The Itself Of Itself FOURTH DIMENSION
Noise and abstract beauty from the hardest-working man in prog.
It’s been 13 years since Steven Wilson last graced the world with a full Bass Communion album, and given his prolific output, it’s a wonder The Itself Of Itself arrived so soon. In just a few years he’s managed to bring out a Porcupine Tree record and two solo albums under his own name, as well as overseeing the prog-focused seven-LP box set Intrigue. Then there’s his sideline in spatial audio remixing for the likes of King Crimson, Roxy Music, Jethro Tull and Yes. On top of that, there were two Bass Communion tracks released in 2021 as part of the soundtrack of Wilson’s ongoing, as-yetunreleased film project, And No Birds Sing.
The Itself Of Itself feels almost like the antidote to all that activity. These seven tracks slow the world down to such a degree that they almost feel liminal. Predominantly for the attention of fans of drone visionaries Sunn O))) and Earth, the album also contains long, meditative passages that are redolent of the bravely expansive terrain explored by Fripp and Eno half a century ago. Wilson continues to deconstruct sound as much as he makes it, with the modus operandi to take analogue noise on a journey, starting with unwanted production by-products like flutter and hiss. Musique concrète and studio manipulation take everyday sounds into the cosmic, enticing the listener with surprising patches of hypnotic warmth or euphony, products of chance from controlled environments.
The title track features a Mellotron flute that decays and dist
