Marillion

Marillion biography

Marillion are a British rock band, formed in Aylesbury, Buckinghamshire, England, in 1979. Their recorded studio output comprises sixteen albums generally regarded in two distinct eras, delineated by the departure of original vocalist and frontman Fish in late 1988, and the subsequent arrival of replacement Steve Hogarth in early 1989. While the Fish era was more commercially successful, the band have enjoyed Top 10 albums and singles in the UK under the leadership of both singers.

The band continue to tour internationally, and were ranked 38th in Classic Rock's "50 Best Live Acts of All Time" in 2008.

Line-up and sound changes

The core line-up of Steve Rothery (lead guitar, and the sole 'pre-Fish' original member), Pete Trewavas (bass), Mark Kelly (keyboards) and Ian Mosley (drums) has been unchanged since 1984. The band has enjoyed critical and commercial success with a string of UK Top Ten hits spanning their career, an estimated fifteen million total worldwide album sales and even an entry into the Guinness Book of World Records.

Marillion's music has changed stylistically throughout their career. The band themselves stated that each new album tends to represent a reaction to the preceding one, and for this reason their output is difficult to 'pigeonhole'. Their original sound (with Fish on vocals) is best described as guitar and keyboard led progressive rock or "neo-prog", and would be sometimes compared with Gabriel-era Genesis.

More recently, their sound has been compared, on successive albums, to that of Radiohead, Massive Attack, Keane, Crowded House, The Blue Nile and Talk Talk, although not consistently comparable sonically with any of these acts. The band themselves in 2007, tongue-in-cheek, described their own output merely as: "Songs about Death and Water since 1979..."

Marillion are widely considered within the industry to have been one of the first mainstream acts to have fully recognised and tapped the potential for commercial musicians to interact with their fans via the Internet circa 1996, and are nowadays often characterised as a rock & roll 'Web Cottage Industry'. The history of the band's use of the internet is described by Michael Lewis in the book Next: The Future Just Happened as an example of how the internet is shifting power away from established elites, such as record producers.

The band are also renowned for having an extremely dedicated following and regular fanclub publications.

History

The Fish era

Formation and early years (1979-1982)

Marillion was formed in 1979 as Silmarillion, after J.R.R. Tolkien's book The Silmarillion, by Mick Pointer, Steve Rothery, and others. They played their first gig at Berkhamsted Civic Centre, Hertfordshire, on 1 March 1980.

The band name was shortened to Marillion in 1981 to avoid potential copyright conflicts at the same time as Fish and bassist Diz Minnett joined after an audition at Leyland Farm Studios in Buckinghamshire on 2 January 1981. Rothery and keyboardist Brian Jelliman completed the first line-up; the first gig with this line-up was at the Red Lion Pub in Bicester, Oxfordshire, on 14 March 1981. By the end of 1981, Kelly had replaced Jelliman, with Trewavas replacing Minnett in 1982.

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