Posts by raelway siding

Quote from DecomposingMan

OK, here's a question related to opening songs: Do you prefer "Where the Sour Turns to Sweet" or "Calling All Stations"?

For me, it's the first one -- best song on FGTR IMO.

I almost didn't buy CAS because of the initial impression I had of the title track. It's one of those songs that took me a while to warm up to. (Once I heard the whole album I was glad I bought it, though.)

I like both, but CAS is better - it's a good, dramatic, emotional song. (But it's not in the same league as e.g. Behind the Lines, Watcher, TLLDOB.) My opinions are kind of the reverse of yours - for me CAS is one of the best songs on that album, and WTSTTS is one of the weaker songs on FGTR

Quote from Barrowlad

I have no idea who this release is supposed to appeal to. Existing fans of the band? Hardly, as they already have everything on it, in all likelihood. New fans? Seriously, there are more white rhinos in the wild than there are new Genesis fans.

This is just the lamest release, which may as well have been titled “We’ve run out of ideas of what to do with the music of Genesis”.

Look at King Crimson. Unbelievable riches. Sets based around a single album that run to 20+ discs. Look at Jethro Tull. Fantastic book-sets that explore each album at length, with around 100 pages of interesting reading, and discs of additional material (studio and live). I’m a fan of the band, but this is poor. It seems only five minutes ago that they put out R-Kive.

Why this? I’ve no idea, in all honesty. Maybe had one glass of wine too many tonight, so feel free to correct me...

Display More

Can certainly understand your disappointment. But it has to be said, there's no way in hell the record company would put this out if they didnt think there was a market for it.

I suppose it's quite nice to have an official "best of" on vinyl for the first time. Well, it would be if I could afford it

Some sites (e.g. louder sound) have the track for Domino listed as "Domino medley". I assume that just means it's the full version of Domino, but could possibly mean something else?

Quote from thewatcher

My memory of the documentary where his involvement regarding Whodunnit was mentioned is that when he heard the track, he said "that's got to be on there" or something to that effect. Ie not that it should be on instead of another track, just that it had to be on the album. I think the band were unsure. I never remember hearing anything about YMR being in the equation.

I'm sure someone with detailed knowledge will be along to clear things up...

That's how I remember it too. I got the impression it was just a throwaway comment - just that he liked it and thought it should be on there. Not like an order or anything. Genesis just happened to agree I guess, and/or felt that his opinion was worth respecting.

Quote from foxfeeder

Ahmet, the man who made Phil add drums to In the Air Tonight, to create the single version, which you NEVER hear now. Even Phil's "Hits" album uses the album version. So, perhaps his judgement was not that good, after all.

I actually didn't know this, or had never noticed the difference. However, the single version was a massive hit all over the world and made PC a superstar, so I don't see anything wrong with his judgment there. He WAS wrong about Whodunnit though!

Quote from Christian

Do you think so? I think it was Ahmet Ertegun who suggested not to include YMR in favor of Who Dunnit, just to give this album more edge and make it more interesting. I assume he thought the inclusion of a "safe" track instead of something controversial such as Abacab would have made this album less ... special?

Did he actually suggest replacing YMR with Whodunnit, or was it just that he really liked Whodunnit and wanted them to put it on the album, without any particular idea of which track it would be replacing?

It's funny that I started off being a big Genesis fan after really getting into Three Sides Live and loving the Abacab tracks on it, but then when I finally got around to getting Abacab itself it quickly became one of my least favourite Genesis albums. Looking at the tracklist I'm not even sure why. Out of all the songs I only dislike Whodunnit and Another Record and really rate everything else. I think it's probably because most other Genesis albums have a strong movement from beginning to end, and by the time you get to the last track you feel like you're coming to the end of a sort of satisfying narrative. I didn't like that there was nothing to look forward to at the end of side 2 of Abacab - just the slightly odd and boring Another Record.

I'm convinced that if they'd swapped Another Record for You Might Recall (and maybe got rid of Whodunnit completely, or replaced it with Paperlate?) it would have had that satisfying flow from start to finish, and it would be considered one of the best Genesis albums (or at least their best pop/rock album)

good thread - has to be TLLDOB for me. Just perfect scene-setting and their most powerful and catchy song to that point of their career.

One which is often overlooked is Down and Out, one of their heaviest songs. Love the way it starts off as if it's going be another Earl of Mar but then hits you like Mar on steroids. It always makes me think that Rush were taking notes - the sound they perfected by the time of Moving Pictures

I find Island quite emotional and powerful. It certainly does have a sort of meat-and-potatoes rock sound but it rises above it quite admirably in my opinion. I've never really enjoyed Another Murder that much - it just seems to hang around not doing very much while Fish strangles the life out of the lyrics. I don't mind One Man's Fool but it's not a favourite.

