In Steve Wilson's own words: Revolver: Was there any specific incident that informed the lyrical themes on Fear of a Blank Planet? Steven Wilson: There were many things that coalesced at the same time, but the main thing was reading the last Bret Easton Ellis Book [2006's] Lunar Park. The central thing is a father's relationship with his son, who is very much the role model for the character in Fear of a Blank Planet - this kind of terminally bored kid, anywhere between 10 and 15 years old, who spends all his daylight hours in his bedroom with the curtains closed, playing on his PlayStation, listening to his iPod, texting his friends on his cell phone, looking at hardc*** p*** on the Internet, downloading music, films, news, violence... He's also on prescription drugs. Parents these days seem to deal with their kids' problems not by sitting down and talking to them but by sending them to the doctor and getting them prescription drugs - which is kind of tragic, really. The song has three parts: 1)"Anesthetize" 2)"The Pills I'm Taking" 3)"Surfer" In my opininion the 3rd part is about the protagonist thinking back to a happy day on the beach somewhere. It is also the opposite to the other parts of the song: Passive media consuming indoors vs being active outdoors. Anesthetize your feelings with drugs vs. being happy.
I like your take on the 3rd part of the song; very interesting. I believe the 3rd part is more metaphorical than literal, the surfer being a almost red herring to this assumption. The surfer has been used throughout literature and music since the beach boys as a metaphor for someone a drift, the fact that anesthetise comes before the surfer sort of tells me the protagonist (i.e. the child) has succumb to the pill and is now adrift in his own head and I believe that with that pretense, having it be a memory makes it even more interesting a sad.
@@Damo887 You might be right. Your take, that this isn't even a real memory is even more bleak. The reason for my take is mainly, that the whole lyrics are written in present tense, only the last part in the past. The water, so warm that day I was counting out the waves And I followed their short life As they broke on the shoreline
@@simond1574 mmm, tense is however a vague indicator haha but I see where you are coming from. To retract my last idea I now think that no matter whether the final section is dream a or a memory it wouldn't matter in the eyes of the child. he/she is adrift not in control and not aware regardless. It's fun to speculate meaning in certain points that are open but maybe we are reading into the wrong things, this is a genuine topic of concern and I'd think that the composers didn't create this just for the sake of speculation, they are being quite blunt in their story telling.
@@Damo887 Well, I think, especially with good music and great lyrics like PT and others, there is still a lot of room to speculate. I don't know, if it's intended or not. But great art should provoke some reflection about the work and the meaning. I don't think, it's bad, if different people come up with different interpretations. After all, this is not Love Gun or Kokomo. :-)
Thank you very much dear Doug for your very clear english. English is not my native language and I can understand you perfectly without subtitles. A musician from Argentina greets you.
I feel like going from a minor chord to a major chord a half step lower while keeping the same note as the third of both chords is something Wilson and Åkerfelt do a lot.
One of many masterpieces of Porcupine Tree, Wilson it's a genius. Doug, excellent analysis and reaction, specially 'cause you played with the band, and the sound of your piano at the end felt like add more perfection to a perfect song.
Very, very nicely done, Doug! I loved your analysis. I've watched a couple of other "a person affiliated with genre X reacts to stuff that they haven't been exposed to before" channels, and yeah it's kind of fun to see the "expert's" reaction to a song you know is going to knock their socks or knickers or teeth out, but it becomes predictable and boring quite quickly. Your analysis of the songs you listen to, however, is something deeper. You use music theory to make sense of the song, and vocalise what you're thinking, and I think that's really helpful. You don't restrict yourself to "a piano player reacting to piano stuff", but you consider it all: lyrics, vocals, drums, bass, guitar, keyboards, rhythm, chords, harmonies, the meaning and the emotion: the music. I applaud that! Great stuff!
As I see it, Anesthetize is about treating symptoms versus treating the root cause. "Only apathy through the pills in me, It's all in me, all in you." Part I: Due to the medication, stimuli are completely dulled and a person feels nothing and becomes completely bored. 2:52 Which may seem controllable for the environment, but it enriches no one. Part II: Experiencing life in its full glory, without medication, causes intense emotions and you have to learn to deal with that. 13:05 It's pretty confusing and can make you go insane and want to rage sometimes, as well. I remember I felt a lot of anger in me when I was growing up. Help from your environment is very desirable here. By learning to deal with it, you form an opinion, character and personality. And when part III kicks in, the medication is worked out, flushed from the system and all senses are open. And it's the canon part 15:30 but also the music 18:23, that tells me and makes me experience that love is so beautiful, that it hurts. But it's okay, because pain makes you grow 🔥
I've seen Porcupine Tree twice at The Astoria (now demolished) in Charing Cross Road, London. I remember Steven Wilson aplogising in case the band made mistakes playing the brand new material. They didn't. They were fantastic. Steven is such a talented songwriter, not to mention engineer (as his remasters of old material by the likes of King Crimson and Jethro Tull testify).
