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How Marillion Helped Resurrect Prog on ‘Misplaced Childhood’

Prog rock was mostly dead and buried by 1985, but Marillion  helped resurrect the genre – albeit in a glossier, streamlined context – with Misplaced Childhood .

The band's third album, released on June 17, 1985, soared to No. 1 on the U.K. chart on the strength of the hit singles "Kayleigh" and "Lavender" – and proved the commercial success of the previous year's  Fugazi was no fluke. But Marillion also reached their creative zenith on the LP, which remains the cornerstone of the entire "neo-prog" movement.

Misplaced Childhood is a loosely assembled concept album spearheaded by then-frontman Fish, who weaves together fractured ruminations on adolescence, lost love and the downside of rock stardom. The singer-lyricist reportedly came up with the bold idea during a 10-hour acid trip. Staring at a print by Jerry Schurr called "Padres Bay," Fish found his inspiration.

"I was in 'Padres Bay' when suddenly I felt a child standing behind me on the stairs," he said in 1998 . "I knew he was dressed as a soldier and vanished as soon as he entered the corner or my eye. Perhaps it was my muse; perhaps it was the drug. It was enough to propel me into reaming off a large scrawl of prose."

That cohesive thematic structure is mirrored by the arrangements, which flow elegantly from the artful synth-and-volume-pedal textures of opener "Pseudo Silk Kimono" to triumphant rock closer "White Feather." Steve Rothery's New Wave-y riffs give the album a decidedly '80s sheen, but his Steve Hackett -esque solos keep the songs grounded in the prog idiom. Keyboardist Mark Kelly takes a similar approach, moving from breezy synth pads to intricate melodic runs.

The lightweight "Kayleigh" became Marillion's breakout hit, peaking at No. 2 on the U.K. chart. But its straightforward verse-chorus structure and soft-pop chorus gave noodly-minded fans cause for concern. (" Didn't I break your heart? " Fish croons on the track. The answer, for some fans, was a resounding "yes.")

Watch Marollion Perform 'Kayleigh'

"One of my most vivid memories of the time was when my wife to be, Jo, asked me to explain how I came up with my musical ideas, picking up a nearby guitar I started improvising what later became the 'Kayleigh' riff whilst explaining that I tried to combine melody and rhythm," Rothery said. "I sometimes wonder if we would have still written 'Kayleigh' if she had asked me if there was anything good on the telly instead!"

But even if  Misplaced Childhood  sounds seamless, the songs weren't easy to assemble. "Most of the album was written and arranged, in some cases even down to the solos," explained keyboardist Mark Kelly. "Being a concept album we attempted to make the music flow seamlessly from one song to the next which presented a few problems. ‘Lords of the Backstage' originally followed ‘Lavender' but was moved at the last minute to follow ‘Waterhole.' I was asked to come up with a link section to get us from 'Waterhole' into 'Lords' the day we recorded the master. I felt under a lot of pressure and was not happy with the result because it sounds forced to me."

The quintet – also including bassist Pete Trewavas and drummer Ian Mosley – recorded the songs at Hansa Studios in Berlin, during a turbulent time for the city.

"Now when you think if it, Berlin was a walled city at the time," Trewavas said. "After all, it was early 1985. If you had enough money you could buy whatever you wanted. There was a great little bar under the studio where we all discovered the most horrible drink in the world (begins with an M by the way). My most memorable moment is probably playing pool with Ian against Depeche Mode and the keyboard player who wore the dress got the winning shot. (I was so embarrassed.) P.S.: He had a fantastic looking girlfriend."

One year after the release of Marillion's fourth album, 1987's Clutching at Straws , Fish left the band to pursue a solo career. Steve Hogarth joined the line-up for 1989's  Seasons End and has remained frontman ever since. In keeping, Misplaced Childhood continued to hold "a lot of memories from a period that was very exciting and crammed with experiences both dark and magical" for Fish, as he said in an announcement for an anniversary tour in 2015.

"The lyrics on that album hold a very special meaning to me as they were written by a young man on the cusp of fame and dealt with a lot of personal issues," Fish added. "It was not only a breakthrough album for the band but also for me as an artist because I was finally discovering my own individual style as a lyricist and singer."    

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Marillion: the story of their dark masterpiece, Misplaced Childhood

Misplaced Childhood is the album that turned Marillion into bona fide rock stars. It’s also the record that broke the group

According to Fish , Marillion owe it all to Terry Wogan. On May 20, 1985, the band made their one and only appearance on the Irishman’s BBC chat show. Back then, Wogan was prime-time TV, and the perfect shop window for any group with a single to promote.

At the BBC Television Theatre in Shepherd’s Bush, Marillion performed what the show’s host called their “current smasheroonie”, Kayleigh . At the end, lead singer Fish gave a shy smile to the camera. And after that, he says, everything changed.

The man born Derek Dick is remembering Marillion’s Wogan performance almost 30 years later. After the show, EMI’s Head Of Promotions, Malcolm Hill, took him aside. “And he said to me, ‘That little smile you did at the end broke every mother’s heart in Great Britain.’”

Soon after, Kayleigh was at No.2 in the charts, giving Marillion the biggest hit of their career. “The Wogan show was what did it,” says Fish. “That lit the touchpaper on the whole thing.”

In June, Marillion’s third album, Misplaced Childhood , toppled Bryan Ferry’s Boys And Girls from the top of the chart. Against all expectations, Marillion had become one of the biggest bands in Britain. “Suddenly we went from being this relatively unknown progressive rock group to a band with a big hit single and album,” Fish marvels. “ Misplaced Childhood was us sticking one finger up at the business and saying, ‘Fuck you! This is a real band.’”

Misplaced Childhood turns 30 this year, and remains the biggest-selling album of both Marillion’s and Fish’s careers. The singer, who’s now planning to retire from touring, will celebrate its birthday by performing the album in full later this year.

Marillion, meanwhile, are busy writing a new album. You sense that the past – especially their past with Fish – sometimes seems like a foreign country. But Misplaced Childhood is an album they remember fondly. As keyboard player Mark Kelly admits:

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“It was the album that saved us.”

To their dedicated and growing fanbase in 1984, it might have seemed as if Marillion could do no wrong. They’d had five Top 40 singles and two Top 20 albums with 1983’s Script For A Jester’s Tear and ’84’s Fugazi . But, in fact, they were actually in danger of being dropped by their record company.

“We’d got ourselves into a bit of a hole with EMI,” explains guitarist Steve Rothery now. The hole had grown bigger after Marillion spent almost as much money on the video

for their last single, Assassing , as they’d done on the whole of Fugazi : “And we were liable for 50 per cent of the costs.”

“Looking back, we were on a bit of a knife edge,” adds Kelly. “ Script For A Jester’s Tear had sold about 120,000. Fugazi cost twice as much but sold a bit less. If we carried on the way we were going, we weren’t going to be financially viable.”

It was a precursor of the situation Marillion found themselves in at the end of the 90s, and which they resolved with 2001’s crowd-funded Anoraknophobia . In 1984, though, they did what any struggling rock band would do: they put out a live album.

Real To Reel , released in November, was recorded at dates in Montreal and, less exotically, Leicester. It cracked the Top 10 and sold well in Europe: “Which gave the label an inkling that it might be worth sticking with us for one more album,” Kelly says.

However, Marillion were in no hurry to tell EMI that their next studio release was a concept album. “That,” admits Rothery, “might have been the kiss of death.”

The concept for Misplaced Childhood came to Fish during an LSD trip. The singer had returned to his house in Aylesbury, Buckinghamshire, at the end of the Fugazi tour, feeling burnt out, but “knowing we had a difficult third album to write”.

Soon after, an envelope arrived in the post with a note from an old girlfriend – “It read: ‘I think you might like this’” – and a tab of ‘white lightning’ acid. “I was bored, sitting on my own one night, so I took half of it,” Fish recalls. “Then I thought, ‘Oh, this is rubbish, it’s not working,’ and I took the other half…” He pauses, then lets out a throaty laugh. “Aye, that old mistake.”

