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Afraid of Sunlight
The theme of the album is the destructive nature of fame. The Freaks list has resonated with argument and counter-argument about whether the album is truly conceptual, with a story running through the songs or not. For what it is worth, I feel that the album is thematic and shows snapshots of various people destroyed directly or indirectly by their own myths and fame: Elvis, Malcolm Campbell, Kurt Cobain, OJ Simpson, Mike Tyson, John Lennon, even Phil Spector, a man destroyed by this prodigious drink and drug intake whilst being responsible for some of the most memorable singles of all time, whose production values are apparent on Beyond You. The songs run through those which are directly linked to these individuals (Gazpacho, Out of this World, King) to those which muse more generally on the themes (Afraid of Sunrise/ Sunlight and Beautiful) and which seem to be concerned with people's obsession of reaching the heights of fame that the Elvises and Cobains had, regardless of the consequences. In many ways, this second group of songs are, I find, difficult to understand. I never quite know what point they are making and am more than willing to be corrected on any mis-analysis I've made. Cover notes: The cover for AOS is a dirty child with angel wings growing from his shoulders. Behind him a halo of flame burns brightly. The moniker and album title are in a modified rounded Arial font. Personally, I find the art work looks cheesy and second rate. It is particularly disappointing when you compare it to the rest of the art work which is very effective. The back cover shows a purple-tinged version of the huge statue of Jesus that stands over Rio, clearly referring to the 'dayglo Jesus' in Afraid of Sunlight, the song. Behind the dayglo drop-shadow, we see an image that corresponds to the ring of fire on the front, but which looks more like a crown of thorns; apt for the Christ figure. All this is over a montage of a desertscape, possibly the Nevada desert of the title song, a rain spattered window and eventually what might be a blurred image of flames. I wonder whether this refers back to the four elements, earth, fire, wind and water, that appeared on Season's End.
This merges into panel three via the spray of a breaking wave. The third panel features a body shot of a laméd suit with a string tie. If it is not actually him, the picture is meant to call to mind Elvis. This merges into the last panel via a field of poppies. These symbolise two things to me; heroin (or rather opiates) and secondly, with the twister earlier (and adding in the fact that I did the Pink Floyd/ Wizard of Oz thing the night before writing this) maybe this is a reference to Judy Garland. The final pain shows a half lit face of a sweating, moustachioed man. I think he may have a black eye. I don't know whether this is true but I think it might be boxer Jake La Motta, who inspires parts of Gazpacho.
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Introduction:
Afraid of Sunlight was Marillion's fourth Hogarth-era
release. After the bleak introspection of Brave, many fans might have
expected something a little lighter in tone. At first listen, one might be
tempted to think that AOS was that album but scratch the surface and you
have an album that has an emotional intensity rivalled by none.
At
the bottom of all this on the vinyl version, and on the inner cover on the
CD are four panels which merge into one another. All feature the crown of
thorns. The first features a figure standing on a desolate beach, maybe
'telling it to the ocean' then a field of crops with a twister in the
background fades into the second panel which mainly features the tail fin of
some sixties US car. Dave Rogers emailed me to
say "I reckon that's the tail fin from a '59 Cadillac, a bit of an 'icon' in
its own right. It's the sort of car that fits in with the glitz and glamour
of Hollywood, and would think it a popular accessory of the stars."
Furthermore, Dave sourced the picture to the left from