STEVEN WILSON Reacts To “Go Back To PORCUPINE TREE” Comments From Prog Fans

In an Interview with Goetia Media, Steven Wilson reacts to “Go back To Porcupine Tree” comments from Prog fans and whether he feels obligated to put the PT songs in the setlist.

Here’s the complete statement:

“I think if I could just sort-of correct you on one thing – this is fine detail. I don’t play any Porcupine Tree songs. I play Steven Wilson songs. Now, I also play a song that was originally recorded on by Blackfield in the show right now.

“I play three songs that were originally played by Porcupine Tree, some nights we play 6-7 songs, but whether they were originally recorded by Blackfield, by Porcupine Tree, or by my solo band, to me, that’s all secondary.

“The most important thing is every single one of the songs I play in my show tonight with the exception of the Prince cover version, but every other song I play in my show tonight was written by Steven Wilson, and that’s all that matters to me.

“Some people will say, ‘Oh, that’s Porcupine Tree song, that’s Steven Willson song.’ Honestly, I don’t even remember myself which is which.

“It’s not relevant to me, and I think it will become less relevant as time goes on. It’s already becoming less relevant as time goes on. They’re simply songs that I’ve written; and by the way, they existed before Porcupine Tree recorded them.

“I wrote them, and in fact, some of the songs that people think of as Porcupine Tree songs were written for a soundtrack album. [2005’s] ‘Lazarus’ was written as a solo song for a soundtrack for a movie that never happened anyway, so it ended up being put on the Porcupine Tree record.”

When asked about being called ‘King Of Prog’, he said:

“I don’t know because I think that was already self-evident. I’ve made many different kinds of records in my career. I have ambient, drone, noise projects, I made pop records with Blackfield, I’ve made pop records with No Man, I’ve made extreme-metal records, and I never felt particularly that I was someone that was working in a particular genre.

“In fact, I didn’t like the idea of being a generic artist. For whatever reason, I’ve become known as a progressive rock artist, and listen, I’m very happy to admit that some of my records are very clearly in that genre, so [2013’s] ‘The Raven That Refused to Sing’ particularly was almost deliberately designed to be like an old-fashioned progressive rock album, and that had nothing to do with that record.

“‘To the Bone’ I wanted to make more of an intellectual pop record, so still very sophisticated production, arrangements, great musicianship, quite dark lyrical themes, but I wanted to make quite direct accessible pop songs.”