It was seven o’clock on a warm summer’s evening. With the world around him growing increasingly fuzzy, Fish jumped on his bicycle and rode to Steve Rothery’s cottage nearby.

“In those days, Fish and I were on very good terms,” says the guitarist. “We were the two bachelors in the band. We socialised together a lot.” Does he recall Fish being under the influence? Rothery laughs: “Yes, he probably was.”

Fish remembers the pair of them watching the recent film adaptation of Thomas Hardy’s novel, Tess Of The D’Urbervilles , starring the beautiful German actor Nastassja Kinski. “Steve had a particular thing about her,” laughs Fish.

But when the drug’s effects became too much for Fish, he asked Rothery to drive him home. “When I got back to my house, I thought, ‘OK, let’s use this.’”

Fish put on a record, crouched on the floor, grabbed a notepad and began what he calls “stream-of-consciousness writing”. At the time he had a print of the American artist Jerry Schurr’s painting Padres Bay on the wall of the house (“I still have it. It’s hanging in my bedroom.”). Schurr’s image of the sea and mountains was so hypnotic, Fish felt that he was actually inside the picture. The hallucinogenic experience paid off.

“That night I got the whole basis for what became side one of the album,” Fish says. “Entire phrases and lyrics from that notebook ended up on the finished record.” One of which, Pseudo Silk Kimono , became Misplaced Childhood ’s opening track. As the LSD wore off, and he drifted back to normality, Fish knew he had to tell someone: “I phoned up Steve and said, ‘I got it. I’ve nailed it.’”

Ultimately, the theme running through Misplaced Childhood was inspired by the 27-year-old Fish’s life so far: watching childhood fade with each passing year; the thrill and attendant pressure of being in a rock band; and, crucially, the recent demise of his relationship with girlfriend Kay. It was a concept album, yes, but one very much grounded in reality.

Writing sessions for Misplaced Childhood began in autumn 1984 at Barwell Court, a freezing cold Victorian pile located in Chessington, Surrey. “I’d sit in the TV room with the fire on, writing lyrics,” remembers Fish, “and hear the others in the next room coming up with the music.”

“My memory is that it all came together very quickly,” says Kelly. “We’re in the process of writing an album now and we were marvelling at how we managed to write most of side one of Misplaced Childhood in a week.” That’s Pseudo Silk Kimono , Kayleigh , Lavender , the multi-part Bitter Suite and Heart Of Lothian . “If only all albums were that easy,” he sighs.

At Barwell Court, the band were also introduced to their new producer, Chris Kimsey. “I wasn’t familiar with Marillion at all,” says Kimsey now. “But their A&R man, David Munns, was a good friend of mine and told me to check them out. I went to the writing sessions at Barwell Court and immediately fell in love with them.”

Kimsey’s CV included engineer credits for Peter Frampton’s Frampton Comes Alive! and the Rolling Stones’ Some Girls . “We were a bit intimidated by Chris at first,” admits Fish. “But he turned out to be such an easy-going guy… and he’d done [ELP’s] Brain Salad Surgery .”

Better still, Kimsey didn’t need to be sold on the idea of a concept album. “I was totally into that,” he says. “Did EMI want a concept album? I don’t think EMI knew what they wanted. They just wanted a hit.”

It was at Barwell Court that Marillion would compose that first hit. Fish remembers being in the TV room when he heard Rothery messing around with the riff that eventually became Kayleigh . “That riff originally came from me demonstrating to the woman that is now my wife how I wrote songs,” says Rothery. “I filed it away, and from such a little thing, our mortgage is now paid.”

Initially, Kayleigh was regarded as just another chapter in the Misplaced Childhood story. Nobody thought of it as a potential single. Fish’s bandmates also had reservations about the title and lyrics. The problem was that his recently ex-girlfriend Kay’s middle name was Lee, and her father’s pet name for her was ‘Kay-Lee’. There was no ambiguity about it.

“The band said [adopts blokey English accent], ‘Er, that’s about Kay. You can’t sing that,’” says Fish. “I said, ‘Why?’ They said ‘’Cos it’s too personal.’”

“I was the main one that objected,” recalls Kelly. “Kay had been Fish’s girlfriend ever since I joined the band. But they’d split up now, and I said, ‘No, we shouldn’t call it Kayleigh .’ And Fish said [adopts gruff Scottish accent]: ‘What do you want me to call it? May-be?’”

“I was a little bit uneasy about it,” adds Steve Rothery. “I knew Kay well and she was a lovely person. But I saw the song as Fish’s tribute to Kay… and how he threw away what they had.”

Either way, Fish refused to change the lyrics, which he has since claimed are about more than one of his ex-girlfriends. Kayleigh was staying put.

In the meantime, Marillion went back on the road for a pre-Christmas tour in November 1984. Their setlist now included most of the first side of Misplaced Childhood . “ Kayleigh wasn’t completely finished yet, though,” says Fish, “and if you listen to bootlegs from that tour, you can hear me ad-libbing.”

Marillion demoed their new material at Bray film studios in Berkshire before heading to Berlin’s Hansa Ton Studio in March ’85. Chris Kimsey had just produced Killing Joke’s Night Time album and its hit single Love Like Blood at Hansa. “It was also cheap,” says Mark Kelly, “which made sense if the record company were thinking about dropping us.”

Nevertheless, there were worst places to make an album than Berlin. It was, says the keyboard player, “like the Wild West”. Or, as Fish puts it, “a playground for adults”.

Before reunification in 1990, West Berlin didn’t officially belong to the Federal Republic Of Germany. This meant its young male residents didn’t have to do national service as they would elsewhere in the country. Rothery says: “So it was full of young people, musicians and artists. There was a unique feeling about the place.”

Hansa Studios was in a converted town hall, and was steeped in history. The main ballroom, Der Meistersaal, had been used by the Nazis to hold propaganda concerts during World War II. It was at Hansa that Bowie had recorded his ‘Berlin trilogy’ of albums, Low , “Heroes” and Lodger , in the 70s.

Kimsey moved into a rented apartment in the suburbs. The band (Fish, Kelly, Rothery, bassist Pete Trewavas and drummer Ian Mosley) moved into the Hervis Hotel, which overlooked the Berlin Wall. Each morning the band were greeted by the sight of barbed wire, graffiti and sentry towers.

Initially, there were teething problems in the studio. The Neve mixing desk on which Kimsey was working had been damaged when Killing Joke set off a dry powder fire extinguisher over it a few months earlier. “It was noisy and knackered,” recalls Rothery. “In the first few weeks, everything we heard at the playbacks sounded very ordinary.”

Kimsey recalls Ian Mosley protesting that his drums “didn’t sound expensive enough”. Rothery says: “Once Chris EQ’d [equalised] everything, we were fine. But we had a real crisis of confidence to start with.”

That said, Kimsey’s assistant, engineer Thomas Steimler, soon had the band on side after demonstrating his great hustling skills. “Thomas phoned up [Austrian piano maker] Bösendorfer and told them there was a very famous English rock band in the studio and could they please send us a piano,” recalls Kelly. Soon after, a Bösendorfer Concert Grand arrived at Hansa and was carried up a flight of stairs to be delivered to the not-that-famous English rock band.

With their sound problems resolved and a new piano to play with, the band and their producer fell into a comfortable working pattern. “Start late afternoon,” says Steve Rothery. “Work till the evening, dinner, go out with Kimsey, drink a lot, come back to the studio and try and do some more work.”

‘Try’ being the optimum word. To achieve the exact sound he wanted, Kimsey recorded one vocal after persuading Fish to stick his head inside the “plastic igloo” surrounding the studio payphone. Fish, meanwhile, now mutters darkly about an “unidentified presence” in the studio while the band were playing the Perimeter Walk section of Blind Curve late one night. “The room where we were had once been an SS officer’s club,” he says. “I am convinced something else was there besides us. I sensed another presence.”

Then again, Berlin offered so many distractions, it wasn’t unusual for some band members to find themselves working while in a heightened state. “The city didn’t wake up until midnight,” says Kimsey. “If we had a day off, we’d go clubbing and all arrange to meet at the Cri Du Chat, a club that only opened at six in the morning.”

