillion’s seamless genre-hopping.

Marbles would be an excellent discovery for fans of Radiohead, U2, or R.E.M.. The strong melodic elements make it Marillion's most accessible album of late, but it is also rich in subtle details. If you allow it to, it will draw you in with its warm colors and textures, then send you soaring over dynamic landscapes. - Chris Allen

Marillion surprised the European market by earning Top Ten placings in the U.K. and Holland for its single "You're Gone" in the spring of 2004, but the comeback wasn't hard to figure if you listened to the record, which found the band making like U2, with a martial beat, a sustained, repetitive guitar figure, and Steve Hogarth keening, "You are the light," in his best impression of Bono. Elsewhere, Marbles, the band's 13th studio album in 21 years, for the most part recalled not so much U2 as a more long-standing influence, Pink Floyd. From the album cover and graphics in the CD booklet, which revealed the influence of Hipgnosis, the firm that did the same work for Pink Floyd, to the lengthy closing track, "Neverland," with its echoing vocals, Marillion, a group formed in the shadow of progressive rock progenitors like Genesis and Pink Floyd demonstrated that they had no trouble continuing the tradition. Indeed, leading things off with the slow, moody 13-plus-minutes of "The Invisible Man," Hogarth showed an interest in melancholy introspection to rival anything on Pink Floyd's Wish You Were Here. The song set the album's tone, as Hogarth lamented his deterioration not so much into an invisible man as, perhaps, a ghost whose former romantic partner cannot hear or feel him. "When you stumble," he wailed, "you will stumble through me." "You're Gone," despite that heroic Edge-like guitar work, continued the moping about romantic disappointment, while "Angelina" found Hogarth praising either a late-night disc jockey or a phone-sex worker, it was hard to tell which. By the time of "Fantastic Place," he seemed to be getting over his depression, however, and in the playful "Drilling Holes," he was even telling jokes ("A girl came to help out in the kitchen/And by the evening/We found we were all washed up"). "Neverland" suggested that the old love had returned or been replaced (maybe by that girl who came to help out) as Hogarth celebrated "Wendy/Darling/In the kitchen/With your dreams." Meanwhile, the band churned out patterned rock music that rose and fell in forcefulness, with only slight regard to the singer's emotional ups and downs. If the result didn't seem to quite live up to the evident seriousness with which it was presented, this was nevertheless a band that knew how to play together cohesively and work up to some rousing climaxes. ~ William Ruhlmann, All Music Guide