Porcupine Tree - Friday, 25th April 2008 - Palace Theatre, Melbourne
On Friday night Carmen and I attended the Palace Theatre to see British progressive/psychedelic/metal band Porcupine Tree in their first ever appearance in Melbourne. Sure they've been around for a long time... and it's taken them "like 500 years" to get here, but as frontman Steven Wilson pointed out, they didn't even really know if they had a fanbase in Australia or not.
And the night was an interesting one: for starters, I originally had tickets to Porcupine Tree and a ticket to Foo Fighters, without realising that both shows were on the same night. After some umming and ahhhing, I ditched the Foo Fighters and went with Porcupine Tree. I'm sure the Foo Fighters would've been brilliant, and Darren (and Glen) did confirm that they were, but I saw them on the In Your Honor tour, and well, I hadn't seen Porcupine Tree yet. Too bad that when we arrived, it was listed that Porcupine Tree would start at 11:00pm, making it quite possible that I could've done both gigs if I knew that fact beforehand. (Rod Laver gigs rarely go past 11pm, what with the whole liquor license expiring at that time)
Support was provided by Sleep Parade. As they were taking the stage two fellows behind us amusingly remarked "uh-oh, the drummer has got a microphone!" and they threw a "please don't suck!" comment in for good measure. A few songs in, the same two fellows were quite impressed and noted that they were "playing to the right audience". They honestly were a perfect pick to support Porcupine Tree: heavy and spacey, but with a big dose of melody. I'd never heard of the band before, but it seems that they're a local band, and they were quite excellent. I picked up a copy of their debut album, Things Can Always Change, which in the process screwed up my monthly music budget and ideas for future purchase, but who cares? I love it when you go to a gig and discover a great new artist/band. I mean, I still have a dumb smile whenever I think about going to the brilliant My Brightest Diamond and St. Vincent gig on something of a whim. Those two were a hell of a find.
Porcupine Tree hit the stage to the title track of their latest album, Fear of a Blank Planet, complete with the song's creepy video clip projected onto a screen behind the band. Images of medicated teens and kids with guns, fighting with each other, destroying cars, and generally being absorbed in television, video games and the internet. The band was obviously a bit more "metal" live and the setlist focussed mainly on the last few albums, though they did reach back to earlier albums, going as far back as 1996's Signify and playing that album's best song, Dark Matter. Exceedingly cool was a lengthy version of Lightbulb Sun's Hatesong, as well the encore duo of Trains and Halo. Steven also pointed out that although they don't play Trains all that often anymore, it's a fan favourite, and being the first time in Australia, they just had to played it. Plus, getting Halo in the setlist was pretty awesome as well, since it's becoming one of my favourite songs on Deadwing.
Bizarrely, at the end of Hatesong, Steven ended up getting part of his earpiece lodged in his ear! As far as I could tell, the cable and actual head piece came out, but the actual cover stayed in his ear. This resulted in him having to play the next song with it stuck in his ear: during an instrumental break he quickly moved over to the side of the stage, and a roadie tried to get it out with a pair of tweezers and flashlight. They had no luck, but eventually managed to remove it on attempt #2 at the end of the song. ("that's never happened before!")
Actually, for all of his... apparent snobby British demeanour, and somewhat tool-ish stage presence, Steven Wilson appears to be a bit more laidback than he lets on. He took the whole weird incident pretty well, amusingly noting that you certainly get value for money in a concert these days, getting to watch an operation on the side of the stage. Later on, he had a good chuckle when he forgot the chorus to one of the band's better known songs, Blackest Eyes. Still, his constant "twitching" and pointing can be a bit much. Carmen, who had moved off the floor and onto one of the balconies, later pointed out that he also played the whole gig bare-foot, and had a Persian rug on the stage.
Hey, has anyone noticed that large groups of headbanging people looks really silly? And what's the deal with people thinking long songs are better? I'm pretty certain Steven was being tongue in cheek when he suggested that, but the crowd went ballistic when he announced that the next song was the seventeen minute Anesthetize. In that case, doesn't that mean that Brian Eno's Thursday Afternoon is the BEST. SONG. EVAR?!
Anyway, enough being old-fartie. Throughout the show, several songs had footage displayed: both Anesthetize and Way Out of Here had particularly striking videos. The former had footage of busy cities, computer animated pills and electrical crackles, and finished with waves crashing, to match the music. The latter involved a young emo girl wandering around a train yard, and quite possibly committing suicide on the tracks. The fact that it isn't spelled out what happens at the end of the song makes it even more uncomfortable. Disturbing, but really impressive stuff.
