THE SKY MOVES SIDEWAYS

I admire this group in their ability to produce "incredible sound" of their music. The first album that I knew this band the first time was a live album "Coma Divine". Considering it's a live performance, the sound produced is wonderful! If the live album they could produce good sound, what about this studio album? Much better!

It requires patience to enjoy this album. If I may suggest, don't try to listen to this album (first time listening) during daylight! You should start listening it in the evening around 10 pm when everybody home is asleep and use an earphone. Or you can use a stereo set, turn off the light, play it loud! You will experience something really different .. IMHO.

The intro of first track "The Sky Moves Sideways 1" consumes approximately 4:41 minutes before vocal enters nicely. In comparison of this intro, you may have completed enjoying one track of "Tom Sawyer" (RUSH) for example. So, you can imagine how long the intro is dwelling in terms of duration. But don't worry, it's a very relaxing intro. It may stimulate you with generation of great ideas to bring back to work the next day. Steve's voice enters the scene very nicely with his low and heavy voice "We lost the skyline ." (observe the sound production in this part, stunning!). I enjoy it very much. I feel like Steve's tongue is just one inch from my ears! The Floydian guitar style is excellently played here. "Ough ." I almost vomit when the track enters around minute 8:26 where the disco-like music with drum-loop and spacey keyboard dominate the background. But when the solo keyboard take the lead, followed then by percussion and guitar .. Wow!!! it's so nice. End of this long track (17 min.) is closed by an acoustic guitar.

The second track "Dislocated Day" is an upbeat track with bass dominating the play, accentuated by a nice drumming. It's an excellent track. "The Moon Touches Your Shoulder" has a nice acoustic guitar and vocal in its intro. You may observe the inclusion of sound effect in this part as well. It's a mellow and beautiful track. The guitar part is extremely Floydian. (When I'm playing this tune now, my friend who never knew this band, thought that I am playing Pink Floyd album).

The shortest track "Prepare Yourself" (1:55" minutes) is an instrumental with guitar solo that sets the tune for the next track "Moonloop", another-17 minute piece. This is another sound exploration by the band. Everything is played at the same melody at its background music. It tends to bore the listener if we only listen to the background. But, the nice thing is at the lead guitar and percussion. The album is concluded with the long track "The Sky Moves Sideways part 2". The last track is really powerful.

Overall, it's an excellent album. You may call it's derivative, as it sounds like PINK FLOYD. To me these two groups are different and I love the two both. One thing unique about PORCUPINE TREE is their passion to explore sound effects. So, I would say that this group is a SOUND EXPLORER. And the result is terrific, like this album. I wish one day this group release the SACD or DVD Audio version of this album.

What do you think? - Gatot Widayanto, Indonesia.