November 2011: The German gigs postponed from October will now take place in February 2012.
November 2011: Our apologies for the website and shop downtime recently, the outages were due to circumstances beyond our control. Hopefully everything has been returned to normal now!
October 2011: Word from Fish: The Germany gigs in Königs Wusterhausen (14th October) and Magdeburg (15th October) have been postponed because Fish has not recovered from the virus.
July 2011: The trailer for the movie "Electric Man" has been released. The cast and crew screening is on 21st July and screening to distributors will be in London on the 24th August. We'll let you know as soon as we hear a general release date.
July 2011: There was a broadcast of Fish's "Takeover" radio show on Tuesday 21st June at 10pm GMT on Rock Radio in Glasgow, Edinburgh, Newcastle, Yorkshire, Manchester and South Wales. It was also available at Rockradio.co.uk and on the smart phone apps. It was a 2 hour show of some of Fish's favourite rock classics and the tracks he played can be found on Rock Radio's website.
June 2011: Fish has been featured in the newspapers again.
"Fish becomes a miner celebrity" - story in the Scottish Sun about Fish's gig in Zabrze. Published 24th June 2011.
"Rocker Fish set to play benefit gig for his own former masonic lodge" in the Edinburgh Evening News - published 22nd June 2011.
"Singer Fish to play benefit gig for East Lothian Masonic lodge" on STV - published 22nd June 2011.
June 2011: Due to circumstances outwith my control I recently discovered that the present domain name will soon become unavailable and I have been prompted to find a new one for the web site.
It has proved fortuitous as I have managed to find a domain name which gives me slightly more identity with the web site and is less ambiguous but still retains our original title.
Very soon, the official Fish site will be moving from its current home to this new one. Eventually the-company.com will be phased out, so please change your bookmarks to http://www.fish-thecompany.com/ as this is now operational.
In the very near future the-company.com will point to another business with no connection to my own activities so if you're browsing the web and find a link to it, please contact the editor of that web site and ask them to update to the new address. Your help with this would be appreciated.
The "official" profiles such as Facebook, MySpace, Reverbnation, etc. are within our control and will be changed very soon.
During the Summer I plan to set up another web site, fishheadsclub.com which will be the centre of the Fishheads releases at the end of the year .The web site http://www.fish-thecompany.com/ will continue to host the forum and act as the community site.
This year is heralding a number of new beginnings and projects and the new domain name change has become part of that process.
Thanks for being out there and for spreading the word.
May 2011: The office will be closed from 2pm on May 25th until Friday June 2nd while Elspeth and Fish take part in a charity walk. You can sponsor them on the Just Giving web site. Orders can still be placed during this period but items won't be shipped until after June 2nd.
May 2011: Fish has written some blogs on his forum. These have been linked into Fish's blog page.
May 2011: Fish is sorry to say that he won't be performing with PFM in London as personal commitments have soaked up any available time he had at the end of May.
April 2011: The office is closed until Monday 9th May due to staff holidays. Merchandise will not be shipped until after that date.
April 2011: The Braunschweig gig in Germany on the 14th April has been lost when the promoter announced bankrupcy. Fish was unable to find a replacement date with another promoter at such short notice and apologises for the inconvenience.
April 2011: Fish regretully has to announce that the gigs in Milan 9th May, Camino 10th and Rome on the 11th are postponed and will be moved to June. A football match in Rome on the day meant that the promoter asked him to move the show and without the Rome gig the Italian section didn't work. There will hopefully be more Italian dates added as there have been offers of more shows at open air events.
March 2011: The gigs on Wednesday 22nd March in Aarhus and on Thursday the 23rd March in Odense have both been cancelled due to poor ticket sales. Please contact the venues for refunds. Fish sends his apologies.
February 2011: Due to a conflict, the date of the Derby gig has changed from Sunday 22nd May to Thursday 9th June. Any tickets already purchased will still be valid.
