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From: rosen@ucbvax.ARPA (Rob Rosen)
Newsgroups: net.music
Subject: Re: New album by Marillion
Message-ID: <9422@ucbvax.ARPA>
Date: Mon, 29-Jul-85 04:23:02 EDT
Article-I.D.: ucbvax.9422
Posted: Mon Jul 29 04:23:02 1985
Date-Received: Wed, 31-Jul-85 01:49:37 EDT
References: <727@water.UUCP>
Reply-To: rosen@ucbvax.UUCP (Rob Rosen)
Distribution: net
Organization: University of California at Berkeley
Lines: 46

In article <727@water.UUCP> gtenti@water.UUCP (G. Tenti) writes:
>This message is specifically for all those who believe Genesis died
>when Peter Gabriel left.
>
>I recently bought the most recent release by a group called Marillion
>
...


       Uh.  I have heard this comparison before, specifically, when Marillion
came out with their first LP a couple years ago.  I should have listened to
my "little voice" that told me to stay away from these guys after I saw the
excerpts from various magazines that served as advertisements for the first
Marillion single (I forgot the name of it); they were something like

    "Well, Marillion sounds a lot like Genesis, only "cleaner."  You
     can make the comparison to Genesis until the cows come home,
     but..."

 ...etc.

I find it hard to believe that any reviewer would actually consider a band
that emulates another band as being worthy of more than a casual examination.
My reservations proved correct after having made the purchase of "A Jester's
Tear (or whatever the album title was)."  The music was droll, uninteresting,
uninspired, uninventive, and just plain "un."  What made pre '77 Genesis great
was the sense of magic in the music that no other band on the face of the earth
could ever emulate - no one, not even Tony Banks, knew why or how that magic
came about but all agreed that it was present (I am of the opinion that it 
departed after Steve left, although many believe that it departed after Peter
left).  The magic was undefinable and very wonderful; Marillion just doesn't
have it -- an Emulator, PPG Wave II and Prophet 10 won't sound half as good as
a simple Hammond/Mellotron configuration if one doesn't know how to utilise
his tools and create with them as an artist would use a palette to paint a
landscape.  I doubt that anything will be a substitute for "Firth of Fifth"
or "The Cinema Show" or "Supper's Ready" -- even now these songs hold as much
magic for me as they did six years ago when I first heard them as a high school
sophomore.


-- 
                   "Yes, that is to say no understanding"

		       --Rob Rosen

		       ...ucbvax!rosen