DORMANT FOR OVER A DECADE, PORCUPINE TREE ARE BACK, IN DEFIANCE OF THE ‘P’ WORD’S “KISS OF DEATH”. BUT WITH MAINMAN STEVEN WILSON’S SONIC SKILLS IN SUCH DEMAND AMONG PROG’S NABOBS, COULD THEIR CATHOLIC AND ENGAGING NEW ALBUM ALSO BE THEIR LAST? “ THERE’S NO GUARANTEES,” THEY TELL TOM DOYLE.

IT IS 1986 AND IN THE SATELLITE TOWN OF HEMEL HEMPSTEAD, 24 MILES NORTH-WEST of London, the 19-year-old Steven Wilson is a home-recording obsessive, creating a private sonic world in his bedroom, working on a 4-track made for him by his electronics engineer father. Inspired by Gong, Hawkwind, but mainly XTC’s psychedelic capers as their Dukes Of Stratosphear alter-egos on 1985 mini-LP, 25 O’Clock, Wilson starts to imagine himself as the leader of some fictitious progressive rock band.

Giving them the suitably strange and mythical name Porcupine Tree, he conjures up a line-up in his mind (Timothy Tadpole-Jones, Sir Tarquin Underspoon, Mr Jelly), along with a backstor y hinting that some of the members might have spent time in prison.

Wilson now accepts that, as a teenager, he was out of step with the ’80s. “I dreamed of this era when creativity and ambition were encouraged,” he says. “And the more kind of eccentric you were, the better it was.”

Porcupine Tree’s first album, the wackily-titled Tarquin’s Seaweed Farm, released in ’89 on cassette only, began to filter out to eager kindred prog heads, surprising its creator. “Porcupine Tree was this fake band because I didn’t think anyone would be interested,” Wilson avers.