January 2011: The office will be closed from the 21st to 28th of January inclusive. Orders can still be placed during this period but will not be processed until after the 28th.
December 2010: Due to bad weather, Fish reluctantly decided to cancel the Stratford show. He wrote to the forum when everyone was safely home.
December 2010: Because The Boardwalk in Sheffield hasn't re-opened in time after it was sold, there has been a venue change. The gig is now at The Plug 14-16 Matilda Street, Sheffield S1 4QD.
November 2010: Due to heavy snow in Scotland, Edinburgh airport has been closed for most of the day and as a result Fish, Frank and Foss have been unable to fly to Norway. The cancelled gigs may be rescheduled within a far bigger tour which will also take in Danish and Swedish shows in the Spring of next year. Yatta is discussing dates for that period with other countries and Fish hopes to be able to confirm the rescheduled dates as soon as he can. Sincere apologies to the Norwegian fans.
October 2010: On October 21st, Fish was featured in The Scottish Sun.
September 2010: Two gig dates (Manchester and Stratford upon Avon) have changed.
September 2010: The gig at the University of Derby, both nights at St Mary's Church and two shows in Germany will be filmed and recorded for a future release involving the Fishheads project.
August 2010: Due to staff holidays, Fish's office will be closed from Thursday 2nd September until Friday 10th September. Online orders can still be taken but won't be processed until after the 10th.
August 2010: Fish has confirmed that the Fishheads Club will be in residence at St Mary's Church Haddington on Saturday the 23rd October. There is an option for another show on the Friday but that will depend on the level of interest. Saturday tickets are available now. If you'd like to attend a Friday show as well, please use the "Enter any special delivery instructions:" box in the Shipping And Handling section of the Shop checkout page when you order. If you could put something like "Friday 3 tickets" then Elspeth will keep a list. This doesn't put you under any obligation to buy them, should the gig go ahead! If you're not ordering tickets for the Saturday gig but could go to a Friday gig, or you've already bought your tickets, please send Elspeth an email. Thanks!
July 2010: Fish is mentioned in The Guardian newspaper and the East Lothian Courier.
July 2010: Fish appeared on "Beechgrove Garden" on Wednesday 14th July 2010 on BBC One Scotland. He was also interviewed on "MacAulay and Co" on July 13th on BBC Radio Scotland.
June 2010: On June 11th, Fish auditioned for a new series being made by HBO.
April 2010: Fish took part in a 96 mile charity walk along the West Highland way for six days commencing Saturday 22nd of May. This was organised by the guys at "Another Way Around" and there are "Just Giving" pages where you can donate directly. All money collected goes to cancer research and CHAS - more details about the walk are on the "Another Way Around" web site news page.
April 2010: The Planet Rock "win a pub crawl with Fish" competition has now closed.
April 2010: Fish has been in the newspapers again, first in the Scotsman with the news that he'll be appearing in "Electric Man" and also in the Daily Record (Sunday Mail) with the annoucement of his divorce.
April 2010: Fish is taking part in another movie in September. It's an independently made Scottish film called "Electric Man" and he has been asked to play the villain! You can find out more about the film and the background to the production at Strange Boat.
He also took part in"The Government Inspector" with the Theatre Alba Adult Leisure group over the weekend of 22nd/23rd/24th April at the Netherbow (Scottish Storytelling Centre) in Edinburgh.
December 2009: We now have a new Shop design! If you've visited our Shop recently, you might have to refresh/reload the pages to see it properly because your browser could have cached the pages and images. If you have any issues with the software, please please email a description of the problem and we'll try to resolve it. Thanks!
November 2009: Fish was involved in the opening of the new community radio station East Coast FM. The station is broadcasting on 87.7 FM and also via their web site. Fish hosted a programme called "Fish Head Curry" on 2 Monday nights between 8 and 10pm (UK). Due to voice problems, Fish has reluctantly cancelled the last 2 shows that were planned.
November 2009: The NEARFest DVD is available now.