I love hearing your perspective and hearing you dissect the chords and whatnot but darn it, Now I have to go find this song so I can hear it in it's entirety. :). I've never heard this band. I've heard of them but never heard their music. Thank you for introducing me to Porcupine Tree!
Gavin Harrison helped make In Absentia Porcupine Tree's 'best' album. FOABP would be number 2. My impression was that Steven Wilson wrote this song to specifically feature Gavin's drumming.
Listen to every Steven Wilson solo album. If the guys from Jethro Tull and Yes allow him to re-master their albums then you know he is not one to mess with.
Hi Doug! Maybe you can start series where you'd watch viewer performance or composition submissions (maybe just a minute a each) and recommend what could make it better? Like "Dougify your track" or something :)
The lyric is written from the perspective of a young person who feels like a ghost- no voice, no life meaning, no love, no attention ...he is in a state of “settled depression”’where he has basically given up on life bc he finds no meaning in anything around him. He recalls a memory from his earlier years that was initially something that was pure joy- the water, the waves, the sun. All was good. Life was good then a tragedy happened. A person was suddenly gone from his life and he suffered. Great loss. Then all he has left is to be in a state of numbness. This is a really sad song. But from a musical viewpoint, pure genius. Typical Steven Wilson. Have you listened to his song “October” with his band Blackfield? I think you would find it compositionally beautiful.
DOUG - for Steven Wilson's compositional brilliance you should check out Luminol from The Raven That Refused To Sing (And Other Stories) album. If you'd rather it live, the Get All You Deserve blu-ray version is probably best
"It's all in me...all in you". In the USA, all water treatment facilities are not designed, and have no cleansing effect, on pharmaceuticals. You're old enough to have a few plastic vials of Px pills in your medicine cabinet. People are typically advised to toss old meds due to those meds having a limited shelf life, usually expressed in terms of "half-life" in the sense their efficacy diminishes over time, and eventually you can no longer be assured of receiving your proper dosage when taking them. But perhaps the best known problem right now is that young women pee out the remnants of their birth control pills, ejecting excess female hormones into the biosphere upstream from where you live. You, in turn, consume these female hormones in your drinking water. The long term effect on male fertility has been studied, and it seems it is trending downwards. Some fish possessed of the genetic programming to become either sex upon maturity are all morphing into females once their hormones kick in, augmented by the female hormones in the water they swim within. The same is true to some degree as to the various psychotropic meds so many of us take to calm us down in a panic-inducing world. Out with the urine, and in with a drink of water. They are all in you, all in me, too.
I think I can come up with a band that you probably aren't aware of and that would be very interesting for you to listen to : Cardiacs. Their music is unique and if you want a particular masterpiece to throw your ears on, check the song Dirty Boy from the album Sing to God. You might want to check the whole thing of course, but if I had to choose one song , it would be this one. It is truly amazing. Anyway, keep up the good work ;)
Please react to Steven Wilson's solo songs First Regret / 3 Years Older. The first is an introduction of the second. Very progressive sound played by a great band with Guthrie Govan in the guitars.
The coolest thing about good drummers like Harrison is that they can fill in the spaces and lay subtle accents and you barely notice it is there. He is not overdoing it, and is not doing too little, it is just right. I didn't hear Doug mention the drumming and in this case that is positive. He was too busy with the melody and lyrics. More respect for (good) drummers please!
It was great to see you play along realtime and improve to the wonderful sound of Porcupine Tree. I was surprised you didn't comment on Gavin Harrison's incredible drumming.
He doesn't really listen that way to drumming, unfortunately. His classical ear takes over usually but that's his niche. He also talks over half of the first solo. I feel Geebz does have a good balance noticing instruments, from an sound engineering standpoint.
