Liverpool Sound and Vision 9/10

To have your essence, your personality, your soul, captured by an artist is perhaps the sincerest sign of immortality that one person can bestow upon another.

We become excited by the thought of seeing ourselves on the television, maybe filmed at a concert in the front row, or at a football match where the scorer of the decisive goal rushes to the crowd to celebrate, and the camera picks you out; screen shot saved for all eternity. Yet that fleeting rush is only produced because of the single moment, not one framed by the eyes of an artist who sees beneath the skin veneer and the outer shell and who appreciates the soul enough to weave into existence a song that truly marks you out as being remarkable; a human being with a story to tell.

Such artistry is a tribute, praise from within, and if the long since passed Eleanor Rigby can become a symbol of loss and sadness, the epitome of human disadvantage and neglect, then its counterbalance is sure to be found in the latest creation by David Neville King, and in the superb Marko Cigaro, one of Liverpool’s best known modern characters, removes their trademark hat from their head, takes a genial bow, and becomes immortalised, forever a part of Liverpool’s music history.

The subject is widely known, but as with all legends, you would have to had come across them to appreciate what the artist sees, what they have witnessed. It is half the fun of listening to a song that has been written with another person in mind, especially when it is someone from the salt of the Earth, a real treasure; and not some high-ranking celebrity, some big cheese who will not understand the enormity of the moment, but who will revel in the attention in such a way that can become nauseating.

Marko Cigaro is the expression of human existence captured, it is to realise that at some point we can all be touched by the artist’s hand and turned into living memory. A great, great song, one that does David Neville King and his Muse absolute credit.

Ian D. Hall