THE COMPLETE I.E.M.

IEM's complete discography has seen a marvelous and final reissue on this 2010 boxed edition. The lavish photographic artwork alone already provides a reason good enough to spend some well-earned cash, but of course, the fact that this music has finally been made available for purchase again is the real reason to throw a party. Or to kick my lazy holiday head back into reviewing mode.

Apart from a few extra's on the expanded Escalator to Christmas album; the music collected here will be entirely familiar to the few souls that ventured out to discover the music of Wilson's most psych incarnation. All albums are presented in their original form, not remixed nor remastered (not that they needed any tampering), and they come in beautiful Japanese mini album sleeves, accompanied with a booklet full of early 20th century black & white photography. No band history or liner notes are provided, but given the mystery surrounding IEM, that's just fine.

If you're only familiar with the music from Porcupine Tree's second decade, IEM might come as a kind of a shock. Abstaining from anything resembling heavy riffs or poppy tunes, the long fluid improvisations, space explorations and the flirtations with early progressive electronic experiments in the vein of Tangerine Dream and Klaus Schulze will be entirely unpleasant to many Porcupine Tree fans. So if you thought Metanoia was self-indulgent drivel, then you should sure stay clear from each of the 2.000 copies this box-set was distributed in.

However, if you love mind-expanding kraut and space-rock, then you will find some of the best music in that field in this box set. Even if Wilson considers IEM as something of a not too serious indulgence, his passion and talent for this type of music shines all the way through. Each individual IEM album rates four bright stars, all of them together is a supernova.

I was so excited to find a copy of this limited edition release available somewhere and was so stoked to have it arrive in the mail. IEM was always one of my favorite Steven Wilson projects because the music they produced was so innovative and nostalgic and I think nostalgia is what the group is really about.

The project's entire discography is here and within you will find some of the greatest psych jams ever released, and impressive blend of krautrock, space rock, free improv and electronic. I literally enjoy every single second of music this band put out and with good reason. This is the kind of music that will take your mind places, make you feel like you're floating and most importantly it just plain sound good. From the craziness to the ambience, Steven Wilson really had a high point with IEM.

And as an added bonus, the packaging is downright superb, a cool little box covered in a nostalgic World War II photo that comes with excellently designed mini-vinyls and 60 pages of more nostalgic photos that are incredibly enjoyable to look at while listening to the music.

If you can find one of these boxsets by chance, do not hesitate. I believe tonefloat has sold their every last copy so now they will be difficult to find.