Jan 072011
See if you can’t invest 9 minutes and 39 seconds in this clip of “classic”-era Genesis and explain to me what motivated Peter Gabriel? I mean, what is at the heart of the music he made with Genesis? What was he trying to communicate? He put a lot of energy into whatever it was he wanted to get across, but his message or general worldview fails to reach me. Did he do a better job of communicating whatever he wanted to communicate on his solo records? He’s sold millions of records worldwide as both a band leader and solo artist, so surely one of you has gotten what he’s going on about. Please explain. Thank you.
Zzzzzz. As much as I love the ’70s, there’s still this kinda stuff that makes me yawn.
I don’t wanna hear Genesis unless it’s Phil Collins’ “Hello, Goodbye” rip known as “That’s All.”
Everybody in the band looks like they wish that they were doing something other than playing Genesis songs (fishing? a movie? taxes?) and Peter is thankfully not decked out in a giant flower costume and a self-imposed reverse mowhawk.
I like Genesis from Abacab through Invisible Touch and have no use for anthing before or since.
I think the 80’s better suited Peter Gabriel’s artisic intentions. either that or his intentions improved, or at least fell in line with what I wanted to see. The Lynn drum and synths let him be a real solo artist, playing the instruments and not turning his songs into 9 minute things so that everyone can get their licks in.
Shock The Monkey, Games Without Frontiers, Salsbry Hill, Big Time, Sledgehammer, Red Rain, Digging In The Dirt.. he had a great little run of bizzare songs that were interesting and commerical at the same time. That’s impressive. The 9 minutes above are a bore.
I don’t mind this song. It’s a lot more palatable than the 23-minute “Supper’s Ready.” I think Collins’ drumming is good. Mr. Mod, you weren’t impressed by the 128-string guitar action at the beginning of the song?
The plot to this song is kinda incomprehensible. Something about a dead boy who comes back to life and then ages rapidly and confronts the little girl who killed him. It’s supposed to be nursery rhyme-like.
I think what Gabriel was going for here was a darker, twisted version of English pastoral-ness. His lyrical concerns when he was in this band were a lot more obscure than when he went solo. That may be why you’re confused, Mr. Mod.
It’s partially a cultural thing. In the prog era, you could be this kind of weird. When he went solo, you had to be a different kind of weird, if you did not want to be perceived as a dinosaur.
You KNOW I dug the 128-string guitar action, Oats! Thanks for the insights. Keep ’em coming. For this week’s Saturday Night Shut-In, I think it’s going to be just me and the couple of Genesis albums I own. We’re going to see if we can’t come to a better understanding of each other.
By the way, doesn’t Phil Collins, at this point in time, look like he should be a member of the late-’60s Beach Boys?
Definitely! He could’ve subbed for Al Jardine and no one would’ve noticed!
Can I just say that “Genesis” is one of the stupid-proggiest band names ever?
A triumph of the Brain over the Heart, Balls and Soul.
Funny you should say that. I was playing “The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway” (the song) while driving my 9 year old to school. He liked the intro of the song (like his dad, he’s big on repetition) and wanted to know who was playing. When I told him he went on a rant about how that’s a stupid name for a band!
I didn’t know Tony Banks played guitar. I didn’t know Gabriel (look how young he looks!) played flute. God I hate the flute. God I hate when someone acts out lyrics with gestures.
Remember that these were public school boys. They’re one of the first group of rockers who were not working class and didn’t pretend to be. There had been art school rockers, but that’s a whole different cultural thing. These guys formed the band right out of school, but they definitely would have gone to university if their parents had had their druthers.
Remember that this would have been the time of Bad Company and Humble Pie. Genesis just has a different frame of reference than bands like that. At least a few of the Geneses obviously had classical music training, which is most apparent in the flourishes at the end of the song.
A lot of us here went to college, right? There was even something called college rock for a while (though it didn’t sound much like this). So I hear what cdm is saying, but it’s interesting to me that accusing any kind of music as lacking brains always sounds hopelessly elitist. Calling the Stooges, say, brainless is even a compliment. But one would never criticize a kind of music as having too much heart/balls/soul, would you? But having too little of those is always considered bad.