November 2009: Mark Wilkinson's long anticipated book 'Shadowplay' features his artwork for Fish and Marillion as well as the best of his art over a thirty year career for bands like Iron Maiden, Judas Priest, The Darkness, Bon Jovi and many other bands, as well as for the Judge Dredd comic and Red Dwarf TV series. There are some sample pages on his web site. He received some early copies of the hardback version recently, just in time for a trip to Switzerland to promote the book and also to send a review copy to Classic Rock, and the first reviews are 'stunning'. So if anyone is thinking of a special Christmas present this year, please contact Mark by email.
Mark takes delivery of the books on November 19th and hopes to begin shipping them soon after.
October 2009: The Fish office will now only be open on Monday, Wednesday and Friday between 10am and 2pm. Merchandise orders can be placed at any time but will only be processed on these days.
I was proud to be the recipient recently of a "Friars Heroes Award" from Mike O Connor at the Friars Aylesbury Website in recognition of my many appearances at the club in the '80s with Marillion.
I was quite surprised after all these years but with the resurgence of "Hobble on the Cobbles" and a vibrant Aylesbury music scene there is renewed interest in the Friars legacy, which is immense and well worthy of celebration as one of the most important live music clubs in the UK.
To be recognised as a major part of that history is a profound honour.
Most of you are well aware of the famous shows we performed there in the early days of the bands history and our glorious returns to the hallowed hall throughout the years of our success. They have been well documented in band biographies.
Although I played in Aylesbury Civic a few times as a solo artist the Friars club itself had closed and the Civic itself now is a building site with the new Civic being built in another location.
The club has a fascinating history for Marillion fans as well as followers of the history of the UK music scene through the '70s and '80s.
Mike has put together a comprehensive compendium of Friar's lore with reviews, photos and paraphernalia from throughout the clubs history and has interviewed many bands and characters involved with the club which you can find on the web site.
There will soon be an interviews available that he conducted with both myself and other members of the band about our memories from those early days.
I just want to say a huge sincere thanks to Mike and all the people involved in the Friars website for the award and to congratulate them on a great job giving the club and it's founder and mentor, David Stopps, the recognition they deserve.
We have always strived to keep our costs on postage and packaging to a minimum and apart from passing on rises in postage prices our packaging charges have been frozen for over two years. The last change to the postal prices also brought in a structure relating to sizes of packages and although we have tried to accommodate this we have discovered our packaging prices have risen and are outstripping our charges. Together with the rise in additional office costs relative to the mail order operation I regretfully have to announce that from Friday 25th September we will have to add a nominal 40 pence an order which is identified as a "handling charge" when you place an order. I hope you will find that the recent price reductions on the merchandise available from Chocolate Frog Records will more than accommodate the necessary rise in P and P charges from the mail order operation.
September 2009: Fish now has an official Twitter profile. This will probably not be updated but has been added due to the recent impersonation attempt.
August 2009: There is a new "Things you always wanted to ask Fish" section on the forum. Fish has already answered several of them - add your question!
August 2009: There is a review of the convention on the Leamington Courier web site.
August 2009: Annie Othen interviewed Fish for BBC Coventry & Warwickshire on Friday 7th August 2009. This will be available via the BBC iPlayer for a short time.
August 2009: The gig at Crathes Castle in Banchory on Friday 14th August was cancelled by the promoter due to poor sales.
August 2009: A live report from the Convention was available on the Company Poland site from Friday.
August 2009: Fish was interviewed live on Nicky Horne's Planet Rock show on Sunday 2nd August at just after 9pm.
July 2009: The East Lothian Courier has featured an article about Fish. This mentions his plans for writing a book, as well as his recent marriage.
June 2009: We are delighted to announce that Fish and Katie are married! I'm sure you'll join with us in wishing them all the very best for their future together. Some photos of their wedding are available now.