If you haven’t seen New Zealand drum teacher Andrew Rooney reactions, you should check him out. He’s got a great sense of humour and insightful appreciation of drumming- here’s his take on Gavin doing a solo studio play through - it’s a funny intro by Andrew, but skip in 2 minutes if you want to miss his take on dogs barking as soon as one starts recording... ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-RFhPcjV-3ZU.html
Please don't put me off him by all '''THIS'' .. I really like him but there's something else going in some of these 'things' here SW FB, Porc Tree FB and so on. He's a great musician .. and .. and .. Don't get me get into some Tool lyrics huh!! If ya see what I mean .. or the odd commandment ... Keep cool .. keep 'LIKING'
@@garanceadrosehn9691 You know what? If you asked me 4 months ago, I would have disagreed and probably said that Anaesthetise is better. However, I recently watched the Arriving Somewhere concert, and I fell in love with Arriving Somewhere (the song). The lyrics are absolutely magnificent, and the music is amazing. I love how that guitar lick is maintained throughout most of the track, reflecting the state of stagnation the lyrics seem to address.
@@robTCGZ - When it comes to the question _"Which Porcupine Tree song is their _*_best_*_ song?",_ there are about 10-20 acceptable answers, and "Anesthetize" is certainly one of them! 🙂
After listening years and years to both songs, the billiance of the phrasing "It's all in you, all in me" just struck me. It's so cynic and sarcastic, because of the poppy flavour. What a dark message. Not sure if Arriving Somewhere is able to retain as my number 1 PT song!
I like how in the part from 7:00 to ~8:10 Doug talks about the unusual lack of a lead melodic instrument. And all i am focusing on is the insanely good, dynamic drumming which is absolutely dominating this part and makes a lead melody solo 100% redundant. Gavin Harrison is something special and even though he is "only" the drummer without him Porcupine Tree wouldn't be what it is. And then again, in Prog no member of the band is "just the drummer" or "just the vocalist". Everyone plays a vital role in making the sound and music a whole and this song is a prime example of exactly that.
they played in my hometown and I went there, but I took a 4hr journey three days ago to see them again. So worth it. It's a shame if they really don't continue after this summer
I had the pleasure of seeing them on this tour. The venue was packed and you could hear a pin drop during this song. I’ve never been to a live rock show where the audience was completely quiet, such is the power of this song. Reminds me of the first show they played in Florida, there may have been 50 people there. This was before they made a big splash with In Absentia. The next show a few years later they grew exponentially in attendance. I feel privileged to have seen them in such an intimate show...absolutely genius level songwriting.
Yes, same when I saw them twice, FoBP and The Incident. Occasionally I would look at the audience and notice something I'd never seen before at a concert. Just mesmerized faces nodding to the beat.
Steven Wilson is a master of modes. He creates new scenes and turns your mind like a magician. This is one of my top 5 favorite tunes. Brilliant drums by Gavin. A bass that both drives the beat and creates harmonies. 17 minutes just flies.
Absolutely! He's like the M.C. Escher of music with compositions (lyrically and musically) that are magical, and change the more you inspect them. And to top it off, they're very nice to their fans after a show!
Such an amazing piece of work by Wilson and the rest of PT. Great analysis as always Doug, just one thing I wish you would have done is give props to how amazing Gavin Harrison is. A lot of time you give drummers grief about their 16th note double bass drumming, yet here Gavin uses his double bass drumming in such an original way- crickets...
The overall theme of the album is ADD and bipolar disorder in children. I think this song is about the over medication of kids as a way of addressing their problems without actually addressing the underlying causes, and the toll it takes on their ability to experience and connect with the world around them. Wilson's lyrics are often a bit inscrutable leaving a lot of room for the listener to fill in the blanks. Porcupine Tree's live performances are always incredible. Wish I'd gotten to see them more than the two shows I was able to catch. I saw them open for Yes in 2002 and Yes made them take the stage earlier than the concert start time printed on the tickets so their set was half over when most people made it into the venue. I'm still bitter about it all these years later and they've said in interviews that this wasn't a one show thing. Yes treated them very poorly. My girlfriend and I left part way through Yes's set. Compared to PT it just felt rambling and self-indulgent.
Yes, this. The album this song is from is called "Fear of a Blank Planet" and the theme is basically that children are overmedicated and overstimulated by technology to the point where everything becomes a blur - life becomes a waking dream, and they become disconnected and end up missing all of the experiences that we would normally wish for our children - the human experience: love, relationships, connection, emotions both good and bad - experiencing LIFE. Other songs on the album focus more on the technology's numbing effects, others on how pornography can leave sex to be an empty experience to just "get through", others on the sense of disconnection from their parents, etc.
Harrison os extremely underrated, when people talk about drummers they always mention the same ones: Portnoy, Mangini, Minnemann; but this guys is a League of his own.
I’ve been a drummer 45+ years and have to say no modern drummer blows me away with their technique, sound and musicality these days like Gavin does. Seen him live 6 times going to see PT in a few weeks.
