SUITS

Fish´s third album, and not nearly as bad as some people claim. That´s my final conclusion after many spins. I even avoided the CD for a long time because so many other reviewers were so down to this work that I didn´t want to risk my hard earned money into something that might be not worth it. However, being a big fan of early Marillion and having listened to several other Fish´s solo output I deciced to take a shot on this one anyway and I got the remastered version, with a beautiful booklet with extensive notes from the man himself. I was not blown away by it, but also I was not disappointed either.

It is clear that Suits is a different album from the previous two. It is more guitar and is more ´song´ oriented, the keyboards are much in the background. But it is also quite progressive and very well done. The four first tracks are just great and Lady Let Die is surely one of fish´s best. The biggest problem I see on Suits is that most of the remaning stuff is also of quality, but overlong: songs like Jumpsuit City and No Dummy, just to mention two, would benefit a lot with some editing. He just goes on and on too much. The production here is quite superior than those I´ve seen on his solo output so far. You can hear everything quite clear and the balance is excellent. The lyrics are, as expected, quite clever and insightful and the liner notes on the booklet are quite helpful to fully understand some of them.

In the end I found this CD a bit too long and its second part drags on a little, but I like it as a whole, not just few songs. Suits is different, ok, but very good prog rock. If some of the tunes only was a little shorter I could give it a higher rating. As it is I´d give it 3. Good, but not really essential.