Tequila became the tipple of choice, consumed in such quantities that Rothery recalls some of the band and their entourage passing out during a late-night screening of Fritz Lang’s silent movie classic Metropolis : “It didn’t help that the subtitles, naturally, were in German.”

Chris Kimsey also became a victim of a boozy prank. While driving through Berlin, Marillion persuaded Thomas Steimler to crash his Volvo into Kimsey’s rental car, just for the hell of it. “Chris was in this Honda Jazz,” divulges Kelly, “and Thomas rammed straight into him at a set of traffic lights. And then we spent the next 20 minutes ramming into him, until the car was making the most awful noise and we had to ditch it… isn’t it strange how when you’re 22, 23 years old, you think you’ll never end up getting into trouble – and somehow we didn’t.”

“Oh, I could fill a book with stories about Berlin,” says Fish. “But you’ll have to wait for the book.”

Key moments include the vocalist’s “first and last heroin experience”, stripping naked in a restaurant, and throwing bricks over the Berlin Wall to try to set off the landmines. “It was fun,” he says. “In Berlin, nobody knew who we were and we could do anything we liked. And I sampled it all.”

So much hard work and fun was had that three months after starting work at Hansa, Rothery claims that Marillion had all “aged about five years”. In the meantime, EMI were asking about singles.

“EMI were gonna get what they got,” says Fish emphatically. “They gave us no guidance whatsoever. They sent A&R guys down to listen, but we’d just shove them in a room, get them pissed and give them a couple of doobies.”

“One guy got so pissed he fell asleep during the playback,” laughs Kelly. “But at the end of it, he said, ‘Is that all you got?’”

The only other new song they had was Lady Nina , which had nothing to do with the concept. “We played him that, and he said, ‘Oh, that’ll be the single,’ Kelly adds. “And we said, ‘No.’ So he went back to the UK, convinced there were no singles.”

Marillion were aware they had to release something , and finally agreed on Kayleigh , with Lady Nina on the flip. “But Kayleigh was seen as the best of a bad bunch,” says Kelly. “Nobody believed it was going to be a hit.”

According to Chris Kimsey, the single was first mixed at Abbey Road and the master sent to Berlin for approval. Kimsey took the tape back to his apartment. “And it sounded awful,” he sighs. “There was one of those 80s ghetto blasters in the kitchen. I put the tape in and lay there with my head between the speakers, making notes on how I could improve it. Then I went to the studio the next day and put it all into practice. I insisted that we mixed the whole album in Berlin.”

EMI also needed a video to go with the single. In a wonderful twist, the promo for Kayleigh , a song about Fish’s ex-girlfriend, would star German model Tamara Nowy, the woman who would later become his first wife.

Fish had met Tamara on a night out in Berlin and was looking for an excuse to spend more time with her. However, the rest of Marillion vetoed the idea of having her in the video and chose two other models instead. One broke her ankle and the other contracted food poisoning just before the shoot. “So it was a case of, ‘Wanna be in a video, love?’” Fish chuckles.

As well as shots of the couple mooching around Berlin, gazing longingly at each other, the promo featured 10-year-old Robert Mead, the ‘drummer boy’ in designer Mark Wilkinson’s Misplaced Childhood cover art. The image was, says Fish, inspired by another supernatural encounter: “Kay used to live in Earls Court and there was a staircase leading up to her flat, and she thought she glimpsed a young boy there one night, just a presence.”

Growing up, Fish was fascinated by military history, and the drummer boy’s uniform would be adapted for his next stage costume: “Mine was rather tight though,” says Fish, “’cos they didn’t do military jackets in double XL sizes.”

Released on April 7, 1985, Kayleigh changed Marillion’s lives forever. For the first time, one of their singles was played on daytime radio, and heard by people other than those who bought Sounds and listened to Radio One’s Friday Rock Show.

It wasn’t hard to fathom Kayleigh ’s appeal over Marillion’s previous singles Assassing or Punch And Judy : it was a universal love song. Better still, says Kimsey, “Steve’s opening guitar riff sounded so good on the radio.”

But it was Marillion’s Wogan performance that really sealed the deal. “Before that, we held the record for being the band who did Top Of The Pops the most times and saw their single go down the charts,” says Rothery. “With Kayleigh , we were flown back from Europe on a Learjet just to play on Top Of The Pops .”

Inevitably, the question everyone wanted answered, though, was: who is Kayleigh ? “ The Sun went looking for her,” recalls Kelly. “But Kay was a very private person so we all had to keep quiet.”

Misplaced Childhood was released on June 17 and compounded the single’s success, eventually reaching No.1. Within a year it had sold 1.5 million copies and gone platinum. “And journalists who’d said we were a bunch of Genesis copyists suddenly went, ‘Oh, this is a happening band,” adds Fish.

Listening to Misplaced Childhood now, Fish’s rather portentous narration on album opener Pseudo Silk Kimono and the Brief Encounter section of Bitter Suite sound like a hangover from the earlier albums, and, however much they resent the ‘Genesis copyist’ tag, there are still familiar echoes all over the record. But ultimately, Marillion had streamlined their sound and become more accessible. As Fish admits, “I’d started to move away from that forced falsetto. I was finding my real voice.”

Furthermore, this wasn’t the woolly, Tolkien-esque Marillion of Grendel ‘and his mossy home beneath the stagnant mere.’ For the most part, Misplaced Childhood addressed real life and real emotions. It was a bigger hit than previous albums Fugazi and Script For A Jester’s Tear because it spoke to more people.

Despite their earlier misgivings, Kayleigh was followed by second Top 5 hit, Lavender , in September. A third single, the Burns Night-meets-rock anthem Heart Of Lothian , followed two months later.

Marillion spent most of 1985 and ’86 on tour, playing the new album in full every night. In America, they opened for Rush and were confronted by “a sea of people going, ‘What the fuck is this?’” laughs Fish. In Britain, it was a different story. On stage, Fish performed without his usual face make-up, as if he was showing his true self. The mainstream music press and daily papers now flocked to talk to Marillion’s outspoken Scottish frontman. “And it rocked the band,” he says. “Because so much of the focus was now on me and I was the one with the biggest profile.”

“Fish seemed to want that more and more,” says Rothery, who admits that Marillion’s brush with “proper fame” made him uncomfortable: “I didn’t like that feeling of never being able to relax.”

Fish, however, had no such misgivings: “When I was a teenager dreaming about being in a rock band,” he says, “this was how I imagined it would be.”

“Fish craved that celebrity,” concurs the guitarist, “and that was part of the conflict that eventually developed between us. He loved a drink and he loved to party. And some people in the band partied too hard.”

By the time Marillion started work on a follow-up album, the cracks were showing. Clutching At Straws , released in 1987, would be Fish’s last with the band. Making it was not a happy experience. “I had a lot to deal with on a personal and professional level, including my ego,” he admits. “I floated off into my own anal world and was a bit of an asshole.”

Rothery laughs when he hears this. “Listen, I took myself far too seriously at that time too. I was all about the music and the art, man .” Tellingly, when asked what he thinks of Misplaced Childhood now, Rothery says he’s proud of it, but that “it represents the calm before the storm”.

In 2005, Fish performed Misplaced Childhood in full on his Return To Childhood tour. To mark its 30th anniversary, he plans to do the same at dates around the country, including the Cropredy Festival in August. But he would have liked to play it one last time with Marillion.

“It would have been lovely,” he sighs. “But it’s 30 years old, for fuck’s sake, so we’d have to drop it down for my voice, and Steve’s gone public and said he won’t change keys.” He pauses, sounding a little exasperated. “But who gives a fuck what key it’s in?”

Marillion clearly do, and transposing the songs to suit Fish is not something they’re comfortable with. “If he can’t sing in the same key as on the album, then we can’t play the same music as on the album,” says Rothery. “You’re not giving people the same experience. It’s better to leave them with the memory.”

For Fish, though, Misplaced Childhood is full of deeply personal memories. On the Return To Childhood tour in 2005, the singer met up again with his old flame Kay. “She came to Edinburgh and I gave her a copy of the album, and she wrote back to say that she cried all the way through.” He hesitates. “I always said I would never talk about her… but she was a pharmacist who worked at Stoke Mandeville Hospital. We’d been emailing each other back and forth, talking about our kids… and one day she told me she’d been diagnosed. Then she went off the radar.”

