The Ministry of Information has posted good reviews of both Porcupine Tree’s “Fear of a Blank Planet” and their gig at Preston.
But there are a couple of thowaway lines I rather take exception to. This one…
Queuing outside the venue, the audience seemed older and more predominantly male than usual, wearing a disconcerting number of retro ‘prog’ T-shirts.
And then this…
The album features guest appearences from Alex Lifeson and Robert Fripp from Rush and King Crimson respectively, if not respectfully – I’m not an admirer, and including what music critics and potential album purchasers could regard as ‘prog dinosaurs’ was needlessly dangerous. I didn’t exactly welcome the announcement that they’d be participating.
Even knowing which guitar solo was provided by Lifeson, I didn’t regard it as noteworthy; SW could easily have composed something himself and denied lazy journalists the opportunity to dismissively liken Porcupine Tree to retro ‘prog’… stuff. Fripp’s contribution, a layered guitar interlude between 4:11 and 4:48 on ‘Way Out of Here’, reprised towards the end of the song, was pleasant enough but again, not distinctive, and nothing SW couldn’t have generated himself.
So why have guest appearences by ‘name’ musicians only of interest to old-time ‘prog’ fans, which have the very real potential to alienate more mainstream listeners and critics? It’s a bad idea in terms of mass-market credibility, which succeeded musically only because the guests’ contributions were unobtrusive to the point of being anonymous. I’d call that a pointless gimmick.
I was probably one of those older males wearing a retro-prog T shirt, which I’d purchased at The Reasoning the night before.
I’m really annoyed by the whole “we’re not prog” attitude of some people; Porcupine Tree’s Steve Wilson and Marillion’s Steve Hogarth, I’m looking at you. I’m thinking of SW’s ridiculous spat with Roine Stolt 18 months ago.
I don’t believe there’s anything to be gained in attempting to appease NME-school music critics. They’re never going to like a band like Porcupine Tree. PT are all about musical content, rather than image or attitude. Their lengthy songs, instrumental virtuosity, complex musical structures and lyrics that aren’t about fights outside chip shops in Leeds are the antithesis of everything the NME school stand for.
Which is why pandering to them is akin to battered wife syndrome. “If only they didn’t invite certain unfashionable musicians these nasty critics wouldn’t be so mean” is a bad, bad strategy. Better to challenge the stupid revisionist ‘post punk orthodoxy’, and get the world to recognise that a clique of critics that seem to think Mark E Smith is a greater genius than Roger Waters aren’t really worth listening to any more.
There was nothing throwaway about my comments – my personal distaste of prog dinosaurs is quite genuine. The first quote you cited was my own view – I was disconcerted by the retro T-shirts because I don’t want to be associated with such bands.
Sorry Tim, but I think you’re being slightly naive here. Like it or not, critical disapproval of old-style ‘prog’ does exist, and artists wishing to reach a mass-market need to acknowledge the ‘rules’ of the promotional system. Staying within the ‘prog’ ghetto and complaining about ignorant critics (who undeniably do have an audience, who in turn are worth pursuing) might serve certain people’s self-righteousness, but won’t get the music heard.
Progarchives recently interviewed Steven Wilson http://www.progarchives.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?TID=37160&FID=47.
Looks like his attitude to “Prog” is cooling a bit. He even apologises to Dream Theater on their new album about some of his comments.
Personally, I love PT and The Flower Kings. But they inhabit different musical spaces.
As regards Fripp and Lifeson on the new PT album. I am sorry but no one sounds like either of those players and their contributions are crucial to the overall feel of their respective tracks. Adrian Belew did the same to Deadwing.
The musical climate is slowly changing, and the influence of the NME-school punk-era journalists is diminishing year by year. Which is why it makes no sense to pander to them any more. Tony Parsons and Paul Morley are the real dinosaurs now, not 70s prog bands.
Don’t forget that the biggest new band to emerge in the past few years, Muse, owe a heavy debt to 70s prog, and don’t bother to deny it any more. And they’re one of the few world-class bands to come out of Britain in the best part of a decade.
It’s also notable that the rest of the world isn’t the least bit interested NME-endorsed 4-chord Britpop, and sees the stuff ridiculed in “Four Chords that Made a Million” for what it is.
I like Muse and in particular the last album. My son loved it too and thought it really new and different. But I know there is so much from the 70′s in that album. Even he is now asking about bands like Led Zeppelin, Yes, King Crimson as they are being mentioned by a lot of the new metal bands.
I grew up with prog in the 70′s, drifted off to pastures new in the 80′s but came back to it all in the 90′s. I think I realised that there was nothing to compare with the imagination, originality and diversity which prog has to offer. I am still finding stuff from the 70′s I missed first time round or listening to a lot of new bands. I am looking forward to the new Anekdoten for instance.
Well, Steven Wilson *should* apologise to Dream Theater for his past comments about their music, especially since, with every new release, Porcupine Tree sound more and more like them…
Indeed, HippyDave. Got “Fear of a Blank Planet” on the CD player right now, and “Anesthetize” could be a Dream Theater song. I thought so when I first heard it live last year.
Porcupine Tree could never hope to even remotely emulate Dream Theater, as DT are in a world of their own… untouchable in the Prog/Metal field.
Perhaps SW was trying to distance himself from DT, so no one would try and compare them, because obviously, he’d have lost BIG TIME.
PT and Dream Theater aren’t trying to do the same thing at all, despite the fact that a few songs sound similar; PT are about composition and atmosphere, and DT is a lot about instrumental complexity and virtuosity for it’s own sake. Personally I find a lot of DT rather self-indulgent, and think they sound best when they rein in the widdling and concentrate on actual songs.