News.RttP{Porcupine Tree Reveals Unsettling World Vision On}

Fear of A Blank Planet (Atlantic/April 24)

•U.S. Tour Set for Spring/Summer 2007•

Porcupine Tree, renowned in rock music for their dense, cinematic albums, have completed their best and boldest work to date: Fear of a Blank Planet, out April 24 on Atlantic Records.

The frenetic, fingerpicked opening guitar riff delivers listeners into a 51-minute masterpiece of a record, modeled, in lead singer Steven Wilson’s words, “on those great old LP albums of the 70s.” It’s a starkly beautiful elegy on the numbness, apathy, and isolation brought about by the constant barrage of television, video games, advertising, prescription drugs, sex, and violence we face every day. The character in the title track muses that “In school I don't concentrate/ And sex is kinda fun/ But just another one/ Of all the empty ways/ Of using up a day.”

The six songs blend seamlessly one into the next, a symphonic arrangement of metal guitars, synthesizers, strings, fat basslines, and Gavin Harrison’s virtuosic drumming. Wilson’s earnest vocals alternate floating high above the instruments and ripping right into the heart of each track. Rush guitarist Alex Lifeson contributes a guitar solo on “Anesthetize,” while Robert Fripp (of King Crimson) provides the soundscapes on ‘Way Out of Here’

Wilson himself mixed and mastered the album, and the stereo and 5.1 versions will be available as a 2-disc limited special edition, as well as a DVD-Audio release.

Porcupine Tree will tour the U.S. in two legs, in May and September of this year.

Wilson will also release Blackfield II (Atlantic/We Put Out Records) on March 6, his second album with acclaimed Israeli singer/songwriter Aviv Geffen.

FEAR OF A BLANK PLANET

1. FEAR OF A BLANK PLANET
2. MY ASHES
3. ANESTHETIZE
4 SENTIMENTAL
5. WAY OUT OF HERE
6. SLEEP TOGETHER

www.porcupinetree.com www.atlantic.com