Porcupine Tree - Fear of a Blank Planet

I listen to Porcupine Tree since 1997, the era of Signify. Their new CD, Fear of a Blank Planet, was the most difficult for me to grasp it and realize what I was listening to. It took me more than 10 times to play it again and again and still I am not very sure I get the details.

First of all I have to say I believe that these guys are remarkable. After Deadwing, their previous work, a contract with a new label, more audience and more money they don’t take the easy way. On the contrary, they make difficult to listen to music and acid lyrics.

This work has to do with a single thing: how kids grow up in modern cities. Total boredom, pills and drugs, guns, shopping therapy and a long term denial. All these are reflected in their music too. Rage and intension most of the times, chill and void some others.

The music

Porcupine Tree keep changing their music and keep producing new music. How many do the same? This group is a team, not some musicians who play their part and that’s all. None of their work is a habit and most of all this one.

Fear of a Blank Planet is harsh. Guitars sound harder than ever before, sometimes you think you are hearing thrash metal music. But you ‘ve got to notice why it sounds like this. If you do this, you ‘ll understand and you ‘ll want more of it.

What hasn’t been changed is their style and melodies which can be found even at the hardest riffs. R. Barbieri, the man behind the keyboards, does his magic again. He can make a song sound chilly or warm an unsurpassed way.

Wilson keeps experimenting with his voice and that’s very interesting especially during some “sensitive” parts of songs. I do believe he is one of the most important musicians of his era. End of story.

The lyrics

What’s inside a teenager who is growing up in New York, London or Athens? How does he treat school, his parents or his everyday life? These lyrics are not smooth.

X-box is a god to me
A finger on the switch
My mother is a bitch
My father gave up ever trying to talk to me

The boredom of having tasted everything and there is nothing new, the dull of TV, the elusiveness, the longing of escaping. It doesn’t matter how, you just want to go away.

Let’s sleep together right now
Relieve the pressure somehow
Switch off the future right now
Let’s leave forever

You go the mall. You get bored. You steal. You get bored. You watch porno and you get bored. You find a gun. You take pills to change your routine and in the end you get bored.

We’re lost in the mall, shuffling through the stores like zombies
Well what is the point?
What can money buy?
My hands on a gun and I find the range, God tempt me
Well what did you say?
Think I’m passing out

Two words for the end

Fear of Blank Planet is a difficult and amazing CD. You first realize it is not easy and then you discover its beauty. Of course this is not music for everyone. It doesn’t matter.

I am glad Porcupine Tree are not mainstream. I am glad they change and they become better. You see, there is this creeping music lowness which engulf us day by day. I am glad these guys are still alive and kicking and their music makes our days and nights better.