Porcupine Tree The Incident

Time flies when they're having fun...
The Incident
Porcupine Tree
Roadrunner Records

Porcupine Tree has always been about exploring the resonance and echoes found within Steven Wilson’s subconscious. After witnessing a road accident, Wilson was prompted to construct an ambitious song-cycle exploring the numerous associations which this initial incident triggered.

Sewn together into one continuous 55 minute stream the end result is a series of multi-layered perspectives which spiral beyond the inciting event into a dark kaleidoscope encompassing bogus gurus, break-ups, betrayals, and all manner of bad blood.

Wilson’s avowedly melancholic outlook finds an unsettling shape in the dreadnought thump of Occam’s Razor, a grandly belligerent entrance clearing the air for the full-pelt salvo of The Blind House, with its mobius-strip riffing.

Like In Absentia (2002) - which this new album seems to most recall - or Fear of a Blank Planet (2007) there is placed the apparently incongruous, competing elements jousting with each other, a convergence of a surging, expertly-crafted melodicism on the one hand and heavy flashes of eclectic electric guitar heroism on the other.

Not for nothing does Wilson’s writing switch between such influential polarities when at the mid-point of the album he declares “I was born in ’67, The year of Sergeant Pepper and Are you Experienced?” on across the staccato attack of Time Flies - easily the most addictive track on the entire album.

Elsewhere, the explosive peaks of Great Expectations suggests the the opening bars of King Crimson’s Red maintains its reputation for influence new generations of musicians.

Hidden in amongst the densely compacted guitars and pummelling rhythm section of Colin Edwin (bass) and Gavin Harrison (drums), Richard Barbieri’s ethereal keyboards add a dignified colour to the violent thrashing which often surrounds it. The Yellow Windows of the Evening Train contains a haunted choir and woodwind-like section that Mark Hollis and Talk Talk might’ve imagined.

The end result of all this pondering perversely transcends the gloom-laden gravity of its starting point. To infer hope from a track called I Drive The Hearse seems counter-intuitive, but as it slowly disappears, the sense of uplifting, welcome resolution is tangible.

Four extra tracks not part of The Incident itself are housed on an accompanying EP length album. Though well worthy, it’s the main event on disc one that holds the juice and demands repeated attention.

Porcupine Tree "Time Flies"