The Vic Theatre was packed on Tuesday for one of only two Porcupine Tree concerts in the middle of the States. With the coasts are getting the bulk of dates, we here in flyover country had to get to Chicago or Cleveland to see the band on this leg of the tour. The crowed in Chicago was a real mix. There were metalheads next to industrial fans along with the grizzled veterans of a thousand prog concerts.
After King's X's opening set, The Tree took the stage and wasted no time delving into their 55-minute concept opus, The Incident, which is one continuous piece of music composed of several parts. The short, slow-burning "Occam's Razor" whetted the crowd's appetite for the opening blast of "The Blind House". This song arguably encapsulates the entire album along with much of PT's history in about five and a half minutes. There's the heavy guitar of touring member John Wesley contrasting with Steve Wilson's acoustic; at the back of the stage Richard Barbieri and his keys fill out the picture and set the mood. I almost feel sorry for bassist Colin Edwin these days because he's often left alone holding things down on the back end as drummer Gavin Harrison is usually busy trying to use every drum and cymbal he has at his disposal. He's not overplaying but methinks that his time spent with King Crimson last year has only made him better. It's not that he fills every space in a song with a fill or cymbal splash, it's that he carves out his own space and plays the right part bar in and bar out.
Curiously enough, Wilson greeted the crowd after just two songs. He said that Chicago was the band's spiritual home here in the States and that they'd continue with the rest of The Incident. Much to their credit, they pulled it off without a hitch. I'm still getting to know The Incident but I can tell you that it is gelling for me. The soaring chorus of "Drawing the Line" is oddly comfortable next to the industrial sludge of "The Incident" (the section of the longer song with which it shares its title). "The Yellow Windows of the Evening Train" provided one of those ineffable personal moments. It reminds me of a certain Genesis song and so the short instrumental pulled a switcheroo, of sorts, and took me somewhere else for a couple minutes.
As Wilson started strumming the opening of "Time Flies", I returned. The song is an epic mash-up of Pink Floyd's Animals with a blatantly catchy chorus. During the slow part in the middle, I kept waiting for someone to bust out a Vocoder and starting intoning, "The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want…" "Octane Twisted", with the screen behind the stage alight with creepy footage of a train careering out of control, had better not be dropped from future sets or there will be hell to pay.
After a 10-minute intermission, the band returned to the stage for a set of mostly older tunes. "The Start of Something Beautiful" started things off. This was followed by "Russia On Ice", from 2000's Lightbulb Sun, which would prove to be as far back in their catalogue they'd go. I hadn't heard it live since 2002 so I was very excited. However, just as I was getting ready to rock to the powerful, riff-laden closing, the band switched gears and launched into the middle section of "Anesthetize", from their previous album, Fear of a Blank Planet, which was also heavy on crunching guitars.
The two sections worked well together as a medley, but I, like many prog fans, am leery of medleys. Genesis got to the point where they basically stopped doing entire songs prior to a certain point in their back catalogue and instead relegated a few minutes from several tunes to a medley. PT, in fact, played two last week with "Strip the Soul" and ".3" also being abbreviated and combined. My own personal preference is for choosing one or the other song and performing it in its entirety. I am hoping that this is not the beginning of a period where the band neglects their wonderful back catalogue prior to In Absentia.
This night saw the live premiere of, "Remember Me Lover", from The Incident's non-concept disc. The wonderful vocals and churning guitars are making this a favorite of mine. "Way Out of Here" was a fantastic closer as it was on the FoaBP tour and it highlighted Wesley's backing vocals. "The Sound of Muzak" and the now obligatory "Trains" were the encores.
Steven Wilson will not go down in history as the best vocalist progressive rock ever produced, but he sounds more confident which each album and this has carried over to the stage. Coupled with Wesley's voice, the vocal harmonies at PT shows are truly beautiful these days. As Gaff from Blade Runner might say, Wesley did a man's job. He is the sine non qua of Porcupine Tree live and deserves a lot more credit than he gets.
The band will be back next spring for the second US leg of their tour, which will hopefully bring them back to Wisconsin.
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