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After Mick Pointer was booted from Marillion's drum stool by Fish, he pretty much withdrew from music to focus on his business and family. Ten years later, he met up with Clive Nolan and began writing new music together. And by "new," I mean in the neo-prog style established in the 1980's by Clive's and Mick's other bands, but updated with an epic hard rock edge. Kinda like a bastard son of a tawdry 1981 affair between Genesis and Rush. Big production numbers, stretching well beyond radio-play time limits, incorporating lots of differing bits thrown together to tell stories of passion, heartbreak, revolution, triumph, and stuff like that. I find myself liking the bits, but as whole songs, they mostly suffer from discontinuity and disjointedness. "Valley of the Kings," with its "Dodo" rip-off intro, is the only rock track I like all the way through. So then there's the "Crying for Help" series. This was originally intended to be a complete piece of music, but they ended up using the bits as little atmospheric interludes between the epic rock tracks. Something about them invokes images of adventure video games like Final Fantasy or The Legend of Zelda. The exception is "IV," which features the whole band in rock-ballad mode, and featuring an appropriately wailing guitar solo from guest Steve Rothery. This being Arena's first album, it feels to me more like a statement of intent, rather than an actual musical statement. Their influences are apparent throughout, and at the same time they're finding their own voice. Better things were to come. review by Jack Hesse — 12-1-00 —

s e a n

Arena was formed in the mid-90s by keyboardist Clive Nolan (the man of a million projects, although this remains his main one) and drummer Mick Pointer, former cast-off of Marillion. Guests include Steve Rothery on guitar for one track, and banshee Tracy Hitchings as a member of the "crowd". The music is very much in the Marillion style, in particular due to vocalist John Carson, who does a good job imitating Fish's overdramatic vocal style circa Fugazi. Nolan and guitarist Keith More also stay in their expected roles, with homages to Kelly and Rothery respectively. Breaking up the tribute band atmosphere are the four "Cry for Help" numbers, more acoustic, pastoral pieces of which the first three are instrumental, and the fourth adds vocals in a ballad style. Definitely the best parts of the disc, and all too short, although the telephone sound effects in the third are pretty hackneyed, and the Fish-isms in the fourth are marring. Even those who deny that Marillion was copying Genesis would have a hard time claiming that Arena wasn't copying Marillion, at least at this point in their career. Unless you are someone who either wouldn't notice, or wouldn't mind, it's hard to recommend this particular release. review by Sean McFee — 3-30-03 —