Posts by Dr. John

Very impressive, especially without the pedals.

I'm not a fan of their catalogue all the way through, but what I like I like a lot. The early songs were OK, but I didn't connect with them until perhaps the single "Senses Working Overtime", which is a pop gem with a bit of weirdness in the verses. I love Skylarking and Oranges and Lemons as albums fully. They are packed with clever pop gems. Nonsuch is pretty good, and I love about half of Apple Venus Vol. 1.

My only experience of this tour has been watching the tour video. It looks like it was a great tour. The ITQE section of the In the Cage medley is particularly crushing. The drum duet is also great.

There are some poor quality videos of the various old medleys that were done, some as rehearsal footage and some from concerts. It is the only time I know of where they varied a medley so much over the tour.

I had the good fortune to see the Queen of Soul twice in concert. Even in her later years, her vocals and piano playing were amazing. RIP.

Quote from Squonk

What bands have been influenced by The Beatles 'cos I can't think of any. Over-hyped, yes they fit the tag, as well as 'kajillions' liking them there are plenty of us that just don't get it - much ado about nothing springs to mind.

This is the first is a series of videos of other artists talking about The Beatles and their influence. Note how diverse the people are: Lemme, Roger Waters, Pete Townshend, Billy Joel, Freddie Mercury, Bob Marley, David Bowie, Sting, etc. In subsequent videos there are Anthrax, Linkin Park, Phil Collins (video 5), Dave Grohl, Henry Rollins...

You sounded like you didn't believe that Tears for Fears were influenced by The Beatles. Listen to Sowing the Seeds of Love and compare with I Am the Walrus. When they performed this song live, they often added a snippet of All You Need Is Love at the end.

Quote from StillCan'tDance

Yes, there's a lovely bit where they put the CD on during rehearsals and when it reaches the highest point in the vocals Phil says "Okaaaay". Isn't that also the moment where Mike asks if they have a twelve string and one of the roadies says "Yes" to which Mike says "Give it to Daryl!"

That sounds correct. Mike has admitted he can't remember some of his alternative tunings on 12 string. Daryl would probably be able to figure them out more easily. The tuning on Cinema Show is particularly interesting as some of the pairs of strings are not tuned based on octaves but instead on fifths or sixths.

There are perhaps three separate issues in the above discussion:

1) The Beatles being over-hyped. If this is in relation to how "good" or enjoyable their music is to a given person, obviously that is a matter of taste. Although their catalogue is diverse and obviously appealed to a kajillion people, I can certainly understand if their music doesn't particularly someone.

2) The Beatles being over-hyped. If this is in relation to their musical importance and influence, I find this a harder point to accept. In essentially 6-7 years, The Beatles completely changed the boundaries of popular music. They went from short pop gems like I Want to Hold Your Hand in 1963 to droning Indian-influenced grooves featuring backwards tapes like Tomorrow Never Knows in 1966 - THREE years later. Generations of musicians cite them as key influences. What they strived for changed the perceptions of what a popular music album could be and how music is recorded and produced.

3) The Beatles are not very English. Not being English, I am less sure about what is quintessentially English. For a Canadian, The Beatles sure seemed English with the various musical and topical references they made as noted above by FeelItComing.

I was pretty pleased with the setlist, knowing they had to think about fans from all eras, with some greater emphasis on their more popular material since the majority of people attending would know this material and not the older stuff. Ripples was lovely. It was nice to hear a bit more of Duke's Travels and Duke's End. If I could have made the call, I would have ditched the In the Cage sequence, which they have played for many tours, and replaced it with all of Cinema Show (which they tantalizingly contemplated).

One thing I love about Genesis is their interplay of 2 and sometimes 3 guitars. This started primarily with Ant and Mike (and Tony) and then transitioned to Steve and Mike (and Tony). Mike made an important contribution here with some of his unusual tunings - the first half of Cinema Show really is based around Mike's tuning. Mike also came up with some great contrasts to stuff that Steve played. Take the intro to Entangled. I'm pretty sure it is Steve doing the initial melodic sequence. Then Mike joins arpeggiating through essentially a different chord. Brilliant.