Not long after, he learned ‘Kayleigh’ had died of cancer. “Her friends told me that in the later part of her life, she let it be known that the song was about her.”

Thirty years on, in 2015, songs from Misplaced Childhood still feature in Marillion’s set. “Out of all the albums we’ve done, there are a few I would rather not listen to again,” says Kelly. “ Misplaced Childhood isn’t one of them. It still stands up today.”

That said, having made more albums with vocalist Steve Hogarth than they did with Fish, Marillion don’t dwell as much on the past. Fish, though, is allowing himself one last wallow in nostalgia. “ Misplaced Childhood was a crucial album for me and Marillion,” he says, “and I wouldn’t change a thing about it. So I wanted to go out and do it one last time.”

By celebrating its 30th birthday, Fish is paying one last tribute to the people and places that inspired Misplaced Childhood – and, you suspect, finally closing the door on the past.

In the end I ran out of time…

Cover artist Mark Wilkinson, famed for his work with Fish-era Marillion, explains how the Misplaced Childhood album cover came about.

Mark Wilkinson still recalls his reaction to being told about Marillion’s plans for Misplaced Childhood.

“This was the mid-80s, and here they were talking about doing a concept album! I really did think they were gonna be slaughtered by the media, and it would be a commercial disaster. Shows how much I knew!”

The idea for the cover was developed during a series of meetings between the band and artist.

“Fish saw this as the last part of a trilogy, which had begun with Script For A Jester’s Tear. Although I still can’t work out why he saw it that way. But what he was adamant about was that it should be the last time we see the jester on a Marillion cover. So, I took him

by his word and that’s why you see the jester figure literally leaving through the window on the back cover.

“From the start, it was decided that the there should be a boy on the front, dressed in a uniform. I had this image in my head of Emil Sinclair, the boy who was the main character in Herman Hesse’s novel Demian: The Story Of Emil Sinclair’s Youth; he seemed to carry the mark of Cain. But I had a problem finding a model to pose for it.”

However, Wilkinson found the right person on his doorstep. Or, rather, in his local pub.

“Robert Mead was one of the landlord’s sons, who was 10 at the time, and I saw him standing behind the bar one day, and I just thought he had the right personality and look for what was needed on the cover.”

Mead is portrayed with bare feet, something that Wilkinson acknowledges nodded towards The Beatles and their Abbey Road sleeve.

“Paul McCartney was, of course, shot in bare feet, which generated so many crazy theories. And I referenced this here. I was also thinking of David Hockney, who used to put socks on his models, because he couldn’t paint feet! It was my way of saying that feet are important.

“I began by painting Robert’s eyes, then did the rest of his face, and I also spent ages over the uniform he’s wearing. Too long, in fact.”

There’s a lot of symbolism in the cover’s other images.

“The poppy was also used on the Fugazi cover, and it is of course a symbol of death, which Fish thought was important. The rainbow and magpies are a reference to a line from the song Childhood’s End? – ‘And I saw a magpie in the rainbow, the rain had gone’. But if you know the old nursery rhyme, one magpie means sorrow, whereas two means joy. Which is why there are two magpies.”

There’s also a mysterious gap on the back cover, into which the song titles were inserted. But this was left for no other reason than Wilkinson running out of time.

“The jigsaw shaped blank wasn’t supposed to be there. I did intend to fill it in, but literally ran out of time. That was always happening to me.” MD

Steve Hogarth on singing songs from Misplaced Childhood.

“I’d never heard Misplaced Childhood before I joined Marillion. I’d heard Kayleigh and Lavender on the radio, but that was it. In some ways, I still haven’t heard the album. But I have discovered it one track at a time. Every now and again, one of the boys would say, ‘Fancy having a crack at this one?’ and I’d listen to the track with a view to it going in the live show. Sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn’t.

“There are facets of Fish’s songwriting and performance that are very angry, and quite violent. And I’m not an angry and violent performer. I’m capable if it, but I can’t summon it up on someone else’s behalf. I’m not a performing dog. So there are songs from the Fish era that I can’t do.

“At the same time, I think Fish has written some great stuff and Kayleigh is a great lyric. Lines like ‘dancing in stilettos in the snow’ and ‘loving on the floor in Belsize Park’ are obviously about very real things and very real memories. And I can latch on to that. I can feel those feelings. It’s got to sit in me like a real thing.

“ Heart Of Lothian is a bit weird because I’m plainly not from Edinburgh. But I enjoy singing it. We don’t do it that often, but we do when we’re north of the border, as a mark of respect.

“So when it comes to these songs, my attitude is: if it’s honest enough and true enough and not too gothic or angry or drug addled, then I can get in to it… and I can even get into it if it’s drug addled, as long as I have the same drugs.” MB

Mark Blake is a music journalist and author. His work has appeared in The Times and The Daily Telegraph, and the magazines Q, Mojo, Classic Rock, Music Week and Prog. He is the author of Pigs Might Fly: The Inside Story of Pink Floyd, Is This the Real Life: The Untold Story of Queen, Magnifico! The A–Z Of Queen, Peter Grant, The Story Of Rock's Greatest Manager and Pretend You're in a War: The Who & The Sixties. 

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Misplaced Childhood – UK Tour 1986

January – february 22 shows.

• Promotional Poster: Misplaced Childhood – UK Tour 1986
• T-Shirt: Misplaced Childhood – 1985-1986
• Kerrang!, 09.01.1986: Fear And Lothian In Soho by Mick Wall – Thanks to Nicolas Velilla Mereles
• 1 show of this tour was cancelled (Hammersmith Odeon, London – 01.02.1986 ) and rescheduled to 06.02.1986

08.01.1986 – Hammersmith Odeon, London

• Ad – Thanks to Guy Tkach
• Support Band: Beltane Fire
• This show was rescheduled from 11.09.1985

09.01.1986 – Hammersmith Odeon, London

• No. 07 recorded for The Thieving Magpie (La Gazza Ladra)
• This show was rescheduled from 12.09.1985

10.01.1986 – Hammersmith Odeon, London

• This show was rescheduled from 13.09.1985

12.01.1986 – St. David’s Hall, Cardiff

• Ticket – Thanks to Rhilip Rogers
• This show was rescheduled from 15.09.1985

13.01.1986 – St. David’s Hall, Cardiff

• Setlist provided by René Romswinckel
• This show was rescheduled from 16.09.1985

14.01.1986 – Royal Centre, Nottingham

• This show was rescheduled from 17.09.1985

16.01.1986 – The Apollo Theatre, Manchester

• This show was rescheduled from 24.09.1985

• Photo by Chris Bembridge

17.01.1986 – The Apollo Theatre, Manchester

• When the autumn-tour was planned, it was not intended that Marillion should play two gigs in Manchester, but massive ticket demand in the autumn had added one more gig at the Apollo Theatre to their schedule. When the tour was rearranged, the extra date was of course kept, as the show on that night had sold out as well.
• This show was rescheduled from 25.09.1985

18.01.1986 – The Spectrum, Warrington

• Setlist by Ian Wood
• This show was rescheduled from 09.09.1985

20.01.1986 – Capitol Theatre, Aberdeen

• Backstage Pass – Thanks to Kevin Mackenzie
• Guest on stage: Alan Reed ( Market Square Heroes ) – Thanks to Kenny Matthew
• This show was rescheduled from 22.09.1985

21.01.1986 – The Playhouse Theatre, Edinburgh

• This show was rescheduled from 21.09.1985

22.01.1986 – City Hall, Newcastle

• Setlist by Jean-Luc Camus
• This show was rescheduled from 20.09.1985

24.01.1986 – Colston Hall, Bristol

• Setlist by AJ Samuels
• This show was rescheduled from 30.09.1985

25.01.1986 – Odeon Theatre, Birmingham

• Photos of the Venue by Steve Mobley
• This show was rescheduled from 26.09.1985

26.01.1986 – Odeon Theatre, Birmingham

• Tickets by Denis Thomas
• This show was rescheduled from 27.09.1985

28.01.1986 – City Hall, Sheffield

• Ticket and Review by Bill Auckland – Thanks to Ian Hepworth
• Ticket – Thanks to by Denis Thomas
• This show was rescheduled from 19.09.1985

29.01.1986 – De Montfort Hall, Leicester

• This show was rescheduled from 29.09.1985

• Photos by Simon Cooper

31.01.1986 – University Of East Anglia, Norwich

• Ticket – Thanks to Andre Rostek
• Ticket – Thanks to Denis Thomas
• Setlist by Denis Thomas

01.02.1986 – Hammersmith Odeon, London (cancelled show) (canc.)

