Tuned In To Music also has a series of podcasts that are like radio shows featuring both music and talk (mostly music) focused on a variety of topics of musical interest. The stream with the best sound quality is the one here at Tuned In To Music. I’m now the Parametric Monkey and tracks can be streamed from the Parametric Monkey page on Tuned In To Music and from the Parametric Monkey pages on myspace and facebook. In addition to listening, loving and talking about music, I’ve started making music to share with others. Tuned In To Music will have reviews, lots of reviews, stories about live gigs, thoughts on music in our lives and culture, discussions of issues regarding music tech and anything else related to music that seems worth including.Ī new phase is now underway. I don’t remember when I first tuned in to music, it was early in my life and it’s been an enduring passion for a long time. If you like any kind of rock that aspires to be more than a place holder in this week’s top ten, Signify is well worth your time. If you like psychedelic or prog rock and haven’t listened to Porcupine Tree, by all means check them out. Wilson is very good and even the tracks he didn’t think were good enough for general consumption at the time have a lot to offer.įans of prog rock probably already know about Porcupine Tree and either have this album or don’t like the band. The Insignificance disc doesn’t sound like this to me. Special edition discs of demos and tracks left off albums often illustrate why the tracks were left behind in the first place and are only of interest to rabid fans who are fairly uncritical in their acceptance of anything their idols have done. I don’t know enough about Porcupine Tree to know if the inclusion of the second disc would make this a worthwhile purchase for fans of the band. Fortunately, the mopey lyrics are embedded in brilliant music and Signify devotes much more space to the music. Everything sucks, nobody understands, nobody has suffered like he has. Signify is filled with the kind of overwrought angst that is stereotypical of this type of music. While on Signify he doesn’t display Zappa’s compositional abilities (but then again, who does?), Wilson is very good and almost always interesting with a seemingly inexhaustible cache of ideas.Īs lyric writer I find him less interesting. Also like Zappa, Wilson is a composer as well as a musician.
In both breadth of style and virtuosity Wilson’s guitar playing reminds me of Frank Zappa. At least at this stage of their development, Porcupine Tree is his vision and, musically, he sees far and wide. He wrote or co-wrote all of the tracks on Signify, sings, plays guitar and other instruments and produced and mixed the album. Steven Wilson is the pith of Porcupine Tree. The Deluxe Edition reviewed here includes a second disc entitled Insignificance which contains demos, alternative versions of some of the tracks on Signify, and songs recorded at the same time but not included on the original album. Signify is Porcupine Tree’s first proper album originally released in 1996. Porcupine Tree is also characterized as psychedelic rock and I should have noted that and paid more attention. Comparisons to ELP have the effect of making run in the opposite direction. Porcupine Tree is usually categorized as prog rock and compared with Emerson Lake and Palmer. I don’t hear what it is about “Horns of the Moon” that might link it to Porcupine Tree (at least what little I’ve heard from the band) but I do like Porcupine Tree. Turns out this is one of the unexpected benefits of making your own music available for people to hear – discerning fans tune you in to music you hadn’t listened to before. Review: Porcupine Tree, Signify (Deluxe Edition)Īfter hearing Parametric Monkey’s “Horns of the Moon” a fan thought I might like Porcupine Tree.