Critical Reception
| Professional ratings | |
|---|---|
| Review scores | |
| Source | Rating |
| Allmusic | |
| Q | |
| Music Street Journal | (very favourable) link |
Q magazine:
“Were it not for the swirling curlicues of the arrangements against which he explores his relationship with the demon drink this could almost be Fish's country and western record, so conspicuously soaked is it in the self-pity that follows straight on the heels of self-indulgence … Musically, Clutching At Straws doesn't depart far from the educated arrangements of previous albums. However somebody has been applying a stop watch to the individual songs and to the solos within them; thus we have eleven distinct songs, each with its own melodic virtues and most with quite acceptable hook lines barked out by Fish in his by now familiar conflation of Roger Daltrey and Peter Gabriel … There are tracks here that could have snuck into Sting's live act quite easily … Marillion may represent the inelegant, unglamorous, public bar end of the current Rock Renaissance but they are no less part of it for that. Clutching At Straws suggests that they may be finally coming in from the cold.”
The album came sixth in Kerrang! magazine's Albums Of The Year 1987.
Read more about this topic: Clutching At Straws
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