Quote from Liquid Len

The battle between good and evil. It’s ongoing. That’s why the song fades out.

Yeah.. I guess. Seems like a bit of a stretch but could be the intention. I suppose it is meant to refer to the song fading out, but it still seems odd to me. It doesn't fade out on a repeated vocal refrain, so not sure why it's signposted in the lyrics.

Quote from Thelawnmower

Just had a play and I hear it as it should be, ‘He is you’ but I could be wrong

Listening to it closely it sounds more like "He is hu-ahhhh" so now I'm not sure! I always heard it as human and thought Phil had made a mistake.

Strictly Inc. is pretty good on the whole. "Charity Balls" I can really imagine Phil singing - could easily be a well-regarded late Genesis song. "Only Seventeen" is a very contemporary-sounding pop song, I'm surprised it wasn't a minor hit at least. Conversely, the album kicks off with the odd and clunky "Don't Turn Your Back On Me" and follows this with IMO one of Tony's worst ever songs, the soporific "Walls of Sound" (there's a clip of them performing it on Pebble Mill or something, and it's the dreariest thing you'll ever see). I can well imagine anyone giving the album a chance back in '95 not getting past those two tracks, and missing out on one of the highlights of Tony's career ("An Island in the Darkness")

Here's another lyrical question I've wondered about for a long time - the lyrics "He's been stamped human bacon, by some butchery tool (he is you)" - I'm sure I hear this sung as "he is human" on the Seconds Out version - just a mistake on Phil's part?

I have noticed this before, I just put it down to some kind of idiosyncratic decision of Gabriel. But as martinus points out, it does feel like a sort of transitional verse that doesn't really fit in either part.

Here's something else I've wondered about - why, at the end of the lyrics is "(CONTINUED)" printed? What's continued?

Yeah that was very interesting. Funny how when talking about the early days of Genesis it all seems quite fresh in his mind - only a few years back of course! Do we have anything earlier than this, in terms of a full and frank interview? I'm sure we don't. I liked the piano improvisation (kept expecting to maybe hear a Genesis or early solo song in there, but no!). The tape is more like a fly on the wall recording so its fascinating for that alone - a snapshot of Genesis on tour in the early 70s. I do think he sounded quite bored and slightly uncomfortable though!

Quote from Liquid Len

I love it all! From ‘When the Sour Turns to Sweet’ to ‘One Man’s Fool’. It’s all good! As I said the other day, there are some songs that just don’t do it for me, but I’ll still listen to their entire discography without hesitation.

Or indeed, from 'The Silent Sun' to 'Run Out of Time'!

(BTW am I right in thinking that the Not About Us single was the final release by Genesis as an ongoing band? I like the idea that 'Run Out of Time' is the "last" Genesis track, with regard to the lyrics. Did they know, or guess?)

Shepherd

It's Yourself

Evidence of Autumn

You Might Recall

Do the Neurotic

Anything Now

But could happily have voted for many others. Some of my favourite G tracks are in this list. Evidence of Autumn and You Might Recall are favourite *songs* of mine, by any artist

Did anyone pick this up? Obviously we know the content pretty well, but how's the sound quality etc?

Quote from Liquid Len

I have to mention that And Then There Were Three deserves honorable mention for being an especially atrocious album cover. I love the songs within; god knows what is going on on the cover. I know that it has been explained on Wikipedia and stuff, I can’t see any of that though when I look at it.

Well it's a fairly standard Hipgnosis cover in that it's abstract and ambiguous. Don't know if it's really meant to mean anything. However, I do like it. It's atmospheric (that beautiful sky!) and suits the album well.

Quote from martinus

Looking For Someone is actually my favourite Trespass song. This is the song with the most hermetic and obscure lyrics pre-Lamb. Peter's acapella vocals deserve a special mention.

I find Looking For Someone fascinating for this exact reason. It's the only Gabriel-era track I can think of that seems to be written from the point of view of the singer, if you see what I mean. Other first person lyrics are in character. It's definitely more reminiscent of the Lamb lyrics, but again they're in character. It really feels a lot more like a Gabriel solo lyric. I'd love someone to ask him about it - why did he not write another song like that until he left Genesis? Etc.

This is assuming of course that he actually wrote the lyrics! I'd be very surprised if it wasn't him though.