It’s a kind of class warfare. Rock is considered a democratic art form, and if you’re smart, you’d do well to hide it.
That being said, this clip mostly makes me cringe too.
And no one’s playing bass! The horror!
That’s funny, Mr. Mod. When I was nine years old, the band Genesis was a household name, it being the year of Invisible Touch. Sounds like that may not be the case anymore.
I’m with you on this one, Mr. Mod. This rock sub-genre is something my ears just cannot tune into. So that part I cannot explain.
But I really like a lot of the PG solo stuff, especially his III and IV albums which I think are tremendous. Even though it doesn’t usually seem personal — he often writes from some character’s perspective — the lyrics are engaging. And he got a lot of good powerful and unique noise out of the early 80’s gear, combined that novel drum sound with synths and Linndrum and crunchy guitar and Fairlight, without it sounding dated like so much 80’s synth rock. Oh yeah, and Tony Levin’s Chapman Stick bass! Is “Shock the Monkey” the highest profile use of stick ever recorded?
This clip is the first time I’ve seen a rock front man with his own bass drum at the foot of his mic stand!
Tell me you don’t agree that Collins has the jealous look of a drummer who desperately wants to be in front of the band.
Funny, I was originally going to post this clip and ask Townspeople to comment on all the things they didn’t like about it, the reverse of HVB’s “If you can’t say anything nice…” series. Then I thought that was too obvious. Yes, the flute and acting out of the lyrics were the first two things that came to mind for me! And yes, the elitist grounding of Genesis reminded me of E. Pluribus Gergely’s points on Animalism, or Animality, or whatever the heck he called it.
Someone was bugged about this in the YouTube comments, if memory serves, and someone else pointed out that there was use of bass pedals.
Why oh why can’t he remove those strands of gossamer from the air? This doesn’t bother me nearly as much as it should, but I admit I don’t understand it except in terms of Pete trying to get in some girl’s pants.
Albeit in a douche-y, passive-aggressive kind of way.
“I’m singing backups, but I’m singing the HELL out of them! I close my eyes, lean my beard into the mic, and really FEEEEL my backup vocals. I’m really good at bringing something true and deep and emotional to MY backup vocals. In fact, the more I think about it… WHY THE HELL AM I NOT SINGING LEAD?”
I don’t know, HVB, I’m beginning to appreciate Collins more and more as I prepare for my sitdown with the band this weekend. Then again, I think Mike Love was invaluable to the Beach Boys…
I kinda already assumed he was your favorite member of Genesis, Mod.
Supper’s Ready gives me an 8 track flashback! I used to have Foxtrot on 8 track and it would click to another channel in the middle of Supper’s Ready! It was the end of the 8 track era and I was getting them 3 for a buck at Woolworths and Montgomery Ward!
Those were the days . . . I got Eno’s first two albums that way and a ton of Roxy Music and Lou Reed’s Berlin. . . nobody else at the Northtown Mall in Blaine, Minnesota wanted the stuff I guess.
Things might be a lot different in this world if Collins could have kept his hair.
i am empowered by, and agree with this interpretation.
I’ll tell you what, the bespectacled guitarist gives him a run for his money. Is that the legendary Steve Hackett?
i like it.
it’s not obvious.
it’s unique.
i think they were trying to do something different.
i don’t consider this to be rock or pop music.
i wonder if they did/do?
i think Gabriel was a performance artist who gained access to wide audiences to sing to and went for it…
with pretty cool results.
So his motivation is to be a performance artist and rock is his vehicle? Could be. To be clear, Townspeeps, I’d prefer we steer away from whether this is “good” or not and focus on Gabriel’s motivation. If anyone’s curious, I found this performance surprisingly Not Bad. There were moments of human expression that I felt despite the presence of the kick drum at Gabriel’s feet, the flute, the 128-string guitar, the hand jazz, etc. I feel there may be a way “in” yet with this band, but I hope to have a better sense of what I might find awaiting me if, indeed, I cross the threshold.
