One hell of a show: Genesis in Chicago (Oct 02, 2007)
Thursday, October 4th, 2007March 12, 2007 wasn’t a very good day for me and, to be honest, there wasn’t much that could take me out of my funk. Or so I thought…
Later that evening, my dad informs me he purchased tickets to Genesis for the show in Chicago on October 2. Now, I had watched this reunion closely since the press conference held in November 2006 but had NO idea a North American tour was even happening, let alone tickets actually being on sale. So it was a nice surprise, and to this day I’m still thankful there was internet access at the hotel he stopped in.
Anyhow, seven months later, and the outrageous anticipation for this show to actually come, it finally came around last night.
On the day of the show I had to go to school. It was a shortened day, but it sure felt like a full one. Before you know, though, dad and I were on the way to the United Center.
Aside from rain clouds moving over us the rest of the ride was smooth, and minus some minor parking issues, we got a nice spot and easily walked into Gate 3 of the United Center around 6:35 p.m, where some crazy guy was either selling or just boasting about having Genesis stage guitarist Daryl Steurmer’s album. And we managed to beat the rain.
We walked around the concourse which was considerably empty considering how many people actually waited at the gates. I bought a shirt, and it’s possibly the coolest concert shirt I’ve ever purchased, featuring the Genesis album covers (minus Abacab, Tresspass, Wind & Wuthering) in a very cool collage. After we picked up some beverages, we hit our seats, and waited for the show to start.Saw some colorful characters, such as the 50+ audience who tried to relive the “glory days” by dressing like they were 20. Me, I’m 16, and it ain’t pretty seeing a 55 year old woman showing off her push-up bra, if you know what I mean.
The lights went down at 8:20, and the map of the world came up on the screen, zooming in on Chicago thus making everyone in the sold out United Center crowd go nuts. Then, after a countdown, the show I’d waited seven months for began with the opening chords of “Behind The Lines”. I’ll tell ya, already I was watching Phil Collins’ drumming and man, if you think he sucks or is overrated, think again. He was smokin’ from the start. This instrumental interestingly closed with “Duke’s End”.
We move on to “Turn It On Again” where our frontman stepped out from behind his set, did the countdown to the song and kicked it off. It was a nice start to the show, the band was hot and Phil’s vocal was very good. Also an appropriate start, considering this is the “Turn It On Again World Tour”. After a short stage rap, the band broke into “No Son of Mine”, and shortly after the classic almost everyone has heard, “Land of Confusion”, both seemed to work very well with the crowd, including myself.
Now, one thing I did notice is, this crowd was very different from all the shows I’ve attended. From the opening chords, mostly everyone in my section sat down, but clapped and sang to every lyric anyway. So it was kind of bizarre but I went along with it, and after awhile got used to it.
Phil then began speaking to the audience about playing some “old” songs, and how the audience was probably filled with some old people, including himself. In a nice special twist, Phil said “Speaking of old people, we have a birthday today” pointing at guitarist Mike Rutherford, thus inspiring everyone to sing “Happy Birthday” to him. He seemed flattered, as a big smile crossed his face as he bowed towards the crowd. Phil returned to his old people rap as he jokingly stated “And yes, I used to have hair, too!” After that crack and audience laughter that followed, they moved on to the next song. This song happened to be one of the highlights of the evening, and that was “In the Cage”.
I’d seen youtube videos and heard audio of this song, but clearly after seeing it live those did not do the song justice. Very energetic performance by the band, and Tony Banks’ keyboard solo was spot on as usual. Even toned down it added a darker mood to the song, which to me worked very well.
After “Cage” we then moved into a medley of instrumentals. Hell, it ain’t called the “Cage Medley” for nothing. “The Cinema Show” was the first instrumental we would hear, and while in the past it was never a song I gave much of a chance, it was incredible in a live setting, with the lighting and quality musicianship of everyone in the band. After that we moved on to “Duke’s Travels”, which was very cool for what we got out of it, but that would medley into “Afterglow”, which is a very beautiful song and worked well live, however transitioned awkwardly from “Travels”.
Up next was “Hold On My Heart,” which since day one of the tour I knew was gonna be when I headed to the bathroom. It was funny, first seeing everyone in the arena bail during the song, and then the bathrooms go from only two people when I walked into to being nearly over-capacity. Two friends were joking, one asked “What’s this song called?” with the other replying “‘The Bathroom Break’”. I managed to get back to my seat before the song ended. It’s just a song that, to me, doesn’t belong in the set of a Genesis concert.
We then got another rap from Phil, about scary people living in a scary house, and it was quite funny. It was cool having everyone do the “whoooo” part, and then him saying “It’s funny you should do that, since we have a song about scary things”, which left the audience very much in laughter. Well, the rap was to be followed by “Home By the Sea”, which was another personal highlight of my evening and seemed to be a crowd favorite. “Second Home By the Sea” came shortly after, and was followed by “Follow You, Follow Me” which featured a very nice video of all the album covers and figures interacting with each other.