• Ticket – Thanks to Jon Brooke
• T-Shirt with cancelled Hammy O date – Thanks to Steven Brodie
• Backstage Pass – Thanks to Jacek Bejer
• This show was rescheduled to 06.02.1986

03.02.1986 – Hammersmith Odeon, London

• This show was rescheduled from 03.10.1985
• Recorded for Front Row Club Issue 15 – Curtain Call

04.02.1986 – Hammersmith Odeon, London

• Ticket and Backstage Pass – Thanks to Denis Thomas
• Setlist by Paul Cavender
• This show was rescheduled from 04.10.1985

05.02.1986 – Hammersmith Odeon, London

• This show was rescheduled from 05.10.1985
• Review by Paul Elliott – Thanks to Guy Tkach

06.02.1986 – Hammersmith Odeon, London (Double O Charity – Marillion And Friends)

• Backstage Pass – Thanks to Denis Thomas
• Support Acts: John Otway with Robin Boult and Peter Hammill with John Ellis
• Guests on stage: Roger Chapman, Mike Oldfield, Joel, Phil Spalding, Mickey Simmonds (No. 09) and Steve Hackett (No. 10)
• Kerrang!, 06.03.1986: Hammersmith Heroes (review) by Mick Wall – Thanks to Yannick Dély

• Photos taken from The Web – Issue No. 20
• Kerrang!, 08.02.1986: Fish In The Bowl (announcement of Milton Keynes) – Thanks to Guy Tkach
• Kerrang!, 20.02.1986: Marillion Keynes! by Mick Wall

Misplaced Childhood – North American Tour 1986

February – april 29 shows.

• Interview: A Few Words With… Fish by Gary Graff (Detroit Free Press, March 1986) – Thanks to Jon Haverman
• Tour Itinerary: February March April 1986 – Thanks to Marko’s Marillion Museum
• T-Shirts: North American Tour 1986 and World Tour 1986

26.02.1986 – Mohawk Valley Community College, Utica, NY

• Flyer – Thanks to Tyler Pittman
• Ticket – Thanks to Duke A. Potter
• Mark Kelly’s Tour Backstage Pass – Thanks to Marko’s Marillion Museum
• Warm-up show
• Setlist by Claus Nygaard
• "As I recall, 700 tickets were sold for that particular Marillion concert in Utica, NY, and people as far away as Canada were requesting tickets for the show. Since it was a warm-up show, I could have sworn Marillion played the song Script For A Jester’s Tear twice during the show, as if they were practicing it." (Duke A. Potter)

27.02.1986 – Memorial Auditorium, Buffalo, NY

• Supporting: Rush

28.02.1986 – Super Skate Seven, Waterloo, Ontario

• The Thieving Magpie (La Gazza Ladra) was omitted for this show, Fish did a spoken intro instead: "This… er… we used to say in the old days, this gig is in actual fact very reminiscent of a concert we did in a place called Tonypandy in South Wales, right? And… er… what was said there could actually be said tonight cos if you want you can sit on the floor whatever you know? Take it easy, no point in standing up all the way through the gig you know? Just relax, get into it, you know? You fuckers in the seats would you ever bring the seats forward? Brilliant! This… er… we shall open with the set with a very broncail Ian Mosley! IAN TAKE IT AWAY!" (Transcription by Keith Wickenden)
• "This was the first time Marillion had played this sequence of old rock and rollers as a jam in concert!" (Terry Blake)
• "No, it wasn’t 🙂 The first time was at De Montfort Hall, Leicester – 29th January" (The Author)

01.03.1986 – The Concert Hall, Toronto, Ontario

• Ticket – Thanks to Dwight Hodge
• Photos – Thanks to Jason Leizer

"I was at that show, and remember particularly, the band was introduced by Shirley McQueen from Q107. Then a stagehand ran out, and unscrewed the mic, reached up as high as he could, then screwed it back in. Not sure if I was more surprised by how short Shirley McQueen was, or how tall Fish was – it was my first Marillion show." (Neil McGivney @ Facebook – 02.12.2020)

02.03.1986 – Barrymore’s, Ottawa, Ontario

• Date and venue provided by Yves Monast

03.03.1986 – Le Colisée, Québec City, Québec

• Ad with tour dates
• Photo by Richard Hbert

04.03.1986 – Montréal Forum, Montréal, Québec

• Ad and Ticket – Thanks to Denis Thomas

07.03.1986 – Le Rendez-Vous, Winnipeg, Manitoba

09.03.1986 – mcewen hall ballroom (university of calgary), calgary, alberta.

• Concert Poster – Thanks to Denis Thomas

10.03.1986 – Commodore Ballroom, Vancouver, British Columbia

• Ad and Concert Poster – Thanks to Denis Thomas

11.03.1986 – Parker’s, Seattle, WA

• Concert Poster and Tickets – Thanks to Denis Thomas

12.03.1986 – Erehwon Ballroom, Portland, OR

14.03.1986 – the old fillmore, san francisco, ca, 15.03.1986 – the roxy, los angeles, ca.

• Cymbiosis, July-August 1986: Marillion In Concert & In Words (interview with Steve and Pete) by Ric Levine

16.03.1986 – The Roxy, Los Angeles, CA

20.03.1986 – Market Square Arena, Indianapolis, IN

• Ad – Thanks to Andre Rostek

21.03.1986 – Rosemont Horizon, Chicago, IL

• Setlist by Peter Goodfield and Mark Abbott

• Photo by Steve Gungel

22.03.1986 – Rosemont Horizon, Chicago, IL

24.03.1986 – mecca arena, milwaukee, wi, 25.03.1986 – civic center, st. paul, mn, 27.03.1986 – devos hall, grand rapids, mi.

• Concert Poster

28.03.1986 – Joe Louis Arena, Detroit, MI

• "I don’t remember if it was after Kayleigh or if it was after Lavender that this happened, but there were a LOT of people in the audience that didn’t seem to care for Marillion. These idiots were tossing coins up at the stage, garbage etc. Well there were about 30-40 of us up front who were very much Marillion fans and were obviously enjoying the show, so Fish walks to the edge of the stage right in front of us, looks out at the crowd and says something to the effect of …for those of you not enjoying the show and throwing things up at the stage, these people up front have two words for you: FUCK OFF! I will never forget that moment. It was truly magical to see him so wanting to give a small group of us who were absolutely into the show the best performance possible and telling everybody else that if they didn’t like it, he didn’t really give a flying fuck." (MZ from Detroit)

29.03.1986 – Riverfront Coliseum, Cincinnati, OH

31.03.1986 – brendan byrne arena, east rutherford, nj, april 1986 – lady nina (single).

• Lady Nina released by Capitol

April 1986 – Brief Encounter (E.P.)

• Brief Encounter released by Capitol
• Promo Poster
• Kerrang!, 03.04.1986: ‘Counter Feat (review) by Mick Wall – Thanks to Mauricio Nicolas Velilla Mereles

01.04.1986 – Brendan Byrne Arena, East Rutherford, NJ

03.04.1986 – civic center, springfield, ma, 04.04.1986 – nassau coliseum, new york city, ny.

• Tickets – Thanks to Denis Thomas

17.04.1986 – Baltimore Civic Center, Baltimore, MD (cancelled show) (canc.)

27.04.1986 – california theater, san diego, ca.

