AFRAID OF SUNLIGHT

Afraid of Sunlight is an excellent follow-up to Brave and has Hogarth's best vocals to date. All the songs are well composed and arranged with nice instrumental passages and time changes. The songs generally build in intensity to a crescendo and have a positive feel compared to the bleakness of Brave. Interestingly John Helmer, who contributes occasional lyrics to the band, is credited with 6 of the 8 songs.

It is hard to pick a best track since there are so many good moments but certainly the title track "Afraid of Sunlight" is superb with its climatic ending with great vocals and guitar and keyboard solos. "Afraid of Sunrise" is an almost acoustic version of "Afraid of Sunlight" which is an interesting idea releasing similarly themed songs played in a completely different manner on the same album. It works.

All the other tracks are also great, in particular "King", "Out of this World" and the ballad "Beautiful". Cannibal Surf Babe is an up-tempo send-up of a Beach Boys style song that has some really nice synthesizer sounds.

At the time of its release this would possibly be Marillion's best effort since Hogarth joined and, although different, matches the quality of the Fish years.

Highly recommended. 4.4 stars