What happens when Steven Wilson heads out towards the dark side of the moon for the chance to imagine a glance back at Earth.

Release Date:  14th March 2025

Label: Fiction Records

Format: CD / Vinyl / Deluxe CD Set / Blu-ray

WHAT? MORE PROG?

The Overview, in which we find Lord Steven of Wilson returning on the crest of a wave that bears a “most audacious to date” and “expansive, progressive music” tag. The promise of an experience that draws upon his thirty years of music making. One formidable task in itself bearing in mind the journey from bedroom imaginings to the Royal ALbert Hall as Porcupine Tree mainman and solo artiste.

The backstory has been well covered. Inspired by the ‘overview effect’ of astronauts looking back at Earth from space, one might consider The Overview album as a treatise, a perspective on significance. Drawing on both the reported overwhelming sense of connection and perception of beauty he considers the contrast with the troubled nature of humanity and the insignificance in the big picture. The core threads – the good and the bad if you will.

Two extended tracks, each comprising quite distinctive musical sections suggest a kind of Supper’s Ready for the modern age. He’s reluctantly admitted (in a PROG magazine confessional) that he’s gone back to a progressive mindset. One that suits the concept. Having said that, his dalliance in the recent past with electronics and trad pop, amongst others, show up as part of the ‘progressive’ package. The term is unavoidable, like it might run through a stick of Blackpool rock; a multicolored one that tickles the tastebuds way beyond trad prog.

Anyway.

OUTLIVED BY OBJECTS

Alongside the options of all sorts that showcase super duper audio visual tweaks and arty presentations with audiophile, atmos and IMAX shenanigans, there’s some music for those of us who simply want an LP or download for the car. The first composition (or is it a movement?), Objects Outlive Us, comes in nine easy parts. Not quite sure at this stage which part is which or what starts and ends where. Ambience and falsetto eases into a chanted passage (dare we say a la The Revealing Science Of God from Yes’ Topographic Oceans marathon?) and to consider the mundanity of life. Queuing at the bank, redundancy, financial arrears – the master of mundane, Andy Partridge at work. Meanwhile in outer space, interplanetary catastrophes occur in a celestial equivalence.

Following some McCartney-esque balladeering, dotted with crescendos and gentle piano decoration, around fifteen minutes, a furious instrumental section (which could be Ark or Cosmic Sons Of Toil or No Ghost On The Moor or none) dazzles with dexterity and close interplay. The languid passage with guitar solo included – Heat Death Of The Universe? – which follows to bring the piece to a close. A poignant and thoughtful refection that conjures up the vastness of space and the universe.

THE FUTURE COMES BACK TO BITE

The title track heads into more challenging territory for those now comfortable in the Prog Rock mindset. It’s Prog with a different hat on. The roller coaster ride offers the challenge posed back in the days when the future bit with a bubbling techno introduction

Having challenged, the reward is a lovely mid tempo intermission. What could be A Beautiful Infinity I (?) is full of Wilson tropes. A piece that would be a prime fit for his Transience (more accessible) collection. A languid tempo and more than a hint of Steven ‘half empty’ Wilson melancholy (“back on Earth my loving wife’s been dead for years“) that’s at odds with the perspective and infinity behind life’s bigger picture. It’s arguably the star turn of the whole record and perhaps a sign of that underlying Pink Floyd DNA threatening to break the surface.

To be fair, I’m happy by this point. Only the bubbling sequencer and flying synth lines – that should certainly have Messrs Holzman and Blundell breaking a sweat on stage – remain. That and the sort of ambient and suitably cosmic three minute playout that Sir Steven puts out in the Bass Communion guise.

AND?

The overview effect has inspired Wilson to deliver another in his series of challenging listens. It’s Prog Rock Jim but not as we know it, but what else would you expect aside from the unexpected. Not giving a f**k is what he thrives on and even when we’re seduced by his reported return to Prog, he throws a spanner in the works. Like the Emperor in his new clothes, he’s not afraid to put his balls on the line. Good on ya’ Steven. See you on tour.

Teaser:

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