People who disown Marillion without Fish are...?

Yeah, a good and knowing post.

With regard to the band, what is extremely telling is that fans of the band such as I from the really old days (Market Square Heroes time) have not just stuck with the band, but loved every single part of the journey as it has progressed. This includes h-era Marillion, various side projects, and also Fish solo stuff. The band have had an almost unique way of bonding a pretty sizeable group of fans to them who have stuck with them through thick and thin, and it should not be forgotten that they really were pioneers of the crowdfunding model of making music, and that would not have been possible without us loyal fans at the time, most of whom started watching and listening to them because of a bloody great big Scottish man called Dick who wore makeup and sang songs that reminded us of the prog heyday.

I have always found forums such as this to be rather too full of really obsessive types. Not just Prog Archives, but also, for example, Star Trek forums, where anything that does not include a character scratching his or her arse in the same manner as Captain Kirk did in 1967 is automatically “not proper Trek”. Our equivalent here is “not proper prog”, or “the eighth sequence of music on the third track automatically disqualifies the album from being categorised as Symphonic Prog”, and etc.

I think it might have been better had the band changed their name when Hogarth joined, and, indeed, band members have confirmed in numerous interviews that this was a serious discussion amongst them.

It really is all about the music. I get why some of the purists don’t get or like them, but I just love the storytelling, incredible musicianship, and the atmosphere the band create.