Taking Sides: Genesis 1970-1977 Vs. Genesis 1978-91

And you know what I pick :)

Where's the "don't care" option?

What's the word for a tiny version of a landslide?

might give it a fighting chance if you lopped the second option off at '86. or even '83.

because... ugh.

1978-1983 would have gotten my vote. 1978-1986 I would have thought about.

All sensible humans willl agree that 1987-1991 is indefensible.

Does this 1983 cut-off include or exclude the dreaded Illegal Alien???

suspect that "lol @ geir" votes will figure heavily in this poll, but would be interested in hearing people who actually want to argue in favor of latter Genesis & aren't just c/p'ing from American Psycho

me, I mean, I left prog the way some people leave the Church of Rome - sold all my Genesis and Yes and Gabriel records back the store and spent the money on Lou Reed & David Bowie instead - but still, pretentious Gabriel Genesis beats almost all of the Collins era except maybe the title track of Abacab, which is ace.

I was brought up hearing 'Three Sides Live' in the back of the family car, so I know that whole era heaps better than the Gabriel stuff. That whole build up at the start of 'Turn It On Again' is great, really! Well as good as Journey or Asia or whatever anyhow.

Which version has less Tony Banks noodling?

It's a completely one-sided split and I don't really agree with Geir about Hackett leaving being the watershed. With the catalogue divvied up like this, it boils down to ...Then There Were Three, Duke and Abacab plus a few good bits off the next 2 versus nearly all of their best material. Now Duke is maybe a Top 3er for me, but beyond that...it's not even that post-Hackett is bad, and it's not particularly about Gabriel, but they were just a lot better and more interesting band for most of the 70s. (See Collins trying to play the old stuff with that tribute act and struggling to keep up with his old self.)

Lots of people do prefer Hackett-less Collins-era Genesis obv and their reasons aren't that interesting (or v different from Patrick Bateman's for that matter). That incarnation had several decent well-crafted stadium pop hits. "Turn It On Again", "Invisible Touch", "Misunderstanding" -- these are all good pop songs. The Gabriel-led band's aesthetic is just far more interesting to me.

John D. dude no love for Mike Rutherford eating his bass alive on "No Reply At All?"

Paperlate is a good song too - I guess the dicking about brass on that prefigures a lot of Collins' solo stuff, but it's somehow way more palatable than Sussudio or whatever.

but would be interested in hearing people who actually want to argue in favor of latter Genesis & aren't just c/p'ing from American Psycho

i'll freely admit that my affinity for this era is grounded in nostalgia, but yeah, some awesome singles here: turn it on again, misunderstanding, abacab, no reply at all, that's all, follow you follow me, taking it all too hard, etc... hell, a couple off Invisible Touch

but i haven't committed to either option as of yet.

You can't really fuck with the Turn It On Again comp released a few years ago. "Turn It On Again" in particular has a nice punk, forcebeat aggression, and I love lots of those post-1983 goopy marvels.

As noted I do honestly prefer the Duke/Abacab-era material to the earlier material. Paperlate, Turn it on Again, Misunderstanding, Abacab, No Reply at All, That's All, Home by the Sea are non-bad. I haven't listened to Invisible Touch since gah, since high school; MAYBE there's something salvageable on it. Parts of Domino and the instrumental had some rawk in them, as I recall.

I unreservedly and unabashedly love Invisible Touch.

john d i hope that as a prog protestant you didn't miss out on the man who sold the world, a great prog rock album and one of bowie's best

It's a completely one-sided split and I don't really agree with Geir about Hackett leaving being the watershed.

Not neccessarily that much quality wise (I agree that "And Then There Were Three" and "Duke" are great pop albums, while I am not so keen on "Abacab"), but more in terms of changing their style considerably. When Hackett was still in the band, Genesis were still a band that liked to do musically complex 8-10 minute suites with lots of chord changes and key changes, although maybe not so many metric changes as in the Gabriel era. However, from "And Then There Were Three", they were more of a three minute pop singles band who liked to throw in the occasionaly 7-8 minute number as album tracks because they thought they would please old fans that way. I kind of like their 80s output too - even "Invisible Touch". Even "We Can't Dance" has a couple good pop songs on it in the case of "No Son Of Mine" and "Jesus He Knows Me", which may almost make me forgive them for recording the title track and "Hold On My Heart" - both of which were horrible.

