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Post by genesis777 on Mar 19, 2018 20:47:00 GMT -5
I'm a Genesis fan I first became aware of the band in the '80's, probably around the time Genesis (1983) came out. Recently, I've gone back and re-listened to many of their albums - here is my review of their '80's albums, in my order of preference:
Duke (1980): Quite simply superb - this album is a true masterpiece in every sense of the word. This seems to be a 'concept' album in that it tells the "story" of the lonely main character (Duke?!); from the opening "Behind the Lines" to "Duchess" to "Man of Our Times", then to the pop songs "Misunderstanding" and "Turn it on Again" (possibly my favorite Genesis song) to the wistful "Please Dont Ask" and "Cul-de-sac", this album is very strong from beginning to end. IMHO, this is one of the top ten best rock/pop/prog albums of the 1980's.
Genesis (1983): Incredible. From the disturbing but brilliant "Mama" to the radio-hit "That's All", to the politically incorrect "Illegal Alien", to the fast-paced "Just a Job to Do", to the incredible "Home By the Sea", this is an amazing album. It's probably around this time that I first started hearing the band on the radio.
Abacab (1981): Excellent album, from the long opener "Abacab", to "No Reply at All", "Keep it Dark", and the poignant "Man on the Corner".
Invisible Touch (1986): Probably their most commercially successful album for good reason - these were songs that sounded great on the mainstream radio stations. Back in the day, this was my favorite album by the group. Even now, I still appreciate "Invisible Touch", "Land of Confusion", "In too Deep", and "Anything She Does", etc. - and, "The Brazilian" is an amazing acoustic song. However, IMHO this album doesn't hold a candle to their earlier '80's work - maybe I've just heard these songs too many times....
We Can't Dance (1991): Good follow-up to IT, with several interesting songs including "No Son of Mine", the self-deprecating "I Can't Dance", "Tell me Why", Had to be tough working in between Phil solo albums
I also see the post-Peter Gabriel and pre-Duke albums, i.e. Wind and Wuthering, Then There were Three, Trick of the Tail as a transitional period to what they were to what they were from Duke on ward.
Best album with Peter Selling England by the Pound
Best Album with Collins on Vocals The Duke
Best Transitional Album Wind and Withering
Greatest talent to come from the Band Phil Collins The drumming, vocals, songwriting, won a Oscar
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redmumba
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Post by redmumba on Mar 22, 2018 15:06:33 GMT -5
Another Genesis fan here. I was more aware of the Collins era stuff than the Gabriel era while growing up. Peter's stuff with the band was more abstract while Collins was a mix of abstract and accessible. I did circle back around to what Gabriel had done with the band so I could level out the listening field. Like you, Selling England by the Pound is probably the best of what he'd done with Genesis - the other albums were these thick slabs of prog rock with extremely long tracks (ok, save for their debut album) - that's not to say that with Collins all the tracks were a radio friendly 4 minutes and however many seconds - he had some long ones as well. For their best transitional album, I'd have to say that would be ...And Then There Were Three... just for the fact that "Follow You Follow Me" seemed to be the track that got more female listeners than before.
What I liked about the '80s - '90s era Genesis was that you still had that one long big track (or a track split into two - Home by the Sea / Second Home by the Sea, Domino, Driving the Last Spike). One thing about Genesis and their single releases is that you really never got any demo versions as b-sides, it was always a live track or an actual b-side song. The only time fans got treated to a "demo" version of songs was on their Archive box sets, but these songs were labeled as rough versions or work in progress. There are demos out there, but I guess you have to know where to look. For example, there's a work in progress version of their Abacab album. The songs on this album are pretty much close to the finished version that was released, but with some minor differences like song titles, counting into the songs, a full version of "Paperlate" and the fact that the songs Dodo / Lurker segued into "Submarine" which then segued into "Naminanu".
I've always believed that the success of Invisible Touch was a carry over from Phil's No Jacket Required album. If you want some insight into Phil's time with Genesis, I highly recommend his recent autobiography (book or audio book - I preferred the audio book so I could hear his inflection and tone).
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Post by genesis777 on Mar 23, 2018 18:23:03 GMT -5
The Duke is my all time favorite Genesis album, Selling England is my favorite from Peter on Vocals era, Phil sang a song More Fool Me its just absolutely beautiful, chokes me up, I would say Phil's solo success opened doors for Peter too with his So album that was a huge hit, same goes for Mike and the Mechanics. No Jacket Required sold 25 million copies and yes it lifted Invisible Touch sales to 10 million, en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_best-selling_albumsWhat I especially liked about Phil and Genesis it all about the songs and the musicianship. Not to mention his outstanding drumming skills. I too listened to Phil's book some Duran Duran quotes from Live Aid, Duran and Phil were supposed to fly together to Philly from London, but I think the fact Andy and John were on tour stopped that.
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