The band will be playing the Tampa Theater, Florida on April 25th - ticket information will follow on. Meanwhile PT will be crossing the border into Canada where they will be visiting Capitole Du Quebec, Quebec City Thursday 6th May, Place De Arts in Montreal on Friday 7th May and the Sound Academy, Toronto, Ontario on Saturday 8th May. More details as we get them.

Speaking of Canada, Rush’s Neil Peart has been musing on music and PT. “I went to see a band called Porcupine Tree not long ago. And I was talking with (singer-guitarist) Steven Wilson. They just put out a 55- minute piece. That's a finger to the whole iTunes shuffle thing, and he intended it as such. And I thought, 'Yeah, that's another way of rebelling against it -- by just saying no.' There's too much lost in giving up the integrity of an album -- what it represents to you as a musician, and as a human being, for that matter. So I like that approach.” You can read the whole interview here.

Readers of Teraz Rock - Poland’s biggest rock magazine voted SW “The Best Foreign Instrumentalist/Musician of 2009” In order to get to the number one slot he beat a field that included The Edge, Jerry Cantrell, Jack White, Kerry King, Kirk Hammett, More Gore, Tom Morello, Mark Knopfler, and Omar Rodriguez-Lopez.









SW was once again featured in Robert Fripp’s updated diary as the pair work on the latest remixes of the KC back catalogue.










Finally, there’s a new interview with Gavin where he talks about his book/DVD package, Rhythmic Illusions, his work within King Crimson and of course, PT. Asked about his contribution to the Tree, GH responded “It’s a hard thing to really quantify – the influence is subtle – but the sound of the band comes from the chemistry of all four members. We all like different kinds of music – and come from different musical backgrounds. I have a jazz background and like to improvise – the others guys are coming from a different place – so sometimes we fight about things but it always resolves in a better outcome in the end. We’re all evolving in our personal lives and that influences the personality of the band – I think the band is growing up.” Read the whole article here

The second part of Gavin’s interview with Drum Department is available for viewing. Find out why riding a bike is part of his personal program, issues around sound production and loudness, his love of Lewis Taylor, recording at home, working with OSI, and the problems of long-term exposure to extremes of noise and tinnitus to name but a few!

Elswhere, SW can be seen talking briefly about producing Orphaned Land and finally there’s a new fan forum on the block. Conference of the Strange is an offshoot of the Rush Forum and celebrates all things PT.

Steven Wilson's Cover Version VI is now available to pre-order and will begin shipping from 22nd February. This will be the last in the series of CD singles featuring a cover version and an original. The single comes in a special limited edition box which contains CV6 in a picture sleeve as well as empty picture sleeves for all of the previous singles too (note that it will NOT contain the first 5 CDs, you have to have them already in order to put them in to the sleeves provided in the box!) The box also contains a booklet of drawings of SW by Hajo Mueller. You can pre-order now from Headphone Dust or Burning Shed. LIMITED AND SELLING FAST!

The sale on merchandise continues over in the US shop. Take a peek here to see what the well-dressed PT fan will be wearing at the second-leg of the US tour.

The second and third albums by Ex-Wise Heads (Colin Edwin’s side-project with ex-Henry Cow win and reed player, Geoff Leigh) are now available as free downloads. Colin offers some comments about this over on his Myspace page blog.

You can get Time And Emotion Study (2003) here and Holding Up The Sky (2006) on this page.

No-Man’s Mixtaped DVD gets the thumbs-up in Altsounds. “The sound mix on this DVD is brilliant and makes clear the atmospheric sound from the sound of the rain coming into the right speaker on the headphones while guitar is played in the left at the end of the first track. The clarity of Tim Bowness’ vocals, the distortion of Steven’s guitar on ‘Lighthouse’. It's just crystal clear (and the reason I now understand why Steven has worked on remastering King Crimson’s work into 5:1)” Here’s that review in full.

Meanwhile, there’s more Gavin than you can shake a stick out. Writing in issue 164 of Drum magazine, Gav offers up ten helpful hints to get your career going. There’s a summary of a couple of them found over on Blabbermouth.


















He’s also been talking to the folks at PyroMusic.net. If that’s not enough, he was also the subject of this video interview and demonstration for the German site, Drum Department and finally, he’s been interviewed by Sydney’s Utopia Records.

Due to overwhelming demand PT have added another date at the Metropolitan Theatre, Mexico. Tickets for the gig on April 13th go on sale on January 29th. Please note there are no ROABP services available for this date.

Later in the year the band will be playing the Hurricane and Southside Festivals on June 19th and 20th respectively. Further details as we get them.

Porcupine Tree will be hosting a special in-concert evening at New York’s historic Radio City Music Hall on September 24th, 2010. Tickets will go on sale to the general public on February 6th whilst ROABP will be able to buy theirs from February 3rd.













Further details about the concert will be posted at a later date, so stay tuned.

You can find out details about how to access ROABP services here .

Porcupine Tree tops the critics polls for 2009 in Germany’s Eclipsed Magazine. The Incident was voted Best Album of the Year, with PT also grabbing the No.1 honours for Best Live Concert of the Year, and Time Flies came in at No. 5 in the Best Song of the Year category.

SW’s Insurgentes got voted in at No. 25 in the Best Albums of 2009 category, whilst SW’s remix of King Crimson’s seminal album, In The Court of the Crimson King was voted in at No. 9 in the Best Reissues of the Year section.

Listener’s to Poland’s Radio 3 also voted The Incident as No.2 album of the year.

The latest edition of Classic Rock Presents Prog magazine also publishes its Best Of polls for 2009 and once again, PT does very well indeed.

PT were voted as No.1 Best Band, the Critic’s No.1 Best Album of the Year was The Incident (SW's Insurgentes was No. 6). The Reader’s poll saw The Incident come in at No. 2.

For their Event of the Year, PT’s The Incident tour was voted at No.4, whilst Gavin got the No.2 spot as Best Drummer, and Steven nabbed the No.4 slot as Best Guitarist. SW also took the No.1 slot as Prog Icon of 2009! Finally, the King Crimson reissues (which SW remixed) were also voted in at No.1 in the Best Reissue category.

A big thank you to everyone who voted for the band and their work in these polls!

Porcupine Tree will be playing at the Coachella Festival. The three day festival in California has the band booked on day two, Saturday 17th April. Get the details of the full festival line-up here.

Meanwhile Issue 9 of PT fanzine Carbon Nation is out. Full of PT-packed goodness it features Richard Barbieri solo gig review/album review, interview with Steven Wilson, interview with PT manager Andy Leff, interview with Colin Edwin, plus Incident tour gig reviews from Philadelphia, Baltimore and LA and the background story to No-man’s Mixtaped DVD by director Richard Smith. For more details on how to order the magazine take a look at the Carbon Nation website.