Of course, it helps that Gabriel was, to quote Leonard Cohen unironically, “born with the gift of a golden voice.”
yes. i think his motivation was to create something new and unique.
more of a modern(70s) storyteller amidst a neo electric folk jazz landscape.
As far as I know, Tony Banks is the only member of Genesis to keep a full head of hair and is the only member of the band who never felt the need to try to break off and have mainstream success on his own.
Is there a correlation between these two points? And is Banks now the de facto leader of Genesis, which he may have been on the sly all along?
I am no Genesis fan, but Collins has two real strengths. He is a really good drummer and I’m thrilled when he turns up on something like an Eno album.
The guy also has an amazingly supple voice. He can go from low to high with nearly no change in the tone of his voice. the only reason I noticed this was that I saw the woman from the Fifth Dimension, (Marilyn McCoo?) sing this when she was hosting Solid Gold, and she struggled mightily on both ends of the range. Collins carries it off like it’s a three note range, totally effortless.
I agree about not being a Genesis (or especially) Collins fan and think I agree about Collins probably being talented.
Could he be the human equivalent of the very phenomenon being argued about on another thread right now, the “I admit this thing is structurally well-built and I still want no part of it” scenario?
Also, on the subject of Phil Collins’ strengths, I bet Collins is deceptively physically strong. He’s famously a short bald dude, but I bet if he jumped you from behind and put you in a sleeper hold, it’d be a real pain to shake him off.
In my mind, Collins is the toughest member of Genesis, even if he’s the one I like the least. Gotta give the man his due.
Awesome! I made it through! Remember though, I was into prog before punk. This is a great performance, if you like this sort of thing.
Yes – Collin’s is a great drummer. Too bad about what he seems to be now-a-days.
I saw Genesis a few times post P.G. but wish I had seem them as they were here too.
“I feel there may be a way “in” yet with this band”
I’m not a fan but my older brother is a huge fan of their 70s stuff, so I heard my fair share back in high school. I think the gateway is the proggy stuff from the 70s after Gabriel left the band. Phil tempered the band’s proggy excesses with his pop/rock leanings and the band kept in check the excessive “Phil-ness” that would emerge later once Phil took over the band.
The song “Squonk” is a good example.
“Squonk” has long been my second-favorite Classic-style Genesis song.
Tony Banks also may have set the tone for the Prime Ministerial Look that Tony Blair brought to office.
This is dull, it is true, but in very interesting ways. Actually compelling viewing, though I don’t think I would ever just LISTEN to this.
Good call, Oats. I agree with the “darker, twisted version of English pastoral-ness.”
Oh, please, please feature “A Trick of the Tale.” And I think King Cole makes an appearance on that album, too.
And from “A Trick of the Tale,” such an underrated album.
I don’t feel that I have a lot to add to this conversation as you chaps have covered so much already. I like early Genesis. I like prog rock. That may be because I’m a sucker for a complicated, shifting time signature. The silly lyrics and PG’s acting them out are thematically relevant as the album is “Nursery Crimes.” I would consider this song and rendition a gold standard of the era.
Although I don’t get the shell.
Big Steve has got it. The members of Genesis were all top public school students. They’re parents expected more of them but they needed to prove they could succeed. It’s allegory, it’s C.S. Lewis set to proggy rock.
I love old Genesis; LMKR is right the entrance point is “Tick of the Tail”
I’m going to start saying that: “This is dull, it is true, but in very interesting ways.” I think it’ll make me sound hipper.
Yeah, this is one of the finest characterizations ever made in these hallowed halls.
It’s all in the delivery, bro.
Boy, I used to listen the grooves off this stuff. Big fan from back then. It rarely occurs to me to ask what someone was trying to accomplish in music. It either works or it doesn’t. And, though I have occasionally come to like an artist I used to not get, that is never because someone reasoned me into it.
In this clip, no one is older than maybe 21? 22? I think Steve hits it with some of their background. Originally, they went to the label saying they wanted to be hired as a song-writing collective, and didn’t want to be a band. Funny. But then, their songs were more pop format in 1969.
I think everyone is pretty engaged here, and it may just be that the lack of histrionics, or “face” of any kind seems to dispassionate for the primal rockists here.
