A strutting Fish has them hooked

Jam House

NEARLY 20 years after he left Marillion, Fish is embarking on a world tour in support of his new album Thirteenth Star.

He kicked it off with this gig under the auspices of Planet Rock, the digital radio station on which Fish was until recently a presenter. Noted for his close connection with his fans, he often played listeners rough cuts of the new album as it came together over the past year.

That connection also ensured that he would not willfully play only new material: over the course of a favourite-packed two-hour set, he presented all the highlights of his long career.

As an introduction, a video is projected on to the backdrop showing the major world events in each year from 1987 to 2007 with amusing captions relating them to Fish and/or Marillion. The scene set, Fish follows his band on stage, and his presence is immediately imposing. He is well-built, bald and very tall, looming over the front row and the rest of the band. He has chosen to wear tartan trousers, a black sleeveless T-shirt and a scarf-cum-dishcloth that also sees service as a towel.

His audience, predominantly male with many bearing a close resemblance to their hero, is instantly and enthusiastically drawn into the occasion. The Fish speciality is fist-clenching, air-punching anthems in the prog rock style, and his band do full justice to the material both old and new. His roots in the age of stadium rock are clear, accentuated by the projected images on the backdrop: clouds, Tube trains, scorpions and footage from Bosnia is mixed with live video of the performance.

Steve Vantsis, co-writer of the new album, stands centre-stage on bass, and Frank Usher and Chris Johnston share meaty guitar parts and solos. Gavin John Griffiths provides fluid drumming and Foss Paterson's keyboards give much of the material, particularly the older work, its melodic character. But the band and the music are vocal-led, and Fish is too often muffled and indistinct, buried under the rest of the band.

With his arrogant strutting, Fish cultivates a bit of a hard man image, helped by expletive-rich banter and the odd gob and tissue-free nose-blow to shock the hometown crowd.

But he's really a man unusually in touch with his fanbase. He indulges in long chats between songs, ranting about Guantanamo Bay and Lebanon and asking, comedian-style, where people in the audience are from.

At one point, he descends from the stage to walk amongst his people, singing all the while, and returns to a freshly poured pint which he had ordered moments before, showing a peculiarly Scottish sense of style.

An 18-year-old birthday boy was invited on stage and given a rendition of Happy Birthday for an experience he surely won't forget. It is these moments that turn the gig, with its rather uneven set drawn from across the years, into a special event. And the feeling is mutual - as he departs on his world tour, Fish seems genuinely appreciative of the Capital's send-off.