Steve Rothery has put a rough timeline on Steve Rothery’s vision for Marillion’s future, telling Classic Rock he does not expect the band to still be working beyond another six years, while confirming a new studio album is in progress and a landmark show at the Pompeii amphitheatre is being filmed.
Pompeii, new songs and the heat
The Pompeii dates are being used as a kind of pressure test. Rothery says the German leg of the current tour, including two nights in Leipzig, has been serving as rehearsal for the Pompeii shows, with the band adding one or two new tracks each night. ‘It probably will change a bit by the time we get home,’ he said, ‘especially from tonight and tomorrow in Leipzig, because those will pretty much be rehearsals for Pompeii, which we are filming.’
The prospect clearly means something to him. ‘I’m excited and a bit nervous, to be honest, especially about the heat,’ Rothery said. ‘Over the last few days temperatures have been in the mid-thirties, so in Pompeii it could reach the forties. My valve-preamps have been crackered out.’ He visited the site as a tourist in the eighties, and describes the idea of playing there as ‘mind-blowing.’
One of the songs being road-tested ahead of those shows is a track from the forthcoming studio album, Marillion’s twenty-first. It’s called Rhythms And Lace. Rothery describes it as ‘a slow-builder with powerful lyrics and a long guitar solo at the end.’ On the album’s release window, he’s cautiously optimistic: if mixing wraps in December after touring finishes, he said, ‘it could be out by the following springtime. Maybe around May?’
Steve Rothery Marillion future and the UK tour dates
A 14-date British tour is the immediate priority. According to the official Marillion tour page, dates include the Royal Concert Hall Nottingham on 20 September 2026, Friars Waterside Aylesbury on 21 September, Symphony Hall Birmingham on 23 September, Corn Exchange Cambridge on 24 September, Glasshouse Gateshead on 26 September, Philharmonic Liverpool on 27 September, Usher Hall Edinburgh on 29 September, and two nights at the Eventim Apollo Hammersmith on 1 and 2 October 2026. Cornish alt. rock quartet Haunt The Woods are along as support, having appeared with the band before. Rothery called them ‘great musicians and a lovely bunch of people.’
The UK run is far from the end of the touring cycle. Marillion also have dates scheduled in the Netherlands in 2026 and Australia in December 2026, making this one of the band’s more globally ambitious runs in recent memory.
Setlist construction is its own balancing act with over forty years of material to draw from. ‘It’s about finding a balance between old and new,’ Rothery said. The tour press release flags that new material will ‘hopefully’ be heard on the British dates, and given that Rhythms And Lace has already been road-tested on the German run, that seems likely.
The Hackett collaboration and life outside Marillion
Running alongside all of this is The Roaring Waves, a collaborative album Rothery has made with Steve Hackett. The nautical concept was Rothery’s own: he grew up in Whitby, and the sea is embedded in his musical thinking. ‘We wanted something cinematic,’ he said. ‘You make movies in your head to go along with the music.’
The project has been a long time coming. Rothery and Hackett had their first writing session nine years ago, with the bulk of the material written during a two-day jam at Marillion’s Racket Club rehearsal space in 2018. ‘Steve and I get on really well socially, which helps,’ Rothery said. ‘It’s a really nice, noncompetitive collaboration.’ A second album is already being discussed, and Rothery says he has ideas forming for it. A live show together hasn’t happened yet, but the conversations are ongoing.
Rothery’s solo diary also stays busy. He has shows booked at Trading Boundaries in East Sussex on 15 and 16 January 2027, listed on Marillion’s official site.
On Fish, the clock and what comes next
Rothery was asked about the retirement from touring of former Marillion frontman Fish in 2025. His response was generous. ‘It’s a shame that the world lost such a remarkable poet and frontman,’ he said, adding that Fish’s choice to settle in the Outer Hebrides ‘seemed like a very strong reaction to whichever pressures he has felt. But at the end of the day everyone deserves to be happy, and if he is then I understand that decision.’
As for Marillion themselves, Rothery is clear-eyed about the arithmetic. ‘At our ages, I don’t see us working beyond maybe six more years,’ he said. But the alternative doesn’t appeal either. ‘What are we going to do? Retire and sit in our kitchens?’ The UK tour opens at the Guildhall in Portsmouth on 12 September.
