ANORAKNOPHOBIA

I just love this album! It may not be the best Marillion album out there, but I always enjoy this one from start to finish. It contains a good combination of longer and more complex songs and some nice pop tunes. And whether you like it or not, Marillion nowadays will always lean towards the pop side of prog (and I enjoy most of those pop songs!).

The opener Between You and Me is a bit of a standard rock tune, but a nice start of the album (especially cool live, it's much better then). Quartz is just a very cool tune, and the first of the longer songs on the album. It has a nice laid back atmosphere to it, with a great guitar line from Rothers. Map of The World is a pure pop tune and just so damn catchy. Nothing particularly special, but it lingers on in your head (in mine anyway). Next is one of the best songs, When I Meet God. Great Hogarth lyric, great feel to it, just perfect. Next two songs - Fruit of the Wild Rose and Separated Out - are in my opinion a bit less (only a bit) than the rest. They're not bad, but just seem to drift by. Maybe it's because I just can't wait to get to This Is The 21st Century, which is brilliant! My absolute favorite Marillion song. It's just so good (can't really explain it, I just love it). The last song took me some time to get used to, but once you get into it it is very good. It has a very cool, bit surreal lyric. It is a bit weird, but very nice.

Overall, Anoraknophobia is an album that is quite consistent in feel, and that I can listen to from start to finish without getting bored. It is not Marillion at their most Prog, but they wrote some of their best stuff here!