Finally, the setlist:
Set:
And the night was an interesting one: for starters, I originally had tickets to Porcupine Tree and a ticket to Foo Fighters, without realising that both shows were on the same night. After some umming and ahhhing, I ditched the Foo Fighters and went with Porcupine Tree. I'm sure the Foo Fighters would've been brilliant, and Darren (and Glen) did confirm that they were, but I saw them on the In Your Honor tour, and well, I hadn't seen Porcupine Tree yet. Too bad that when we arrived, it was listed that Porcupine Tree would start at 11:00pm, making it quite possible that I could've done both gigs if I knew that fact beforehand. (Rod Laver gigs rarely go past 11pm, what with the whole liquor license expiring at that time)
Support was provided by Sleep Parade. As they were taking the stage two fellows behind us amusingly remarked "uh-oh, the drummer has got a microphone!" and they threw a "please don't suck!" comment in for good measure. A few songs in, the same two fellows were quite impressed and noted that they were "playing to the right audience". They honestly were a perfect pick to support Porcupine Tree: heavy and spacey, but with a big dose of melody. I'd never heard of the band before, but it seems that they're a local band, and they were quite excellent. I picked up a copy of their debut album, Things Can Always Change, which in the process screwed up my monthly music budget and ideas for future purchase, but who cares? I love it when you go to a gig and discover a great new artist/band. I mean, I still have a dumb smile whenever I think about going to the brilliant My Brightest Diamond and St. Vincent gig on something of a whim. Those two were a hell of a find.
Porcupine Tree hit the stage to the title track of their latest album, Fear of a Blank Planet, complete with the song's creepy video clip projected onto a screen behind the band. Images of medicated teens and kids with guns, fighting with each other, destroying cars, and generally being absorbed in television, video games and the internet. The band was obviously a bit more "metal" live and the setlist focussed mainly on the last few albums, though they did reach back to earlier albums, going as far back as 1996's Signify and playing that album's best song, Dark Matter. Exceedingly cool was a lengthy version of Lightbulb Sun's Hatesong, as well the encore duo of Trains and Halo. Steven also pointed out that although they don't play Trains all that often anymore, it's a fan favourite, and being the first time in Australia, they just had to played it. Plus, getting Halo in the setlist was pretty awesome as well, since it's becoming one of my favourite songs on Deadwing.
Bizarrely, at the end of Hatesong, Steven ended up getting part of his earpiece lodged in his ear! As far as I could tell, the cable and actual head piece came out, but the actual cover stayed in his ear. This resulted in him having to play the next song with it stuck in his ear: during an instrumental break he quickly moved over to the side of the stage, and a roadie tried to get it out with a pair of tweezers and flashlight. They had no luck, but eventually managed to remove it on attempt #2 at the end of the song. ("that's never happened before!")
Actually, for all of his... apparent snobby British demeanour, and somewhat tool-ish stage presence, Steven Wilson appears to be a bit more laidback than he lets on. He took the whole weird incident pretty well, amusingly noting that you certainly get value for money in a concert these days, getting to watch an operation on the side of the stage. Later on, he had a good chuckle when he forgot the chorus to one of the band's better known songs, Blackest Eyes. Still, his constant "twitching" and pointing can be a bit much. Carmen, who had moved off the floor and onto one of the balconies, later pointed out that he also played the whole gig bare-foot, and had a Persian rug on the stage.
Hey, has anyone noticed that large groups of headbanging people looks really silly? And what's the deal with people thinking long songs are better? I'm pretty certain Steven was being tongue in cheek when he suggested that, but the crowd went ballistic when he announced that the next song was the seventeen minute Anesthetize. In that case, doesn't that mean that Brian Eno's Thursday Afternoon is the BEST. SONG. EVAR?!
Anyway, enough being old-fartie. Throughout the show, several songs had footage displayed: both Anesthetize and Way Out of Here had particularly striking videos. The former had footage of busy cities, computer animated pills and electrical crackles, and finished with waves crashing, to match the music. The latter involved a young emo girl wandering around a train yard, and quite possibly committing suicide on the tracks. The fact that it isn't spelled out what happens at the end of the song makes it even more uncomfortable. Disturbing, but really impressive stuff.
Finally, the setlist:
Set:
- Fear of a Blank Planet
- What Happens Now?
- The Sound of Muzak
- Lazarus
- Anesthetize
- Open Car
- Dark Matter
- Hatesong
- A Smart Kid
- Blackest Eyes
- Way Out of Here
- Sleep Together
- Trains
- Halo