But still, the prog era had so much more sophistication, so much more complex stuff, so much more interesting to investigate and hear again and agan, so there is no competition, really.

Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.

Definitely the latter for me. I like about eight of those hit singles. They lasted too long but don't we all.

john d i hope that as a prog protestant you didn't miss out on the man who sold the world, a great prog rock album and one of bowie's best

Bowie did not count as prog at all to me & my goodbye-to-prog buddies, when I stopped listening to genesis and yes and gabriel and all that stuff I went over to Lou Reed, David Bowie & Iggy Pop all day

then Iron Maiden came along and fucked my shit up proper, the end

"The Man Who Sold The World" was about as prog as just about any pop album was in 1970-71, I guess. I mean, even stuff like Paul McCartney's "Uncle Albert" and "Back Seat Of My Car" was kinda proggy too.

I can listen to "Keep It Dark" over and over and over again.

We are ignoring 'Calling All Stations', right?

Um, of course. I should read gooder.

Automatic thread bump. This poll's results are now in.

I love the *Three Sides Live* version of "Abacab" to an almost embarrassing degree. I wish the solos went on for twice as long.

I guess I never noticed this poll before, so I didn't vote, but I'm so damn happy with the results. ILM *high five*

Also agree with J0hn D. that the title track of Abacab was pretty cool. Don't remember it all that well, now, though. I certainly can't claim to have heard their whole career, and I believe Phil Collins can only be hated by about 90% but I do know for certain that there is a year somewhere in the 80's that if I have to hear them, I'm going to drive a nail into my finger to turn that shit off.

Also I recently heard Nursery Cryme for the first time thanks to Noodle Vague, thanking U. I thought it was fantastic and I couldn't believe there were synthesizers on it. I try not to worship Peter Gabriel the way I worship Kate Bush - it's only an illusion.

There were no synthesizers on "Nursery Cryme", but maybe that is what you were trying to write?

Yeah, but there's some kind of electronic piano, isn't there? What is that noise on the first track? Surely that's not a guitar, but I could be naive.

organ, mellotron, piano, electric piano

Right! that's what I meant to say was electric piano, not "electronic". Thanks.

's cool. The mellotron is a kind of proto-synth anyway.

Did anyone here see them live when Gabriel was singer? Tell about it.

Looking at some of the song titles mentioned on this thread, though, has convinced me I need to dig up some early 80's Genesis pronto. Might even be post-punk enough for me to really enjoy.

"Turn It On Again" actually reminds me of the Who (with Daltrey singing of course). This is a nice trip down memory lane. Thanking ILXors. "Abacab" is making me hella happy right now too.

God, where would I be without ILM? Where?

"Misunderstanding"! Wow! I forgot all about these songs. Jesus christ.

misunderstanding is terrible. about half of duke is pretty good. abacab is a great album, s/t is a really watered down verson of same, invisible touch an even more watered down version of s/t. but I think abacab was really pretty progressive of them, more so than duke and certainly more interesting than the awful 'and then there were three'.

I've heard about half of the Abacab album now and I must say I'm mighty impressed. Not just with the songs, but the production absolutely knocks me out. I would like there to be more records in the world that SOUND like that, please. I'm becoming a lot more intrigued with this part of their history. Haven't really started digging in to Duke or And Then There Were Three, yet, but I will. Also gonna give the self-titled one a try. I can't really deal with "That's All" anymore, but I'd like to hear the rest of it, especially "Taking It All Too Hard" which I think I bought the single of but can't remember much about.

pretentious Gabriel Genesis beats almost all of the Collins era except maybe the title track of Abacab, which is ace.

<3 u for this J0hn

Never see how that track is so particularly great either. The fact that the same beat goes on all the time kind of damanges what might otherwise have been some nice mood changes.

Plus the bass theme is ripping off Sparks' "Beat The Clock" - the intros are almost identical!

you don't do drugs ever, do you

80s Genesis is the bomb, it hasn't aged!

some awesome singles here: turn it on again, misunderstanding, abacab, no reply at all, that's all, follow you follow me, taking it all too hard, etc... hell, a couple off Invisible Touch

^^i was otm up in here

Just the fact that there were singles means it is obviously inferior to the 70s stuff.
Prog bands, shouldn't make singles, they should make complex 20 minute suites!

"the fact that they were singles"

yeah that's good news for anyone who didn't get the Classic Records pressings (or at least pre-remix pressings). the downside is the vinyl is at 45rpm which means splitting Suppers Ready in two. I might spring for the SACDs though.

