Steven Wilson's "THE FUTURE BITES"

Good afternoon everyone! This is my third post on the blog, and I’m so excited to talk about this next album I listened to on Friday on stream. THE FUTURE BITES is an album coming from artist Steven Wilson, someone who I never listened to. Not knowing anything about him or this project, I decided to listen to the song that came out before the album “MAN OF THE PEOPLE”. Upon listening to this song, I realized that I was in for a treat with this album because the concept that was going to be covered in Wilson’s music would be great to analyze.

Upon sitting down and playing the first song, I was welcomed with a great guitar solo that soon introduced a soundscape that brought out emotions based on the idea of isolation and abandonment. Wilson’s voice slowly comes in and from there, we have officially entered the album’s atmosphere. As I went through the album, there was a good amount of 80s inspired sounds that I enjoyed as it blended with this experimental isolated soundscape that Wilson’s created. His vocals throughout the project was amazing and I felt like each line and tone had a certain purpose towards the concept being portrayed in this album.

THE FUTURE BITES goes over a lot of concepts that has to do with modern society and the complications it can harbor on the future generations of people. Wilson does a great job covering topics such as pride, self-esteem, and self-indulgence as we deal with social media, consumerism, and the other by-products of our evolving society. Songs such as “SELF”, “KING GHOST”, and “EMINENT SLEAZE” show how pride is valued in our celebrities and our role models, yet this same admiration is what causes a lot of evil deeds to go unlooked. “MAN OF THE PEOPLE” furthers this idea by going over a scenario of a toxic relationship, something that Wilson himself talks about, having the singer be a lover to a powerful politician/religious figure who’s been caught in a scandal. The song “FOLLOWER” shows another side of this issue as our idols in social media force us to undervalue ourselves as they give us fake information to buy whatever they’re selling. The consistent line “Oh, follow me, follow me” symbolizes the consistent battle we have as consumers as we wager our self-esteem and self-indulgence when following our influencers.

Finally, the song “PERSONAL SHOPPER” is a ten-minute experience where Wilson tries fitting in the issues of consumerism in the auditory sphere. The isolated keys that you hear in the beginning creates this idea once again that we as consumers are alone as we fight this battle to take part in buying all these luxurious items around us. The first verse of this song talks about possessions and how we as human beings are being valued based on what we own versus who we are as unique individuals. The second verse shows criticism on the financial world with the usage of loans in modern society and how we’re encouraged to “buy” a better life rather than taking a more wholistic approach on changing ourselves for the better. This reminds me of the movie Fight Club and there’s a speech by Tyler Durden that I play on my stream to further this idea that we pretty much “work jobs we hate so we can buy shit we don’t need.” The third verse focuses on the idea of excess spending and how the usage of debt is rationalized to help create that ability to indulge that much. I also wanted to note the presence of Elton John in this song as he lists a bunch of items we consume as a society. Someone from my chat pointed out that Elton John is known for his over-indulgence and his appearance being over the top. By having him as a specific feature in this song, it cements the truth about this song. It’s not made up, this is something real and if you don’t realize it now, you won’t ever until you’re too far in the process.

I talk about so much more in the stream, so below I’ll attach the timestamps for the discussion for each song and how we went over the album as it was playing live. Thank you for reading this and I hope you get a chance to hear this great project as well.

IMPORTANT: none of the music heard on the video is mine and are owned respectively by their artists and music labels.

Tracklist and Timestamps:

1. UNSELF – 4:16

2. SELF – 7:13

3. KING GHOST – 12:21 (FAVORITE)

4. 12 THINGS I FORGOT – 17:43 (FAVORITE)

5. EMINENT SLEAZE – 23:44

6. MAN OF THE PEOPLE – 27:25

7. PERSONAL SHOPPER – 35:37 (FAVORITE)

8. FOLLOWER – 46:55

9. COUNT OF UNEASE – 50:23