Fear of a Blank Planet

Deluxe CD/DVD Edition. Porcupine Tree, renowned in rock music for their dense, cinematic albums, have completed their best and boldest work to date: Fear of a Blank Planet, out April 24 on Atlantic Records. The frenetic, fingerpicked opening guitar riff delivers listeners into a 51-minute masterpiece of a record, modeled, in lead singer Steven Wilson’s words, on those great old LP albums of the 70s. It’s a starkly beautiful elegy on the numbness, apathy, and isolation brought about by the constant barrage of television, video games, advertising, prescription drugs, sex, and violence we face every day. The character in the title track muses that In school I don’t concentrate/ And sex is kinda fun/ But just another one/ Of all the empty ways/ Of using up a day. The six songs blend seamlessly one into the next, a symphonic arrangement of metal guitars, synthesizers, strings, fat basslines, and Gavin Harrison’s virtuosic drumming. Wilson’s earnest vocals alternate floating high above the instruments and ripping right into the heart of each track. Rush guitarist Alex Lifeson contributes a guitar solo on Anesthetize, while Robert Fripp (of King Crimson) provides the soundscapes on Way Out of Here. Wilson himself mixed and mastered the album. This is the limited edition CD/DVD version.

On iFear of a Blank Planet/i veteran progressive-rock act Porcupine Tree takes up the task of exploring the alienating forces of the media and its impact on our youths and ourselves. iFear/i's titular cut features lyrics rife with allusions to the confusing, isolating effects of TV, the X-Box, drugged out consumer escapades, and the iennui/i that arrives with prescription and self-prescribed numbness. "My Ashes" advances the themes of isolation, as a young person becomes increasingly estranged from himself; "Anesthetize" aptly captures dull apathy with accuracy and knowing but perhaps delves to deep into the dark depths and instead of alleviating pain and pressure instead deepens it via a track that fails to offer much emotional or mental counterpoint. The tune does feature an exceptionally lyrical guitar solo from Rush's Alex Lifeson and proves that if anyone can write a sprawling, throbbing epic it's most likely Porcupine Tree. Elsewhere, such as on the beautifully crafted "Sentimental" and "Way Out of Here," Wilson and Co. land squarely between the epic grandeur of peak-era Pink Floyd and the psychically distant cool of Radiohead, a feat that doesn't as much demonstrate how well PT echoes those bands as it shows us how expansive the English quartet's music and emotional vocabulary is. For elder listeners iFear/i probably won't serve as the powerful statement it wants to be--its themes have been explored to more exacting impact before and, musically, it's fairly standard progressive fare--but it is a strong and intelligent album and for a generation that's grown numb from three-minute ditties about life at the end of the country club cul-de-sac that embrace rather than rage against the dying of the light, it may serve as a wake up call and provide hope for a brighter and more color-infused tomorrow. ––iJedd Beaudoin/i