Yeah, same here. FWIW it’s part of a major project they’re doing in cooperation with Warner’s Atlantic Records catalog, and reportedly they’re aiming to reissue 75 albums at roughly two per month over the course of three years (starting this or next month) so the Genesis albums could end up being spaced out over a long period of time.

Found a complete list of relevant titles (subject to change, including potential additions):

Nursery Cryme
Foxtrot
Selling England By The Pound
The Lamb Lies Down On Broadway
A Trick Of The Tail
Abacab
Genesis

And from Phil Collins:
Face Value
Hello, I Must Be Going!

I gave in to my origin-is-the-goal Genesis nostalgia zombie and preordered all the hybrid SACDs. I've bought some of these albums six or seven times now — why stop there? (If I read the fine print correctly, Acoustic Sounds doesn't charge your card until discs ship.)

yeah the UK version makes no sense. I like those 4th side tracks fine but it was weird that became the defacto version of the album at some point. I also liked how tidy Genesis were with live albums: it was more or less 3 studio records, then a live album. Putting those earlier live tracks on there mixed up the eras.

― I? not I! He! He! HIM! (akm), Tuesday, September 19, 2023 3:55 PM (five hours ago)

I totally get that. I want to hear the band amidst their then-current material, especially if they already placed some of the same live versions in previous releases (a la Rush with "Closer To The Heart" being placed on both Exit...Stage Left and A Show of Hands).

yeah the stuff from an earlier tour makes it a compilation and not representative of a show from the tour.

Salmacis with Phil on Three Sides Live is brilliant, because it's such a bizarre song for him to sing, although it was the version I heard first. Also, he hits a massive sour not near the start which I am pleased they left in

The studio cut of Afterglow was a bit of a disappointment after being familiar with the 3SL take, although these days I reckon the performance fom the VHS might be superior.

*note

The studio cut of Afterglow was a bit of a disappointment after being familiar with the 3SL take, although these days I reckon the performance fom the VHS might be superior.

Hard agree - also it really benefits from following that intense medley of old proggy stuff, this balming ballad to send the longhairs off into the night.

Looking at the tracklisting on wiki, interesting that FYFM comes from a show 18 months or so earlier than the rest of the main 3 sides - I wonder if they'd junked it from the set by the time they were touring Abacab?

Also, considering this was an album I played incessantly when I was 11 or so (became a Genesis mega fan for a couple of years circa Invisible Touch), it's nutty to me that I knew almost every word of Vine and Samalcis, etc, off by heart but never had a clue (and still don't) what they're actually about. Maybe that's for the best.

the problem with that FYFM is the audience trying to clap along and not quite working out what beat to do it on. happens a few times on the Genesis live recordings I've heard!

Also, he hits a massive sour not near the start which I am pleased they left in

something I really appreciate about Phil is that he attempts to do all the vocal parts, even the ones that run close together and weren't really intended to do live. he's game for everything.

yeah I think most of the Afterglow live versions outshine the studio version, though I wish there was a live take of the entire suite (Unquiet Slumbers/Quiet Earth/Afterglow)

My main gripe with FYFM is that Phil has 200k followers on twitter and seriously he's only followed like 5 of them back. Not cool to cheat people like that Phil

How is ABBA doing on the "knowing me, knowing you" front?

XXP - I'm pretty sure they were doing that on the '77 tour? I should check back though my boots

My main gripe with FYFM is that Phil has 200k followers on twitter and seriously he's only followed like 5 of them back. Not cool to cheat people like that Phil

he can't even hold a drumstick but you want him to click on a mouse?

Shouldn't make promises you can't keep, that's all i'm saying

It's always the same, it's just a shame

Follow me/I won't/Follow you

There are some great quality bootlegs of the Duke tour on the genesis movement site. Listening to Sheffield as I type this and it's a beaut. Personally I'll take an FM quality recording of a single show over the more curated approach of a live album every time.

yeah as bad as the band have been re: tending to their own legacy and official releases, they have allowed that site to stay up with their blessing for years.

"Follow You, Follow Me" was a key Genesis song for me, because as a child of the '80s (born in the mid-'70s, but became a radio listener in the '80s), all I heard were the usual Genesis radio singles, basically from "Duke" onward. But classic rock and adjacent radio would also play "Follow You," which sent me back to the '70s stuff. Iirc "Follow You" was the only Genesis stuff from the '70s I ever heard on the radio.

