Porcupine Tree
Interview with Steven Wilson
Words: Shawn Kyle
Photos: Lasse Hoile

Appearing:
October 3, 2007
House of Blues, Orlando

Steven Wilson and his band, Porcupine Tree, have been pushing the boundaries of the term progressive rock for almost twenty years.  Their triumphant new album, Fear of a Blank Planet, displays the fruits of growing, experimenting, and solidifying a cult-like fan base over that time through word of mouth alone.  They continue to evolve which each new album, proving that music as art is still alive.

REAX:  Initially, the music of Porcupine Tree began in 1989 as one of your recording studio projects.  What were your inspirations and motivations in the band’s infancy as opposed to the music that you’re making now?
Steven Wilson:  I think things change over the years.  When I started out in the late ‘80s making music, my ambition was simply to make a record… to be able to hold a record in my hands and say that I made that.  Like a lot of musicians, when I started I was wearing my influences on my sleeve.  It was pretty easy to pick out where I was coming from.  Over the years my ambition has developed where just making records is no longer enough.  It’s important to share it with many people and feel that you are growing artistically. 

REAX:  You are an artist and a songwriter that continues to write music that complements the concept of the album.  With being able to download music and it being listened to in a different way than before, what effect does that have on the way you compose and perform your music?
SW:  The simple answer is that it doesn’t have any effect.  To look at the question in more of a broad sense, I think it’s very important that musicians, filmmakers, painters, and writers create their art in a vacuum.  There is a distinction to be made here between an artist as opposed to an entertainer.  An entertainer is someone that creates music to fulfill an expectation or a market or a need, or an audience that is ready to buy that product.  An artist, I think, makes music… or whatever else they’re doing, for themselves.  Ultimately that is the definition of an artist.  An artist is someone who creates the work because of an internal need to express something… something emotional, but through the medium of art.  The consideration for the outside world is very much a secondary one.  If I’m writing an album, I’m not thinking about how it’s going to be marketed, which radio stations are going to play it, is it going to disappoint the fans… but these are all things which are obviously considered once you finish the record.  When you’re actually creating the music, I think you have to disassociate that side of yourself, the business side of yourself and try to create something that is totally pure and in some respects, completely self-indulgent.  That’s one of the great ironies of being an artist.  You create something for yourself, which you then share with other people and I think that same thing applies to the issue of download culture.

REAX:  Is there an underlying theme to the progression of the last three records?
SW:  Lyrically no, they’re all very different projects.  In Absentia was inspired by books I was reading at the time about serial killers… and not in a Marilyn Manson–esque sensationalist way.  I was more interested in what creates these people, what happens in their childhood that sets those things in motion.  The next record, Deadwing, was based on a movie script that I wrote with a friend of mine.  It was kind of fantastic and more fictional.  This album is very much my feelings about the world I live in.  Musically, I think the three records belong together.  The first album that we made for Atlantic Records in America, In Absentia, was the first time we embraced metal as part of our sound.  The last two records have seen that side of us gradually integrated into the fabric of the band.  It’s just become part of the language we speak with now.  At the time, it was shocking for the fans that had listened to the previous six albums and were surprised at that development.

REAX:  I know the group has so many influences and a lot of times they peek out in the music.  How do you manage those in creating a new body of work?
SW:  It’s a hard question to answer because I am usually not aware of those processes taking place.  Very early on, I decided that I was not interested in being the kind of artist who is basically making music that sounds like a guided tour through his record collection.  I wanted to do something that was specifically me, unique, and to create a sound that people would talk about as the Porcupine Tree sound.  I think every album gets close to that.  Fear of a Blank Planet is the best epitomization of that kind of ambition and evolution of the band’s sound.  That continues to be the main motivation, to share the music and continue to evolve and develop.  I still discover and enjoy new music, but a lot of the influences that formed Porcupine Tree are from music I don’t really listen to anymore.  It was music that I listened to a lot when I was a teenager.  Obviously, Pink Floyd is a band that is mentioned all time when talking about Porcupine Tree.  I haven’t listened to that band in over 15 years, but it’s true that I listened to them so much when I was young that I think it became part of my DNA.  Those influences from when I was a teenager will always be there, but it’s the other things that have happened since then.  The interest in metal, literature, movies, and experiences I’ve had traveling and touring… those are the things that intuitively help you to sound different.  At least I hope so.  Maybe we don’t… maybe people think we sound like some kind of tribute band.

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