However, the track "State of Mind", featuring former Dire Straits guitarist Hal Lindes on guitar and guest musician John Keeble from Spandau Ballet on drums, was released as a single as early as 16 October 1989, more than three months ahead of the album.

The painting contains many references to the lyrics, political allusions as well as "hidden" messages only understandable to fans (such as the faces of Marillion's keyboardist Mark Kelly and manager John Arnison).

The central element is a "hill" consisting of junk consumer goods in a post-apocalyptic landscape, on top of which a couple clad in pseudo-oriental clothes stare into the distance, holding an hourglass.

[citation needed] Other songs express a more general disgust with materialism ("Vigil", "View From The Hill" and "The Company", the last of which is also a coded account of Fish's disillusionment with and departure from Marillion).

The phrase "wilderness of mirrors" is originally from T. S. Eliot's poem Gerontion, but has since become a widely used metaphor for disinformation in spy fiction, where Fish picked it up.

A number of the lyrical concepts on the album (most particularly, the Voice in the Crowd motif) can be heard in Marillion demo sessions released on the 1999 remaster of Clutching at Straws.

As he is primarily a lyricist and not a musical composer, Fish collaborated with keyboardist Mickey Simmonds in writing all songs except "View From the Hill", which was co-written and recorded with current Iron Maiden guitarist Janick Gers.

In 2024, a deluxe edition of Vigil In A Wilderness Of Mirrors was released on Chocolate Frog Records as a 3CD digibook, a 4CD/Blu-ray set, and a 2LP boxed version.

CD 2 Demos CD 3 Live Dusseldorf Phillips Halle 7/12/91 "Uncle Fish and the Crypt Keepers" Hammersmith Odeon 2/4/90 "Pigpen's Birthday" Utrecht Vredenberg 21/3/94 "Sushi" Haddington Corn Exchange 8/11/91 "Derek Dick and his Amazing Dancing Bear" Leamington Spa, 24/11/21 "Vigils End" The Studio, Spittalrig Farm "Fishheads Club Acoustic Versions 11/3/12"

CD 2 Demos CD 3 Live BBC Town and Country 11/11/89 Hammersmith Odeon 2/4/90 "Pigpen's Birthday" BBC Nottingham Royal Court 15/11/91 Muziekcentrum Enschede 28/6/02 CD 4 Live (continued) Dusseldorf Phillips Halle 7/12/91 "Uncle Fish and the Crypt Keepers" Haddington Corn Exchange 8/11/91 "Derek Dick and his Amazing Dancing Bear" Utrecht Vredenberg 21/3/94 "Sushi" Przemysl, Poland 97 Leamington Spa, 24/11/21 "Vigils End" The Studio, Spittalrig Farm "Fishheads Club Acoustic Versions 11/3/12" Blu-ray Disc The only Fish album to be released by EMI, it was also his most commercially successful.