IN ABSENTIA

I'd listened to Fear of a Blank Planet a couple of times before listening to In Absentia. It struck me as a good album, but not mind-blowing or Earth-shattering. I listened to In Absentia first time round. And wow.

The first track to really grab me was The Sound of Muzak: a perfect example of how Porcupine Tree convey emotions so very well. The next few tracks to impress me were Trains, Blackest Eyes and .3. Each of these songs are masterpieces: Trains being one of the most heartfelt songs I've ever heard, Blackest Eyes being incredibly dynamic and .3 being a classic ambient/psychedelic PT track. No single track on the album is bad or even approaching bad. Each track brings something different to the mix. In terms of atmosphere and mood, most songs are quite sad; however the dynamics and textures conveying those emotions vary incredibly.

This album is something of an anomaly in that it is one of the only Porcupine Tree releases not to have a 10+ minute track on it. Perhaps this album saw PT going mainstream. Sometimes going mainstream annoys me (the most prominent example being Genesis), but a switch to shorter tracks isn't necessarily detrimental to the quality of the songs. Some songs, while not prog epics, still approach the 8-minute mark and radio-friendly tracks are still in a minority.

This is one of the few albums which I feel I can safely recommend to almost anybody. It has heavy, metal-influenced parts for the metalhead, mellow, keyboard-driven instrumental parts for the progger, and all-round tracks for the average listener. Truly an essential.