Label: Delerium
Release date: 9/30/1996
Production: Steven Wilson
Album length: 61.53 min
Genre: Progressive Rock
Rating: 9/10
“Signify” was the fourth studio album from the cult English prog heroes Porcupine Tree, and the first one where the whole band played together from start to finish, unlike its predecessor “The Sky Moves Sideways” (1995) on which their boss Steven Wilson wrote all the compositions himself, apart from “Moonloop”. It was also the second album where Porcupine Tree worked as a band in the true sense of the word, and not merely as Wilson’s solo project with the occasional backing musicians. Keyboardist Richard Barbieri, bassist Colin Edwin and drummer Chris Maitland became full-time members of the group from “Signify” onward, rather than just a supporting crew. Even a glance at the somewhat gloomy cover, with a woman tangled in a net, told you that the mood inside Porcupine Tree’s music on “Signify” had started to turn darker than before, while individual lyrics took on more openly socially critical messages.
Stylistically, “Signify” was a bridge between the early psychedelic rock / space rock sound and the later, more ‘accessible’ albums, which featured progressive rock with proper beginnings and endings and clearer arrangements, with the occasional prog-metal and radio-friendly moment. Thanks to certain krautrock influences, above all from Neu!, who had a big hand in shaping the title track (it was originally supposed to be a cover of the Neu! standard “Hallogallo”), the album still has a very experimental character and a few psychedelic moments. That very title instrumental holds an early seed of the later prog-metal experiments, putting a raw guitar phrase and uncompromising drum fills up front, while the keyboard improvisations stay firmly anchored in the world of space rock and psychedelic rock.
“Sleep of No Dreaming”, with its many tempo changes and its swapping between calm and dramatic sections, was a kind of prototype for the dark, melancholic compositions that would later take over Porcupine Tree’s music. “Waiting Phase One” is a psychedelic-nostalgic piece that opens as an acoustic-leaning ballad until it shifts into an instrumental section with a melancholic guitar solo and Mellotron waves. Its main charm is the nostalgic vocal harmonies, while the highlight of its instrumental follow-up, “Waiting Phase Two”, is a psychedelically spiced guitar solo. Dark and dystopian, black as pitch, “Sever” has a nostalgic chorus with magical vocal harmonies that beautifully cut through the fatalistic gloom. After all these years it’s still one of the best choruses in the history of these cult prog heroes.
“Idiot Prayer” would come off as ‘just’ one of the many at-least-solid space rock instrumentals Porcupine Tree made in the nineties, if it didn’t have an ending that was fairly innovative for the time. The visionary “Every Home Is Wired” was Steven’s pretty bleak and pessimistic, yet prophetic, commentary on the dawn of the internet age and on a digitalization increasingly ruinous for humanity. With its mix of psychedelic arrangements and dreamy vocal harmonies, it ranks among the best moments on “Signify”, and even the pretty experimental, dark and obscure final minute doesn’t spoil it.
On the instrumental “Intermediate Jesus”, it’s mainly Maitland’s drumming talent that shines, often overlooked these days because of his technically superior successor Gavin Harrison. Edwin’s complex bass lines deserve a special mention here too. The ethereal, ambient instrumental “Light Mass Prayers”, with its mysterious and gloomy atmosphere, could easily be used as the soundtrack to some horror movie. The closing masterpiece “Dark Matter” is the peak of the whole album, mostly thanks to one of the best guitar solos of Steven’s career. Its lyrics give Steven’s take on the downsides of touring, which he’d experienced for the first time not long before recording “Signify”. His first tour must have been a grueling experience for a musician who until then had spent all his time in the studio.
“Signify” was a major turning point for Porcupine Tree and a bridge between two different creative periods, as Mr. Wilson finally decided that sitting in the studio forever makes no sense if you want to win over more than a handful of friends and supporters with your music. Precisely because of this ‘transitional’ or ‘hybrid’ status, on the border between two different stylistic phases, it remains somewhat overlooked even among most Porcupine Tree fans, even though it’s not far off from cult status. It had already laid out, in an ambient way, the dark and melancholic sonic approach that would go on to dominate the music of these then still pretty obscure prog-rock overachievers.
Author: Peter “Dr. ProgRock” Podbrežnik
Tracklist:
1. Bornlivedie (1:41)
2. Signify (3:26)
3. The Sleep of No Dreaming (5:24)
4. Pagan (1:34)
5. Waiting Phase One (4:24)
6. Waiting Phase Two (6:15)
7. Sever (5:30)
8. Idiot Prayer (7:37)
9. Every Home Is Wired (5:08)
10. Intermediate Jesus (7:29)
11. Light Mass Prayers (4:28)
12. Dark Matter (8:57)
Lineup:
Steven Wilson – vocals, electric & acoustic guitars, ‘samplers’, tapes, organ, Mellotron, piano, drum programming, music box, bells
Richard Barbieri – piano, Hammond organ, synthesizers (Prophet-V, Roland System 700), tapes, sequencers
Colin Edwin – bass guitar, double bass
Chris Maitland – drums, cymbals, percussion, drum loops, keyboards on track no. 11, vocals on tracks no. 5, 7 and 11.
Guest musician:
Terumi – vocals on track no. 1
