RAINGODS WITH ZIPPOS

Fish's first release on Roadrunner finds him consolidating the artistic gains made on Sunsets on Empire. The album is a little less cohesive than its predecessor, but it's also a little more broad musically speaking, with tracks ranging from the comparatively commercial to the decidedly experimental.

In the former category, Fish takes us on the first side through a diverse set of art rock songs which include a brilliant cover of The Sensational Alex Harvey Band's track Faith Healer, in a version which I'm inclined to say is better than the original. (In fact, the first time I ever heard Fish sing was when this song was played on the radio in the small hours on the rock show on a radio station I could only barely receive.)

But the crown jewel of the album is A Plague of Ghosts, the sidelong track. No rip-off of Plague of Lighthouse Keepers this; instead, Fish takes us on a musical journey which encompasses both the neo-prog styles of his early career and some cutting-edge stuff, including some influence from modern electronica and dance music here and there. At this point Fish, like his former bandmates in Marillion, was settled into producing music which he wanted to produce without any reference to what people thought a Fish album should sound like, and though I don't think this album is quite the classic Sunsets was, it stands as proof that its predecessor was no flash in the pan and that Fish's creative juices were flowing to an extent they hadn't since Clutching At Straws.