This is the best song in the world and Gavin is a drum deity. I hear this song for more than ten years now and i never get tired of it. The absolute masterpiece.
man Doug, you're doing such great songs lately. Opeth yesterday and now this. I am kinda addicted to this kind of analysis even though I don't really know much music theory myself. keep them coming! This version is of the song is absolutely amazing
I agree! Doug inspires me to learn more theory. I’ve picked up my guitar and try to play along with his piano. I discovered I’m nothing more than a dressed up chimpanzee.
@@BlueeyesofSkye no need to be hard with yourself. Art is a beautiful journey. The more we know about it, the clearer it becomes how little one actually knows!
I had to pause another Doug video to come listen to this as soon as I saw it posted. This whole filmed concert is incredible, but this song is on another level.
Hello Doug, it's me, once again, suggesting "Rainbow - Stargazer" to be in your music rotation. Some upvotes would help, if you could. Thanks and have a nice day!
This is the song that got me into Porcupine, and made me the great fan that I am now, and it was because back then, I learned that Alex Lifeson played on Anesthetize. One more thing to thank Rush!
This song is so damn good. One of the best pieces over written and an amazing live performance. I highly recommend thank you scientist. One of the coolest prog bands playing today.
I'm a big Stephen Wilson fan and I can tell you that this song anesthetizes probably their best song out of all of their catalogs. I've met him several times and his band I've seen them do this live multiple times. By far this is a masterpiece.
Do Porcupine Tree - Dark Matter. It stands up as one of their most artistically interesting songs in my opinion. But you gotta do the live version with Gavin Harrison on drums, he's a beast. Also their singer Steven Wilson has some interesting solo stuff, particularly early in the 2010's. Try Deform to Form a Star.
Nah, definitely the studio version. Chris Maitland doesn’t get enough credit from the PT community as a drummer. I think when it comes to those early songs he does them better, he had an amazing feel and pocket. That said, I definitely can’t see him playing Gavin’s songs, that’s a different territory that Gavin is a master-class at.
Richard Barbieri is so underrated. I’ve been a fan of his since ‘Gentlemen Take Polaroids’- Japan. There’s obviously a reason Wilson has him aboard such a mountain of talent.
Love your reactions, Doug, but drummer Gavin Harrison is playing his ass off, but there no mention of it. Please continue to do what you do but maybe look more closely at the actual musicianship and skills of the players in addition to breaking down the compositions and theories. That will make it even more enjoyable for many of us. Keep up the great work!
@@roguecheddar Easter is one of their best songs, but I see Doug likes to choose long and complex suite, so I think Ocean Cloud, The Leavers or The New Kings would be perfect
@@arcam4981, I'm sure you're correct. I don't have enough Marillion in my life, need to get more. So much good music out there, need to catch them all!
Today I discovered your channel and I am really thrilled. My suggestion would be Gentle Giant, any song from the Freehand album. It's a prog rock band whose members are talented multi-instrumentalists, classically musically educated. If you haven't listened to them yet, you will surely be pleasantly surprised.
Steve Wilson put out the best songs I have heard in decades. I was brought up on Yes, King Crimson, and Genesis. So, I don't usually give such high praise to an artist.
In this moment, this comment is stolen, as black across the sun. 😆 I made that exact comment 5 years ago on the start of something beautiful, I think I wrote Porcupine tree, the greatest band you’ve never heard of. 👍🏼
Wow. Every PT reaction video on here is about Anesthetize. Great song, but PT has a lotta other songs. The Signify album was classic. So was In Absentia...lots of great choices to critique on those two. Why Anesthetize so much?
Damn, Doug... The songs you've picked lately are on fire! Got to love opeth, porcupine tree, etc. And I really like how you use piano to analyze these songs and jam with the band.
Gavin Harrison is the lead instrumentalist during the break in the middle. If you see the isolated footage of him playing this song live you would not believe the things he's doing to that drum kit. Great reaction as always!
Love your videos, But I wish Maybe if you'd talk more about the music itself or the inspiration, some thoughts or opinion more than talking about keys and musical theories the whole time. some people don't know what you're talking about. maybe more comments on Music, Thank You
Loved the reaction, and that you joined in on the piano on occasion. This is a fantastic song by a band I fear will never be surmounted in terms of sheer musical skill.
I believe this is a bit over your head. No comment on the drums???? What is the noodling on the piano and acting like you have any idea what their doing. Funny!
Wow amazing reaction! If you are interested in other more progressive music, I would suggest King Crimson next with songs as In the court of the crimson king 21st century schizoid man And starless I would love to see you react to those and I think you might like it