• Photos by Jay Allen Sanford

• Photo by Craig Carroll

" Shot with a little 100 Instamatic camera at San Diego’s California Theater, a tragically under-attended show that was almost cancelled for low ticket sales (more the blame of the crumbling soon-to-close theater that had stuffed local newspapers over ads so often that the only way to find out about this show was the San Diego Reader calendar)." (Jay Allen Sanford)

28.04.1986 – Beverly Theater, Los Angeles, CA

• Ticket – Thanks to Marko’s Marillion Museum

29.04.1986 – Beverly Theater, Los Angeles, CA

Welcome to the garden party – summer 1986, june – august 13 shows.

• 2 shows of this tour were cancelled

06.05.1986 – Stadthalle, Offenbach (cancelled show) (canc.)

• "In June 1986 Marillion came back to Italy for a press conference and we spent 2 days with them (Fish was in Scotland)" Thanks to Ezio Candrini
• June 1986: Hotel Fiera, Milan (Pete, Ian and Steve with Paperlate/Real To Read staff)

11.06.1986 – Liseberg, Gothenburg

12.06.1986 – Gröna Lund, Stockholm

• Photos by Per Eriksen

• Photo by Per Eriksen
• (Unofficial) Poster: Welcome To The "Garden Party" Live

14.06.1986 – Hippodrome De Vincennes, Paris

• Ticket and Concert Poster at Queen Concerts – Thanks to Denis Thomas
• Photos by Gary Floyd
• Setlist by Michel Brinkerink

15.06.1986 – Olympiahalle, Munich (Rock In München ’86)

• Concert Poster (German tour dates)
• Ticket – Thanks to Luca Benporath
• Mark Kelly’s Artist Backstage Pass – Thanks to Marko’s Marillion Museum
• Running Order – Thanks to Luca Benporath
• Fish on stage

"The venue for the Munich show in 1986 was Olympiahalle (despite what was written on tickets etc.). I took a couple of pics of Fish backstage before the Marillion show." (Luca Benporath)

16.06.1986 – 1982-86 The Videos (VHS)

• 1982-86 The Videos released by EMI
• Ad in Kerrang! No. 123 (26.06.-09.07.1986)
• Review by Sylvia Patterson – Thanks to Georg Stevens

17.06.1986 – Stadthalle, Vienna

• "I had become a Marillion fan with Misplaced Childhood but very soon loved all their stuff – music, lyrics, covers, the lot. It didn’t take long either to find out that no-one else around me felt the same way about the band and that, unlike Germany, Austria chose to largely ignore the success Marillion was having at the time. But that was fine by me – feeling like the only Marillion fans (my brother was the other one) was somehow special. And then a Marillion concert was announced at the biggest indoor venue on offer in Vienna, with a capacity of up to 18,000. I didn’t care much for that before the concert, I was just too excited because it seemed like a miracle that Marillion played Vienna at all.
• It is difficult for me to tell how many people turned up, but the crowd seemed lost in the vast arena, and even Fish commented on this fact after Garden Party . And I can’t blame him. At this point in their career, they were used to playing the largest audiences outdoors and indoors, so I am sure this concert came as a shock. If it did, it shocked them into playing a wonderously dynamic set, with Fish singing bits in German and the crowd responding enthusiastically. The concert ended with Market Square Heroes including the wonderfully entertaining couple of cover versions of She Loves You and Let’s Twist Again . Recently stumbling across a recording of this show proved my recollections not exaggerated at all – it was a high-energy and fun concert and, probably needless to say, the best concert I have ever been to. It remained their only show in Austria." (Robert)

19.06.1986 – Ahoy Arena, Rotterdam

• Ticket – Thanks to Henk Roubos

• Photo by Henk Roubos

• June 1986: Welcome To The Garden Party (bandinfo, german language)

21.06.1986 – Maimarktgelände, Mannheim (Open Air 86)

• Musikexpress, April 1986: The Open Air ’86
• Musikexpress: Ad with german tour dates
• Concert Poster (Mannheim and Cologne)
• Ticket, Concert Posters, Backstage Passes at Queen Concerts – Thanks to Denis Thomas
• Stage Security Pass
• German radio broadcast (SWF3)
• No. 02 recorded for The Thieving Magpie (La Gazza Ladra)
• Wikipedia: Photo
• Fish was Queen’s guest on stage for Tutti Frutti . They introduced him “Hey, hey… Mr. Fish!”
• Report – Thanks to Denis Thomas
• No. 03 taken from German TV documentary Rocksommer ’86 (ZDF)

• Kerrang!, 26.06.1986: An American Prayer by Mick Wall

26.06.1986 – Waldbühne, Berlin (Open Air 86)

• Musikexpress: Ad with German tour dates
• Concert Posters – Thanks to by Denis Thomas
• Concert Poster at Queen Concerts – Thanks to Denis Thomas

28.06.1986 – Milton Keynes Bowl (National Bowl), Milton Keynes

• Sounds, 05.04.1986: Ad – Thanks to Guy Tkach
• Concert Posters and Ticket – Thanks to Denis Thomas
• V.I.P. Pass – Thanks to Jacek Bejer
• Guest Pass (yellow) – Thanks to Jacek Bejer
• Guest Pass (blue)
• T-Shirt: Garden Party
• Review: Tull Tales
• Review: Fish-Bowl! – Thanks to Stef Jeffery Depolla
• Review: Oh For Milton Keynes – Thanks to Stef Jeffery Depolla

• Photo by Mark Kelly

• Photo by Shaun Gardner
• "… once again from memory but I thought that Marillion covered Let’s Twist Again and amazingly Madonna’s Material Girl !" (Chris Dye)
• "I stayed with some friends of friends. We played Runequest the day before! It was a warm day and Jethro Tull supported I think. I remember walking home afterwards singing Bad Wolf Rising at the top of our voices. People must have hated us." (Dave Pashby)

• Photo by AJ Samuels

July 1986 – Welcome To The "Garden Party" Live (Single/Maxi)

• Welcome To The "Garden Party" Live released by EMI Elektrola, Germany
• Popular 1, July 1986: Marillion – El Sinfonico Que Non Muere by Joan Singla and Cesar Martin – Thanks to Meinart Hansen

17.07.1986 – Stadio Giuseppe Meazza, Milan

• Real To Read-Members (italian fan club) by Ezio Candrini
• Setlist by David Dunnington
• Italian radio broadcast (RAI)

19.07.1986 – Müngersdorfer Stadion, Cologne (Köln Open Air 86)

• Ticket – Thanks to Nicole Welzel
• Fish and Steve backstage with members of the Italian fan club – Photo by Ezio Candrini
• Photo in The Web – Issue No. 21
• Last entire Misplaced Childhood
• Guests on stage: Brian May ( Market Square Heroes ) and Fish ( Queen’s RnR Medley )

• July 1986: The Open Air 86 (poster with Queen, Marillion and Gary Moore) – Thanks to Denis Thomas

27.07.1986 – Rugby League Ground, St Helens (Soap Aid)

• No. 03 aired by Channel 4, broadcasting date unknown
• St Helens Star, 23.01.2021: When Soap Stars Mixed With Marillion At St Helens by Mike Critchley

• Photo by St Helens Star
• "The one [photo] with Fish looking to his left (see gallery below) was where he was berating a group of non Marillion fans fighting! My recollection of the fighting was it was nothing to do with the music, it was two groups of drunken mobs in the heat of the afternoon, Scousers and Wools (those from Liverpool, Scousers and those outsiders or Wools). I recall Fish screaming, “This is a rock concert, not a fucking battleground!” I think I captured Fish’s disdain in my photograph." (Kenton Lawton)

03.08.1986 – Olympia Theatre, London (British Music Fair)

• Ticket – Thanks to Phil Pio
• Ticket – Thanks to Matthew Hales
• Programme – Thanks to Julian Hulse
• Robin Boult played guitar because Steve married the day before!

04.09.1986 – Preco, Milan (cancelled show) (canc.)

Farewell to 1986, december 5 shows.

