Steven Wilson Retrospective Part 3: Karma - "The Last Man To Laugh" (1985)

Unlike Altamont, Karma managed to record a second album. Unlike The Joke’s on You, nothing from this has been re-recorded by any of Steven’s future projects. A lot of what applied to The Joke’s on You (namely the lo-fi recording) also applies here, but this album is stronger than The Joke’s on You and remains the strongest of his 80's demo recordings.

• “Where Is The End If There’s No Beginning?” (9:45)

This song opens with some curious synth effects, then clean guitar. Then, there’s a voice that is clearly a woman’s (can’t be Steven), After this, there’s a shift to heavier, soaring leads. And then a long, long, long jam that goes through various rhythms, tones, and dynamics. There is little to a structure here, so it’s best to strap in, go for a ride, and take it as you go.

This track also exhibits a Grateful Dead-like tendency to stretch one’s wings, but there is a bit of repetition in the first half. Granted, the track does flow better than the longer excursions of some of the tracks on The Joke’s on You, but still not ideal. Still, a progression like this makes the transformation from the Steven Wilson of 1985 to today more endearing—it was one made possible through decades of development, not overnight intrinsic talent.

The use of sound effects (like that of a clock ticking) shows that Steven, even at this early age, was determined to be cutting-edge and innovative within the confines of whatever genre he chooses to play in. Regardless, this is a soncially-ambitious song to be recorded as a demo-tape—excursions through light and heavy, various guitar effects (clean and heavy, volume effects, Genesis-esque violin tones), sound effects related to time (ticking clocks and an alarm clock), and an ending with a female choir. That this was Steven’s last demo recording shows that—even at 17 years old—his sonic ambitions would need a fuller sound to support them.

• “A Peace on Earth and Good Swill to All Pigs Part 1” (8:33)

The beginning of this song has the sound effects thunder, footsteps, typewriters, and a gunshot before a drum-fill leads into a very 80’s rhythm (overlaid by heavy synths). This rhythm repeats for the verse from Steven Wilson where I swear I heard “I’ll dry your eyes with tear gas.” That line alone is a thematic precursor to much of the darker lyrics of later Porcupine Tree, particularly an album like In Absentia (a loose concept album about a serial killer exhibiting tendencies of rape and necrophilia; also one of the greatest albums Steven has recorded in any project), to which Steven said of the title:

“I have an interest in serial killers, child molesters, and wife beaters... Not in what they did, but in the psychology of why. What caused them to become unhinged and twisted? Why are they unable to empathize? It's [In Absentia] sort of a metaphor - there's something missing, a black hole, a cancer in their soul. It's an absence in the soul.”

That question of “What caused them to become unhinged and twisted” varies in the answer depending on the subject and the atrocity. Sure, the “absence in the soul” (it’s not for nothing that one of the final tracks of In Absentia is titled “Strip The Soul”) could work in the context of a serial killer. But what about the contexts of “I’ll dry your eyes with tear gas,” a suicide bomber (“Detonation” from To The Bone), nuclear annihilation (“Radioactive Toy” from On The Sunday of Life), or those who forgot Joyce Carol Vincent (whose life is re-imagined in Hand. Cannot. Erase., Steven’s greatest solo album) so thoroughly that she decomposed for three years while no one bothered to check up on her?

Back to the song, the verse leads into a simple guitar solo (one which starts with the first few notes unaccompanied), which leads to another verse. After this, a synth solo sparks a change in rhythmic pattern from the whole band—one where the whole band is busy. After this, a clean guitar passage plays, shortly joined by the rest of the band for another verse. This ends with an abrupt jam which starts with a chant that gets cut off by rhythmic stabs of the synths/guitars/bass. On top of this rhythmic formation comes a drum solo that is soon joined in by a bass solo, only to shift into a new 4/4 rhythm for another guitar solo. After this, the song ends with the sound of thunder, someone panting, waves crashing, and then a scream.

This song introduces an element that Steven would use for his career—a focus on violent, uncomfortable topics set to music with an impeccable sense of melody. This is especially true to contrast with the lyrics of a song like “Nine Cats,” whose word-salad nature may leave it mistaken for a Robert Hunter-penned Grateful Dead lyric.

• “A Peace on Earth and Good Swill to All Pigs Part 2” (12:15)

The full band are put in this one right out of the gate, with bass and synth being particularly prominent. Steven then starts a verse with “My lungs are almost full/And my eyes will not respond” before a repeat of the opening passage, then another verse. After that, guitar punctuates a variant of the opening passage, which leads into a synth solo. Following this, there is a soundscape-like passage punctuated by cymbal taps and non-lexible vocals The presence of a very ELP-sounding synth soon carries the song out of the soundscape and into a new rhythmic passage with the drums and bass. This pattern ends up vamping for a while as various bits of feedback-drenched guitar screw around on top of the vamp, eventually leading into a new verse with a standard 4/4 rhythm playing as the synth pattern carries over. The only lyrics of this part I can make out are “I’m sinking./I’m free./I’m dying.” The rest are too buried in the mix to decipher. Eventually, the band crash out and leave clean guitar to play an arpeggio, soon overlaid with a warm-sounding synth. Once drums and bass join in, there is a Gilmour-esque guitar solo (but played with a Hackett-like tone). After this, a marching-snares drum rhythm is punctuated by stabs of bass and synth for a few measures before abruptly stopping. At this instant, the sound of torrential downpour plays, followed by the sound of someone opening a door to get away from the rain, picking up a phone, a gasp, slamming the phone into the receiver, and opening the door again.

The flow of this longer piece is closer to that which Steven would utilize time and time again in his subsequent career. It’s not all-the-way there yet, but it is a massive step up from both “Altamont” and the Karma version of “Nine Cats.”

• Final Thoughts:

The production is honestly one of the few drawbacks to this. Apart from that, this is the strongest of the demo-tape recordings of Steven’s early career. Very impressive for someone who was 17/18 at the time of release.

NEXT TIME: Porcupine Tree - "On The Sunday of Life" (1991)

This will be interesting for me because it’s one of only two Porcupine Tree albums (the other being "The Incident," their swan song) I have not heard in its entirety. Will be a relief to be out of demo-tape land, but I've heard mixed things about OTSoL. Well, I'll be the judge of that!

#music #prog #stevenwilson #karma #1985 #discography #thelastmantolaugh