To be literal, though, Mod, I think what they were trying to do here, was make music, outside of the 2:28 pop song, and to tell a story. (Though the story is abstract as all get-out.)
This band seems to be stuck in your craw, like David Bowie. Just relax into your status of non-fan, non-hata.
Thanks, General, I’ll keep your words in mind as I have my sit-down session with Foxtrot and The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway later today. Wish you were here to moderate our summit meeting.
Old Peter Gabriel was odd old soul and an odd old soul was he,
All the art school chaps and all the Godalming sods,
Couldn’t string together what Gabriel wanted Genesis to be.
Re-listening to some of this older genesis stuff got me thinking: what happened to those Songs That Told A Story. They used to be pretty popular for a while there with those Brits around that British Pastoral time (and then there is the whole folk oral tradition). Maybe it’s my old fart brain, but I’m not recalling any recent examples, “abstract as all get-out” or not. I was just listening to some Primus, and there are lots cracked up stories there, but those records were from the early 90’s.
Help me out here. Is this my brain/lack of exposure to the music that is out there, or is Songs That Tell A Story a trend that is long gone? And is it a good thing?
Just letting you know that “Ripples” makes me cry every time.
The trend of 10 minute Songs That Tell A Story is somewhat out of trend. I think it’s a good thing when it comes to the prog bands of the 70’s. I just feel that too many of them were trying to out do each other. In the end, Rush was the only band to survive with some credibility.
Nowadays, bands seem to be stringing together Song Stories over concept albums like Sufjan Stevens – Ilinoise
A damn fine example of a recent Song Stories is The Decemberists interpretation of The Tain
ladymiss, your love for Genesis is a bit of a shock to me! Very interesting. It’s terrible to ask such a question in any circumstance let alone with a sample of 1, but was Genesis the prog band that was most open to women? I usually think of prog-rock as a dude’s genre, but the interest from women that came out of our John Wetton interview should have told me otherwise.
I must owe up: my history is riddling with dating musicians, and the later days of high school included love for a drummer. Early Genesis, Rush, ELP, Yes – a certain sort of drummer’s heaven and consequently, my set list at the time. Some of my continued enjoyment of those bands reflects nostalgia and as I’ve mentioned before, a love of interesting time signatures (hence Primus and more current “math rock” bands).
I can’t speak to Genesis’s general appeal to women, although PG was pretty cute in the day.
As loathe as I am to admit it … my first real musical-love experience was with Genesis. They were the first band I saved my money for or asked my parents for. I have every one of the early Genesis albums. I guess as a 14-year old boy, the whole mystic thing spoke to me in some way … in the same odd way that I loved the cover of Point of No Return. Plus the Lamb Lies Down on Broadway totally sucked me into the whole rock-opera thing. Which is funny, because anyone who know me knows a hate any music which sounds like it could be in a Broadway musical. And my first “song” with my first “girlfriend” was “follow you follow me.” God I was lame. Oh, The Carpet Crawlers is a pretty cool song.
Ah, machinery, you are speaking my language. I saw Kansas so many times as a high schooler. And “Follow You, Follow Me” WAS the rocker choice for a love song at that time, and certainly a more apropos choice than “Something In the Air.” (Although, did all rock guys and gals memorize that drum solo?)
Thanks for your input. It was of great value to me this evening.
https://www.rocktownhall.com/blogs/index.php/rock-town-halls-saturday-night-shut-in-in-which-mr-moderator-attempts-to-get-his-head-around-peter-gabriel-era-genesis/
Mod, try this one word definition for what’s at the heart of what Gabriel is trying to convey in Genesis.
Fey.
–adjective
1.
British Dialect . doomed; fated to die.
2.
Chiefly Scot. appearing to be under a spell; marked by an apprehension of death, calamity, or evil.
3.
supernatural; unreal; enchanted: elves, fairies, and other fey creatures.
4.
being in unnaturally high spirits, as were formerly thought to precede death.
5.
whimsical; strange; otherworldly: a strange child with a mysterious smile and a fey manner.
————————————–
When he updated himself on his solo records, he went to a sleeker, more modern, edgier fey.
Extremely helpful, mwall, thanks.