• Marillion played – Misplaced Childhood (Part 1) without Pseudo Silk Kimono – Misplaced Childhood (Part 2) without Waterhole (Expresso Bongo) and just the first section of Blind Curve – That Time Of The Night (The Short Straw) linked with Incommunicado Thanks to Paul Cavender
• Sounds, 06.12.1986: Tour Dates – Thanks to Guy Tkach
• Kerrang!, 11.12.1986: Straw Gods (report) by Mick Wall – Thanks to Mauricio Nicolas Velilla Mereles
• T-Shirt: Farewell To 1986

27.12.1986 – Civic Centre, Aylesbury (The Web Fan Club Show)

• Ticket – Thanks to Sandy Fearless
• Ticket in scrapbook – Thanks to Denis Thomas
• Mark Kelly’s AAA Backstage Pass – Thanks to Marko’s Marillion Museum
• Probably the last time Fish had face paint on stage
• Margaret was introduced by John Arnison

28.12.1986 – Civic Centre, Aylesbury (The Web Fan Club Show)

• Ticket (signed) – Thanks to Enric Pascual Poy
• Support Band: MGM
• Special guest on stage: Bruce Dickinson ( Margaret )
• Proceeds of both Aylesbury shows were donated to Aylesbury Hospice: GBP 5,500.00
• " Pendragon supported on 27th, on 28th a band called MGM with Bernie Marsden, Neil Murray (other members maybe Mel Galley and one or two more). I was there at 28th with the German Marillion fan club German Jesters . We all met the band before the show, I think all Iron Maiden members were there, too." (Andreas Budde)

• Photo by Stuart James

29.12.1986 – Royal Court Theatre, Liverpool

30.12.1986 – royal court theatre, liverpool, 31.12.1986 – barrowland ballroom, glasgow (the web fan club show).

• Fan club show, for members only – all fan clubs showed up!
• Mick Pointer and John Marter in the audience
• Review: Highland Fling by Grahame Bent
• Kerrang!, 22.01.1987: Highway To Hogmany by Mick Wall

Tour Programmes

Ahoy arena, rotterdam – 19.06.1986.

The Fan Club Years

Music from the beginning

Marillion – Misplaced Childhood Tour – 1985/6

January 29th 1986 – De Montfort Hall

This concert was due on September 29th 1985 (ticket date) but was cancelled due to Fish (the lead singer) having laryngitis.

Marillion were now a force to be reckoned with and producing some fantastic music.

Their latest album, Misplaced Childhood was being toured and had what have turned out to be classic rock songs, bordering on pop classics!

Lavender and particularly Kayleigh are regualarly heard on the radio, even now in 2019. I was tempted not to add the review of the time as it truly is a piece badly written by a journalist showing a dislike for the band. The concert, I think he concedes, was superb, but the sarcastic undertone shows why he is a local media journo!

Sure there are songs reminiscent of early Genesis, but there are also far more showing the progression this band has made to carve out a place in the music industry different from others.

I don’t know about the band changing, but the crowd would agree, definitely time for sad journos to move on.

I can only assume, Fish gave short shrift to this idiot and he thought he would try and be clever. Any which way another great Marillion performance with classics like Script for a Jester’s Tear and Forgotten Sons mixed in with the new material. All went down a storm.

The critics never really warmed to Marillion and quite probably it was more about Fish’s ambivalence to the media, but as a live band they were tight and very professional prog-rock band with melodic pop songs to boot and attracted a fiercely loyal following.

I don’t remember who the support act was, but it could well have been Pendragon again……

• The Thieving Magpie (La Gazza Ladra)La gazza ladra
• (Gioachino Rossini song)
• Emerald Lies (intro only)
• Script for a Jester’s Tear
• Pseudo Silk Kimono
• Bitter Suite
• Heart of Lothian
• Waterhole (Expresso Bongo)
• Lords of the Backstage
• Blind Curve
• Childhood’s End?
• White Feather
• Encore: Giz a Bun (Fish song), Fugazi, Punch and Judy, Market Square Heroes
• Chelsea Monday
• Encore : Forgotten Sons

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Misplaced Childhood

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Release Date

Recording date, recording location, discography timeline, allmusic review, user reviews, track listing, similar albums, moods and themes.

1985: Marillion - Misplaced Childhood

The albums which will be reviewed are either milestones in the history of progressive rock, or good examples of the catalogue of a certain band. Of course, we cannot review every special album and we cannot satisfy everyone's taste with our choices, which will be revealed over the year.

Our goal with this list of albums, is to show the quality and the diversity of different groups and different styles. So you won't find 6 Pink Floyd-albums, or 5 Genesis-albums, even though these bands have recorded many classics.

On this list, (almost) every week a new year is reviewed. For some years we will use two weeks, but at the end of December we will have reviews of every year, including the "dark" eighties...

We hope you will have lots of fun in the coming weeks with this selection of special albums that had been selected by the DPRP-team, especially for you!

The lyrics are even more fragmented than the music and because of the personal nature they're pretty difficult to interpret. Unlike last week's Counting Out Time issue The Pros and cons of hitchhiking these lyrics hardly read as a story.

Misplaced Childhood by Marillion

Album Reviews 1985 Albums , 2015 Reviews , Album Reviews by Ric Albano , British Artists , Marillion 1

Buy Misplaced Childhood

The group was formed (originally as “Silmarillion”) in 1979 by guitarist Steve Rothery . Fish joined on as vocalist in 1981 with keyboardist Mark Kelly and bassist Pete Trewavas joinig the following year. After releasing a three song demo which caught some attention, Marillion recorded and released their debut album, Script for a Jester’s Tear , in 1983. The album peaked in the Top 10 of the UK charts and spawned the Top 20 single, “Garden Party”. Former Steve Hackett drummer Ian Mosley joined the group in time to record their the second album, Fugazi , in 1984.

The concept for Misplaced Childhood was sparked during an “acid trip” by Fish when he hallucinated a vision of a child dressed as a soldier. He instantly wrote “a large scrawl of prose” with a mixture of autobiographical, traditional, and popular culture references. The album was recorded in the spring of 1985 in Berlin, Germany and produced by Chris Kimsey . Aside from composing the the music itself, the biggest challenge was getting the songs to flow together seamlessly from one song to the next, with some “link” sections constructed to get from point ‘A’ to point ‘B’.

The opener “Pseudo Silk Kimono” is a subtle, slow, and soft piece, fueled by long synth strings and guitar pedal effects throughout the two brief verses. “Kayleigh” is the signature song on this album and most indelible track from Marillion overall. A perfect song of reflection, which topped our list of Forgotten Rock Gems of the 1980s , the song is dripping with nostalgia and emotion lyrically while it is musically led by the great guitar riffing and fantastic lead by Rothery. Largely ignored in America, the song reached number 2 on the British charts and also ranked high in several other European countries. Most importantly, it holds up well 30 years later as a piece that represents the best elements of eighties rock.

“Childhoods End?” is a pleasant, almost poppy dance song, driven by the bouncy bass of Trewavas along with odd, funky rhythms during the verses. This is complemented by stronger, straight-forward rock choruses which work to make this track different than anything else on the album in musical vibe. The song’s title is phrased as a question which is ultimately answered in the negative at the very end of the lyrics. The closing “White Feather” is a new wave flavored, groove rap with animated drums and a uni-directional arrangement before it fades out to complete the album.

During the tour for Misplaced Childhood , Fish would often announce that there is time for only one more track before the band performed the entire album in sequence. Marillion followed up with a less successful fourth album, Clutching at Straws in 1987, before Fish left the band to pursue a solo career. He returned to the group in 2015 to launch the “Farewell to Childhood” tour, where the group plays the full LP to honor its 30 th anniversary.

Part of Classic Rock Review’s celebration of 1985 albums.

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“He [Fish] returned to the group in 2015 to launch the “Farewell to Childhood” tour, where the group plays the full LP to honor its 30th anniversary.”

Er, whomever wrote this article plainly knows little about Marillion or Fish.

Fish did not return to Marillion. The “Farewell to Childhood” tour was a solo tour with his own touring band with no appearances by any of the current members of Marillion.

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Marillion Misplaced Childhood 1985

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Uploaded by Abder31 on September 26, 2020

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‘Misplaced Childhood’: Behind The Album That Saw Marillion Come Of Age

Majestic and dream-like, Marillion's 1985 album, ‘Misplaced Childhood’, brought the neo-prog quintet success beyond their wildest dreams.

