Old turns...

MARILLION

Seasons End: Deluxe Edition PARLOPHONE

EMI-era album reissue campaign ends on an impressive high.

When it was released in September 1989, Seasons End had one foot in the past and one foot in the future. Marillion’s fifth album marked the debut of ‘new boy’ Steve Hogarth – actually a veteran of more than one band that had flirted with stardom without ever sealing the deal – but a chunk of the music on it was left over from the preceding Fish era.

"A 360-degree view of both the album and the band."

Seasons End itself remains a top-tier Marillion record, one that’s simultaneously familiar and unfamiliar. Berlin, The King Of Sunset Town and others date back to earlier sessions, and they act as a musical bridge between ‘old’ Marillion and this retooled version. The biggest point of difference is Hogarth himself. The singer’s rich voice is closer to The Blue Nile’s Paul Buchanan and So-era Peter Gabriel than to his predecessor’s untutored but effective squawk, and his songwriting contributions here – chiefly the bittersweet love letter to Ireland that is Easter – bring an extra dimension to Marillion’s music that would come to fruition on their subsequent albums.

Marillion fans will already know that stuff, but where this reissue really succeeds is in presenting a 360-degree view of both the album and the state of the band at the time. The CD/ Blu-ray edition features the usual souped-up mixes (48/24 Stereo LPCM and 5.1), plus a few previously available but still crucial audio and visual extras, including B-sides, demo versions and promo videos (Hogarth’s am-dram thesping in The Uninvited Guest remains charmingly OTT). There’s also the From Stoke Row To Ipanema documentary and a full gig filmed live at Leicester’s De Montfort Hall on April 24, 1990 for short-lived TV show Rock Steady.

Things are further fleshed out by the unreleased extras. Unheard demos and song fragments from before and after Hogarth’s recruitment add more of a sense of where the album came from, while a ‘bootleg remix’ of a pair of February 1990 shows at Montreal’s Spectrum club (a Marillion stronghold) suggests that any concerns about their post-Fish future had evaporated. Best of all is a new 80-minute documentary, featuring plenty of fan-serving detail – the photo of half-naked band members being served legal papers from Fish’s lawyers as they stand poolside at Hook End recording studio is one for the ages.

The care that’s gone into this reissue is mirrored in its new artwork. Changing any cover that’s deeply embedded in fans’ minds can be heresy, and it’s easy to get wrong, but this offers a striking but sensitive modernist reimagining. An essential release, all round.

DAVE EVERLEY

BRIAN AUGER & JULIE TIPPETTS

Encore ESOTERIC

Remastered release of a long-lost gem from twin talents.

The fruitful partnership of Brian Auger and Julie Tippetts (née Driscoll) is so entrenched in the 60s that their all-too-brief 1978 reunion tends to get unfairly discounted. Not that either remained dormant during the interim period. Driscoll married Keith Tippett and embarked on a number of exploratory projects with him while also recording solo and collaborative albums, as her erstwhile partner spearheaded jazz fusion ensemble Brian Auger’s Oblivion Express.

Though on the one hand Encore begs the question of what might have been had Auger and Tippetts continued working together, this nine-track album is better appreciated as a testament to two colossal talents actually getting it on to create an artefact that was every bit the equal of what had preceded it a decade before.

Crucially, Encore is an album that doesn’t beat about the bush. Rather than off-roading into any number of meandering directions, Auger and Tippetts – here augmented by drummer Dave Crigger, bassist David McDaniels and guitarist George Doering – first and foremost service the song, which means that the influences of soul, jazz, gospel and rock are deployed throughout. Witness the perennially covered Don’t Let Me Be Misunderstood. Tippetts infuses the song with the experience of a life well-lived, her voice almost pleading yet wholly demanding. Elsewhere, the Staple Singers’ Freedom Highway takes on a life of its own thanks to wonderful ensemble playing that sees the rhythm section coalesce beautifully with Auger’s understated keys and Tippetts’ soaring vocals. Auger’s self-penned Future Pilot avoids the pitfalls of indulgence. Here, his Hammond B3 flourishes embellish and colour rather than dominate, and his playing on Jack Bruce and Pete Brown’s Rope Ladder To The Moon thrills with its well-judged yet attacking brevity.