Knebworth '78 is my go-to, such a great gig, but I think it's been released now, or partially? I was just thinking how well-served Genesis were on the bootleg front as well as numerous radio recordings.

imo FYFM is gorgeous and kickstarts a brilliant run of UK singles that last's until Illegal Alien.

lasts* (tf)

My main gripe with FYFM is that Phil has 200k followers on twitter and seriously he's only followed like 5 of them back.

I DM'd him once, but there was... no reply at all.

Must be some misunderstanding.

He’s more of a lurker

, that's all.

What he's waiting for, I don't know.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M_nwwUpsGFk

Definitely the right time of the year to revisit that album

wind & wuthering my autumnal genesis go-to though I still can't really tolerate the aggressive whimsy of All In A Mouse's Night and the shrillness of 11th Earl Of Mar

Agree about Mouse's Night but Earl of Mar is pretty moving imo

whole record might be a bit trebly tho, I listenedto it most on my teenage lo-fi gear

The essayist is kinda down on a lot of ATTW3 and I can maybe see his point (too much Banks, too ponderous/romantic), up until 1980 I think I would be more inclined to listen to live recordings and as Genesis Live was my proper first exposure to them as a nipper I've always looked through that prism.

For this period I've always really enjoyed listening to the Knebworth '78 recording, some of which is on that recent Box Set (although I think it incorrectly says 1980) the Friday Rock show rebroadcast it sometime in the mid-80s and my mate taped it for me on the shittest quality cassette, but it was a really good intro to some of those songs from the era.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0swxbAIgX2s

...and this is a nice radio recording of a full gig from Chicago

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SLnrlOPbzsk

I feel like when you see musicians in their 60s and especially in their 70s and up it can be a gamble on how well they’re able to play in relation to their younger peak ability…I saw Steve Hackett last night, though, and would say he’s still operating fully at 100% (maybe 110%) even at 74 years of age. He’s playing Foxtrot all the way through (he has been for a while now, it just hadn’t made it here) and it sounds immaculate. The guy that’s singing, Nad Sylvan, does a way better Peter Gabriel than I expected, and the musicianship is outstanding…the climax/last few minutes of Supper’s Ready actually brought a tear to my eye. This is all my roundabout way of saying that if you’re a fan of Foxtrot or Hackett-era Genesis he’s still well worth seeing, as I had my doubts on whether to go.

I have the same story, didn't really want to go either but a friend had a spare ticket so I figured what the hell. It was really great. I should've figured it would be since a guy like Hackett probably has his pick of whatever musicians he wants to work with so it's no surprise all of them were excellent. I had no idea that the bass player was going to be Jonas Reingold, or that the drummer was the guy from Frost*. But yeah Sylvan doing a near perfect Gabriel impression was what really drove it home. It was so good I was wondering if this was better than the actual Genesis shows of that era. I've heard Supper's Ready a thousand times, probably could go never hearing it again, but yeah seeing it live was really something. I mean I never thought I'd get a chance to see something like that. Sound was excellent too - one of the few shows I've been to where you could clearly hear everyone, though hilariously the one guy who did sometimes get drowned out was Steve himself, just like he was in Genesis :)

Friends of mine went and gave it rave reviews. Sorry I missed it, but budget outweighed my middling Genesis fandom.

Happy birthday to passive-aggressive fucker Tony Banks!

He really is the most amusing asshole if you're not actually in Genesis

Everything pinched and sour about UK upper-upper-middle-classes in one fairly talented pianist

seems like Mike R is underrated af as a bass player btw

He really is!

No Reply At All is such a sick bass part that for years people theorized it wasn't him, it was the iirc Earth Wind and Fire guy.

which is funny cuz verdine didn't always play in ew&f studio tracks.

mike/tony/phil never used studio dudes. they are a totally in-house operation. there's tons of footage of them working on albums and it's pretty amazing stuff to watch. mike is really a min blowing player.

Well, Stuermer has played live with Gen; he's definitely all over Phi's records. Do we know fo sho that he hasn't appeared recorded Genesis?

p sure yah!

they always had cams documenting the recordings and theres tons of vids like this on yt

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QgN325HVzQU

i've seen Hackett a few times and that is a great show, band is phenomenal and if you like his guitar you will get a whole shitload of it, and it will sound great.