BRAVE

Having bent to EMI wishes and decided to go commercial for their previous Holidays In Eden, Marillion made concessions they rather forget now, like letting the recording company decided for a pop producer (Chris Neil) and even going as far as letting the guy "teach" how to write "simpler" songs. Unfortunately although the results were far from bad, the band ended up feeling cheated, for the massive success that was promised did not come with the new direction (the singles did make to top 40 in England and the album reached a respectable number 7, but they had made no impact at all in the american market, their main target). Worst still, the move had also the side effect of alienating part of their strong fan base. Feeling they had "sell out", the group vowed never to bend to outside pressure ever again. They did. And Brave was their first step towards that goal.

Well, that might have explained why they made such a radical change: the new CD would be a concept album (their first with Steve Hogarth) and, sure enough they made no concessions at all this time. The album had a depressive theme (an abused teenager tempted to commit suicide), there were no easy listening stuff for singles and the album was too long for a vinyl release at the time. I guess we should applaud their decision in terms of artistic integrity, but did all this translated into a real good album? And I must say I tried very hard to like this album thru the years and still I found it one of their least appealing albums, if not the least appealing of all. Unlike most of my friends at the time who saw it as "return to form" of sorts from Marillion, I only saw a work that is lacking good melodies, inspiration and flow. Although I can not really point anything really bad, this is surely Marillions most boring stuff in years. It seems to me they decided to do a "non-commercial" at all cost and overdid it. Nice melodies and strong hooks were frequent elements of their songs since the beginning and nobody called them sell outs then. Like Saga´s Generation 13 the group decided to make Brave a kind statement of "seriousness". Like most concept albums the music here sounds more like a background soundtrack to a story.

Not that this album does not have good moments. It does. Runaway is probably the best moment, a very moving number. The acoustic closer Made Again is another fine tune, that lifts the mood a little, but then it is too late. Some other exquisite instrumental bits and the occasional burst of energy can be found in this 70+ minute record, although, as a whole, I found it to be too depressive and monotonous for my taste. Definitely not for newbies.

Rating: Two stars.