Long considered to be a captivating and kaleidoscopic masterpiece, Marillion’s third album, Misplaced Childhood , was a towering achievement that turned the band into the biggest prog-rock act of the 80s. Entrancing listeners with a tale of lost love and a disillusioned soul bathing in the fading glow of childhood memories, it saw singer-songwriter Fish pair his delirious stream-of-consciousness lyricism with Steve Rothery’s spellbinding guitar riffs to produce the group’s most vivid and evocative work to date.

Listen to ‘Misplaced Childhood’ here .

After cooking up the concept behind Misplaced Childhood during a ten-hour acid trip, Fish and the rest of the band relocated to Hansa Tonstudio, in West Berlin, in late 1984, to record the album with Rolling Stones producer Chris Kimsey. Though the sessions were undeniably productive, it’s a miracle the group made it out alive, with Fish’s wayward antics leading him on one occasion to strip off his clothes in Hitler’s favourite restaurant, and to throw bricks over the Berlin Wall in the hope of setting off landmines. Little did he realise that the resulting album would be just as explosive.

“The Wogan show lit the touchpaper on the whole thing”

Described by Fish as “a way of saying sorry” to an old flame called Kay, the album’s incendiary lead single, Kayleigh, was released in April 1985, a mesmerising hit-in-waiting full of Mark Kelly’s sizzling 80s synths and Steve Rothery’s blazing guitar arpeggios. After performing the song on Terry Wogan’s BBC One talk show, Wogan , in May 1985, Kayleigh set fire to the charts and asserted itself as one of the best Marillion songs . “The Wogan show was what did it,” Fish later said. “That lit the touchpaper on the whole thing.”

Following the Wogan performance, Fish broke into a smile that prompted Malcolm Hill, former Head Of Promotions at EMI, to declare that the singer had just “broke every mother’s heart in Great Britain”. Peaking at No.2 in the UK, and denting the US charts, Kayleigh instantly became one of 1985’s biggest hits, sending public interest into fever pitch over the impending release of its parent album.

Released on 17 June 1985, Misplaced Childhood went to No.1 in the UK and sold 100,000 copies in just one month. From its LSD-inspired opener, Pseudo Silk Kimono, to the strutting call-to-arms of White Feather, the album was a rousing prog-rock opus that meditated on the ruination of juvenile innocence and the pitfalls of adulthood. As Fish muses about ill-fated romance on the nearly eight-minute-long Bitter Suite, or recounts his alcohol-sodden adolescence on Waterhole (Expresso Bongo), there’s little doubt that Misplaced Childhood found Marillion’s neo-prog ambition reaching its peak.

“The subject matter was personal yet everyone could relate to it”

Keen to keep their commercial momentum going, Marillion released Lavender as the album’s second single, in August 1985. Starting out as a lilting piano ballad inspired by Joni Mitchell ’s experimental masterpiece The Hissing Of Summer Lawns , it soon blossoms into a soft-rock torch song with roots in the 19th-century nursery rhyme Lavender’s Blue. Entering the UK chart at No.5, Lavender grew out of the childhood themes dreamt up by Fish, who explores “the little boy’s dream” of walking through the park and bumping “into the lady of your dreams that you’re going to fall instantaneously in love with”.

Given its hallucinogenic origins, Lavender was a perfectly-formed psychedelic pop single that meshed naturally with the album’s all-encompassing prog-rock scope, sandwiched as it was between the blissful balladeering of Kayleigh and the swirling synth majesty of Bitter Suite. With Misplaced Childhood best seen as one long composition, its second half ventures beyond the lavender fields and into the uncharted terrain of adult life.

Having already hinted that he was growing tired of life on the road, Fish expresses his cynicism with the touring treadmill on the delightfully busy-fingered rocker Lords Of The Backstage. Immediately thereafter, the melancholic nine-minute odyssey of Blind Curve sees the singer reflect on the death of a friend in a car accident, set to one of Steve Rothery’s greatest guitar solos. However, by the album’s penultimate song, Childhood’s End?, his tone turns to optimism as he realises his “misplaced childhood” is alive and well, finally ready to be rejuvenated in the wind on White Feather. By that point, of course, Marillion themselves have taken flight.

“It was obvious that the band had gone up in musicianship”

The final single to be released from Misplaced Childhood was Heart Of Lothian, a song that saw Fish reflect upon his Scottish upbringing with a tribute to the city of Edinburgh. Though not as commercially successful as their previous hits, it still peaked at No.29 in the UK following its release, in November 1985, thanks to Fish’s poetic descriptions of “wide boys” on the Royal Mile and tower blocks looming like “stalagmites of culture shock”. With all the force of a literary giant, Heart Of Lothian stomped its way into everyone’s affections.

Part of what made Misplaced Childhood so era-defining was its artwork, created by Marillion’s long-time collaborator Mark Wilkinson, who had also designed the covers for their previous albums, Script For A Jester’s Tear and Fugazi . “It was obvious to everyone that the band had gone up a fair few notches in musicianship,” Wilkinson said. “The subject matter was at once personal yet everyone could relate to parts of it because we all remember our childhood.” Having asked the son of Wilkinson’s next-door neighbour to pose for the cover, which pictures the boy in a red military jacket and surrounded by storm clouds, the band then had him star in the promo video for Kayleigh, making him forever synonymous with the album’s success.

By the end of 1985 – a year which also saw them play Live Aid – Marillion had become one of the world’s biggest rock groups, successfully revitalising the prog-rock genre by embracing synths and a radio-friendly pop nous. Eventually selling over 815,000 copies, Misplaced Childhood is by far and away one of the best Marillion albums, and the band’s greatest achievement during their imperial phase. A stupendous work of child-like wonder, it has grown into a prog-rock classic that truly belongs in the annals of British rock history.

Find our which ‘Misplaced Childhood’ tracks made our list of the best Marillion songs .

• Album Stories

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• November 9, 1985 Setlist

Marillion Setlist at Parc des Expositions, Mulhouse, France

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Tour: Misplaced Childhood Tour statistics Add setlist

• Song played from tape The Thieving Magpie (La Gazza Ladra)La gazza ladra ( Gioachino Rossini  song) Play Video
• Emerald Lies ( intro only ) Play Video
• Script for a Jester's Tear Play Video
• Incubus Play Video
• Chelsea Monday Play Video
• The Web Play Video
• Pseudo Silk Kimono Play Video
• Kayleigh Play Video
• Lavender Play Video
• Bitter Suite Play Video
• Heart of Lothian Play Video
• Waterhole (Expresso Bongo) Play Video
• Lords of the Backstage Play Video
• Blind Curve Play Video
• Childhood's End? Play Video
• White Feather Play Video
• Fugazi Play Video
• Assassing Play Video
• Garden Party Play Video
• Market Square Heroes Play Video

Edits and Comments

4 activities (last edit by ExecutiveChimp , 13 Nov 2016, 20:08 Etc/UTC )

Songs on Albums

• Bitter Suite
• Blind Curve
• Childhood's End?
• Heart of Lothian
• Lords of the Backstage
• Pseudo Silk Kimono
• Waterhole (Expresso Bongo)
• White Feather
• Emerald Lies
• Chelsea Monday
• Garden Party
• Script for a Jester's Tear
• Market Square Heroes

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Marillion Gig Timeline

• Nov 07 1985 Exo 7 Le Petit-Quevilly, France Add time Add time
• Nov 08 1985 Le Zénith Paris, France Add time Add time
• Nov 09 1985 Parc des Expositions This Setlist Mulhouse, France Add time Add time
• Nov 10 1985 Marquee Club London, England Add time Add time
• Nov 11 1985 Hanns-Martin-Schleyer-Halle Stuttgart, Germany Add time Add time

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Misplaced Childhood (Deluxe Edition) [Remastered]

June 17, 1985 46 Songs, 3 hours, 35 minutes ℗ 2017 This Compilation Parlophone Records Ltd, a Warner Music Group Company

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The story behind the record cover - Misplaced Childhood (1985) - MARILLION

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