May 2009: Fish is now a Classic Rock Society patron along with Rick Wakeman, Carl Palmer, John Wetton, Dave Greenslade, Rod Argent and Steve Hackett.
April 2009: 3 new Marillion remasters are available now.
March 2009: Fish now has an official profile on FaceBook. You'll have to be a FaceBook member to join the list of fans.
December 2008: The Fish forum has moved! Existing members of the old forum can find their unique temporary password for the new one by logging in and checking their private messages for one with the subject line of "Your new The Union password". You will need this when you first try to log into the new place; if you have already been successful then you can ignore it. You should change this temporary password as soon as you can - details about how to do this can be found in "Feedback, Q&A, general forum stuff".
We'll leave the old forum open for a bit longer while people continue to move across, but you won't be able to view or post to any topics there because they've been transferred.
If anyone is still having trouble logging in, please send an email and we'll try to sort it out for you. Make sure you tell us your forum user name, which web browser you are using and any details about the problem.
Come along and join us, we hope you like our new building!
November 2008: 'Fish On Friday' returned to Planet Rock! On Sunday 2nd November at 7pm there was a two hour show of highlghts from last year's series, then on 7th November at 6pm 'Fish On Friday' was back for a new series of 2 hour shows. Listen online at the Planet Rock web site, on DAB digital radio, Sky Channel 0110, Cable TV Channel 924, Freesat Channel 730 or, if you have a mobile phone that is compatible or an Internet Radio that streams WMA files, you can find info that you'll need to listen via other devices.
November 2008: On the 21st of October 2008, "Zoe 25" was at #26 in the Top 50 Indie Singles.
November 2008: On November 1st, Fish sponsored a game at Pontardawe football club. He was the match day sponsor of the home Welsh League game against Cwmbran Town. Pontardawe won 6-0!
September 2008: Marillion: "The Early Stages" - Official Bootleg Box Set 1982-1987 is a 6 CD box set containing archive material of Fish's performances with Marillion and taken from licensed BBC recordings, Radio Clyde and the EMI archive. The CDs are all individually packaged in a specially designed box set with new artwork commissioned from Mark Wilkinson and containing extensive sleeve notes written by Fish.
Exclusive offer! The Company and Racket Records have teamed up to bring you a bonus: an extra-special A4 print of the box set cover artwork signed by Fish, Steve Rothery, Mark Kelly, Pete Trewavas, and Ian Mosley, free of charge (while stocks last) as a thank you for supporting us!
September 2008: During the week ending September 20th, the Daily Mail newspaper gave away an album every day for 12 days. Misplaced Childhood was free on the 19th September.
I'm sad to say that I have to announce that I have decided to call it a day on Fish TV. It was a great idea but costs of creating the programmes were greater than the income from subscriptions and with so much stuff available on YouTube and the like, difficult to attract people to sign up.
I still have a lot of material which I hope to incorporate into the remasters as a bonus DVD with accompanying interviews etc. That's something I am looking into at the end of the year.
Just to say thanks to Andy and Jeff and all the guys at AVP for putting all the work in over the last year. We gave it a good try but in the end we all had to agree that financially it wasn't making sense.
Thanks to all of you who subscribed and hope you had some fun watching the clips and interviews!
As you have probably read they are no longer taking subscriptions and anyone who has already subscribed will be refunded in full (payments made during August) by the suppliers.
August 2008: The new bass player is Gavin Dickie, who appeared with Fish in Poland in 1995 and plays regularly with Frank in the Border Boogie Band.
July 2008: '13th Star' dDouble vinyl gatefold including reworked artwork (both Dark Star and Angel/Boat designs in different versions) and specially redesigned labels. The discs are high quality 180gm vinyl, the track listing is the same as the CD on sides 1-3 with side 4 made up of live material from tour recordings - "Circle Line" from the Rome show 2007 with "Dark Star" and "13th Star" from The Amsterdam Paradiso in March 2008. Mastered by Calum Malcolm, limited edition of 2000.