Next came another old song, “Firth of Fifth”, which my section of the crowd clearly didn’t know. Nevertheless, I don’t understand why Stuermer gets a bad rap for not “perfecting” Steve Hackett’s guitar work, such as “Firth”, but to me he pulled it off very well. That medleyed into “I Know What I Like,” which had everyone singing and also featured probably the coolest background on the video screens, with pictures of the past with the band and even some video. Phil even did his “Tarantella” dance, which is his famous tamborine act. Interestingly enough, the video in the back was Phil, 31 years ago on the “In Concert” DVD, with long hair and a beard, doing that same dance, nearly in synch with what Phil was doing that same time. The whole thing appeared to be a crowd favorite, and proved to be another highlight for me.
Now halfway through the show, we moved on to “Mama”, which was obviously Phil’s most challenging vocal, and surprisingly handled it VERY well. The song was intense, just like it is on record, and was actually better live, as it was tuned down to a lower key, was MUCH more haunting. That’s how a song like “Mama” is supposed to be.
Phil then (jokingly) apologized for the “digusting, slutty smut” on the back video screen and saying how they will never play the song again. “Well, maybe we will tomorrow” said Phil, which got a good laugh out of the crowd. Then he said how we would move on from that, to a beautiful place where the bluegirls go. Some audience members knew what the song was, which was “Ripples”, but after Phil sang “Bluegirls come in every size”, the place erupted. I was glad to be a part of those cheers, and this was a very special moment in the show for me as this is one of those older Genesis gems you’d never expect to hear at a modern Genesis gig. The place sang along happily throughout the chorus and was clearly the highlight of the evening for me. Even dad looked at me and said “Yep, this is one of my alltime favorite Genesis songs”. Beautiful moment in the show.
“Throwing It All Away” was next, which I never cared for on record, but got the crowd involved and worked very well in a live setting. The “dee-da-day-a” part was also fun to do live. After that came Phil’s popular “Domino Principle” rap, which was rather annoying on video or audio, but outrageously fun during a show. It was also funny booing the other sections of the arena when Phil called on them. Everyone also laughed when he did something reminiscent of “Home By the Sea”, having everyone say “Domino!” and proceed to say “It’s funny you should say ‘Domino’ because, we have a song called ‘Domino’. Imagine that!”
Next was, you guessed it, “Domino”. The “In the Glow of the Night” portion was somewhat boring, and I’ve always felt that way, but then when “The Last Domino” part kicked in everyone woke up again and jammed through it. Personally, all of “Last Domino” was my favorite song of the night behind “Ripples”. Clearly this part of the song works much better when you’re actually there, and was very fun to watch in concert.
Next was the “Drum Duet”, which started off on friggin’ BAR STOOLS! How cool is that? Very impressive work by Phil and show drummer Chester Thompson. After a few minutes jamming on the stools, they slowly moved on to their drum sets, and accompanied by some outstanding lighting the crowd went wild, before they broke into the best instrumental of the evening and third favorite song of the evening for me, “Los Endos”.
There isn’t much you can say about “Los Endos” that you probably didn’t already know. Six and a half minutes of outrageously tight musicianship, fabulous drum work, and reprising “Dance On A Volcano” and “Squonk” from the 1976 classic A Trick of the Tail, which just so happens to be my favorite Genesis album. Just a wonderful display by the band as they seemed to be very much into the performance.
After this we moved on into “Tonight, Tonight, Tonight”, which had the entire arena singing along. That medleyed into “Invisible Touch”, which I HATE on record, but is very cool live, especially when Phil has everyone do the “Yeah!” part of the song. The pyrotechnics at the end were also incredible, and unexpected at a Genesis concert.
The encore was “I Can’t Dance” which was fun live. The videos of the “walking” guys in the background were also very cool. Not much else to say to this one, minus the fact that Phil added the humor and did his “dance” at the end of the song.
Phil took a moment to introduce Daryl Steurmer and Chester Thompson for their contributions to the show, and thanked everyone for the support as they were going to do one last song, which is “a very special song” to them, and Phil requested people who knew it to sing along.
“Carpet Crawlers” was that song. Very special song, with my dad and I belting out the lyrics through the entire chorus, each time the chorus came on. Its a shame people were leaving as they really missed out on a wonderful closing song. Even the woman who SCREAMED they were playing the song and was DANCING to a song you shouldn’t dance to left during it. It was a beautiful moment, and my final highlight of the evening. The band took a final bow with all five, and then the three big names, Phil Collins, birthday boy Mike Rutherford, and Tony Banks took a final bow.
So we took the sleepy ride back home in heavy rain from United Center to the small city of Lockport, listening to the Loop play some Genesis for half the ride, and nothing but lame selections from other stations the rest of the ride.
One hell of a show. Matches up there with Rush as the greatest show I’ve ever seen. Different kind of show, no doubt, but nevertheless special. Not a single flaw in production or the music itself, and the sold out crowd made the experience all the better. Definitely an experience I will never forget. Thanks to my dad for the tickets and all the people who supported me during the wait. And thanks to Genesis for giving me the chance to see you guys at least once in my life.
by Zach Bernard
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