PORCUPINE TREE’S NIL RECURRING IS A B-RATE COLLECTION OF B-SIDES

Porcupine Tree – Nil Recurring
Nil Recurring is a collection of B-sides left over from 2006’s excellent Fear of a Blank Planet. Nil Recurring‘s four songs (each over 6 minutes in length) aren’t the best Porcupine Tree has to offer — as with all B-side collections there’s a reason they didn’t make the original album cut — but it’s hard to ignore anything this band does because they’re so damn good. Nil Recurring delivers what you’d expect from Porcupine Tree — expansive, heavy, ethereal prog-rock soundscapes — and as such is a must-have for the PT completist. But if you’re a casual fan or new to the band there’s no reason to have this collection; there are better places to start, such as the A-sides from whence these B-sides came, and pretty much any other PT album.

-VN

(two and a half out of five horns)