How did Porcupine Tree become popular?

My only guess at that time frame would be WWW, them getting more attention on forums and discussion sites. I got into PT probably around 2000-2001 and I remember around 2005ish when MS Zune forums were going on or just started, The Social, people were talking up PT quite a lot. I assume on other forums as well during that time frame.

I lurked here for a couple yrs before joining in 2009 and they were being discussed as well. I think the old MySpace forums were buzzing with PT too.

The reason I say last 10 yrs is I think more and more people have come to know PT and SW in the last 10yrs and people are going back and buying PT albums for the first time. Just look on Discogs and you'll see many of their albums have been re-issued/remastered in the last 10yrs. SW has said himself that InAbsentia sold much better well after original release date, since about 2017-18 it has been reissued a few more times. I have my orignal CD from 2002, a LP release from 2010 and also from 2018......Most of those sold out on release and are out of print, the LP versions. It was recently reissued in 2023.

That's how they became more popular.

I saw Porcupine Tree open up for Yes at the Bryce Jordan Center on the Penn State University campus in 2002. I had two friends with me. One of them started buying PT albums following this concert. Even if it was minimal, it did gain them at least one fan. I also bought a PT tee-shirt, which I still own.

PT had some sound issues in their performance. The bass was drowning out their overall sound. It was still a great performance. On the other hand, Yes had no sound problems and sounded better than any other act I ever heard at the Bryce Jordan Center. BJC is notorious for having bad acoustics. I saw Elton John and the Steve Miller Band there. Both had sound issues throughout their performances. BJC is more of a sporting venue, particularly basketball, volleyball, etc. That Yes concert was the last concert I've been to. 

I actually think metal fans in general. Most prog metal fans already know about prog stuff. The metal fans have to go to prog metal then to prog. When PT put out IA and DW they were probably starting to getting marketed as prog metal or metal which imo is kind of like clickbait (or bait and switch). PT were never a prog metal band let alone "metal" but to some people anything with any kind of heaviness is metal. I've seen KC and Rush referred to as metal and prog metal also. Oh well.

I meant we can agree to disagree about certain aspects of it. I think PT got big first before SW and you don't. That's what we can agree to disagree about. ;) I also say that because to be honest I get tired of going around in circles about this. ;)

Selling England by the Pound was first released in late 73 and didn't go gold until 1990 which is over 10 years. Genesis were much bigger than Yes as a pop band but Yes were bigger as a prog band. Anyway, I thought we were discussing PT and SW? 

PT and SW have become more popular in the past ten years? Maybe a little but based on PT's last album not charting as high as their previous ones I would say not in the US. So for the countries where they charted higher maybe otherwise no. I told you already the chart positions in the US which prove my point(see this is where we can agree to disagree! ;)) imo but probably more so than Genesis, Yes and Rush which isn't saying much. Again, younger folks are discovering the older bands all the time. 

Agreeing to disagree means you both agee not to continue the argument. It is sort of like a truce. We acknowledge that we don't agree and don't really see the point in continuing this ad infinitum (otherwise you like to argue just as much if not more than I do! ). However, it just gets tiring for me to keep saying the same thing over and over again (ie PT albums charting higher than SW albums etc.). Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz.

Many of them do though. Maybe it's split down the middle so maybe half do and half don't. I do know that a lot of prog metal fans consider PT to be prog metal.

Ok, no arguing just discussing.  Anyway, I'm not sure what I said to make you think that I think most people got into PT because they only listened to old bands. I think initially younger folks got into PT because they were either psych fans or prog fans or fans of Pink Floyd (which apparently therre are plenty of younger fans of unlike say Yes who has mostly older fans - at least in my experience). Maybe at some point they got into them through Alternative rock also since the few albums right before IA seemed to have had a strong alternative influence. But being that metal (or heavy metal as I still often call it) seems to have tons of youn ger fans it seems that when they added the metal elements (after Gavin Harrison joined) that is when they got a larger fanbase which included a lot of younger fans. Did some older fans discover them too? Maybe I don't know. But typically for a band to become really big (say sell over 50,000 copies or make a dent on the charts)they have to make pretty big waves with the younger crowd. Usually at prog shows I would see mostly older folks but for PT and also Haken it seemed to be mostly younger folks(I knew the older folks at these shows were probabbly prog fans but I couldn't say the same for the younger fans). That was also the case for Ozric Tentacles who are not metal but brought in the young jam band fans (some of whom knew what prog was based on my brief conversations with them). One band that seem to have an almost equal number of fans of all different ages is Rush. For some reason the younger fans seem to think of Yes as an old granpa band or something. 

None of your metal friends even heard of PT? Even now? I find that rather surprising. They must stay in their own little bubble. I wonder if they have heard of the older mostly forgotten (at least by most it seems) bands such as Budgie, UFO or Uriah Heep (not as metallish but you can throw in Hawkwind too if you want but I bet a lot of fans discovered them through Lemmy). Everyone knows Motorhead, Judas Priest, Black Sabbath and Iron Maiden. 

Here's my theory about the Genesis thing. SEBTP imo probably sold about 200 to 300,000 copies within a year of its release. Then in the 80s it sold enough to go gold (so another 2-300,000) which it (and a few other 70s Genesis albums did) in 1990.