After Steve left, Mike primarily focused on repetitive riffs - more of a rhythmic chordal foundation that Tony could wander over. To some extent, Mike had been doing this all along (second half of Cinema Show, second half of ITQE). An exception was the elegant solo he did on Abacab, which is probably my favourite of his. He also does a lovely short solo in Duke's Travel's, just before the reprise of Guide Vocal. His overall shift away from intricate arpeggiated parts to more rhythmic riffs worked well with the band's overall shift to simpler, more pop-based songs.

First show was Exhibition Stadium in Toronto in 1986. I remember being particularly excited when I realized they had switched into the full In That Quiet Earth after In the Cage (was expecting the usual segue into Cinema Show). When they switched into Apocalypse in 9/8, I remember being one of the few in my area of the stands who was over the moon. Sadly, many people seemed mystified and then uninterested.

I know we are way off topic, but it is important to distinguish association with causality, particularly directionality. I don't know, but it may be true that more successful entertainers are more sensitive to criticism. What is harder to determine is what causes what. Are those who are more sensitive also more talented and destined for greater fame? Or is it that those who become more famous are subject to greater scrutiny/criticism and become more sensitive?

Quote from Backdrifter

I wasn't crazy about the TIOA medley but can't get especially worked up about it. It didn't come across as a Collins indulgence as such - I can imagine him being the driving force behind it, but not as some kind of vanity kick. While I was lukewarm about it I could see it kind of fitted with that part of their evolution as a live act. Also, I quite liked their rendition of some of those snippets - Pinball Wizard had great energy and made me want them to do a straight cover of the whole track.

Tangential question: are those medleys the only time they ever did any covers on stage, except for Solsbury Hill at the Six Of The Best show? Am I imagining they did covers in their very early gigs (Stumble being one)?

If you count that Atlantic Records performance, they cover snippets of You Can't Hurry Love, Shortcut to Somewhere, and All I Need Is a Miracle. Not quite the same as these are solo songs by the members, but they are technically covers.

I don't mind the song, but far prefer other tracks on that album.

My favourite version is the live version with strings from 1986. Does anyone know more about how that came to be? I don't remember them doing it on previous tours unless they did it a bit on the W&W tour. So why did they resurrect specifically for this show? I remember hearing something about them having to make use of strings for some kind of contractual reason (can't remember the details), but why not do that for another song that they are playing regularly rather than a song they haven't played for years, if ever, live?

Quote from StillCan'tDance

Neither does Phil. In hindsight he felt it was the wrong thing to do, that it was far too cabaret and that fans who might have come to hear a particular song would've (rightly) felt short-changed if all they'd got was one line of the tune before the band moved on to the next snippet.

I've always found it odd that the medley for which Genesis appear to have got the most criticism from a section of the fanbase is the Turn It On Again medley that they started performing during the Mama tour. It's no different in its execution and intent to the medleys that Led Zeppelin used to do of old blues numbers (usually in the middle of some interminably long Whole Lotta Love or Dazed And Confused) or when Queen used to do drop bits of Little Richard, Ricky Nelson and Buddy Holly numbers into their shows.

As someone who loves the original songs in the Mama tour TIOA medley, I still don't like that medley. Genesis doesn't have a history of being a cover band and tipping the hat overtly to influences in their live performances (the quote from Don't Let Me Be Misunderstood in the IKWIL jam notwithstanding). I don't think it is their strength, so I didn't care to hear it. Reinventing old blues songs and folk songs was definitely a strength for bands like Led Zeppelin. Right from their first album, they had stunning covers of Babe I'm Gonna Leave You and You Shook Me.

Quote from FeelItComing

According to Anthology 1 Leave My Kitten Alone was written by Little Willie John & covered by Johnny Preston. It's a favourite of mine as well.

My bad. I was mixing up Slow Down and LMKA in my head.

Quote from FeelItComing

Although I can do without Dizzy Miss Lizzie.

I love every Larry Williams cover they did. This one, Bad Boy, and Leave My Kitten Alone. John is fully committed on the vocals.

Forgot to mention that I was seeing Janelle Monae last night. This is the second time I've seen her and she remains an incredibly engaging and committed performer.

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The Who's sets in 1969-1970 showcased Tommy (minus a couple of songs) in order.

Quote from Fabrizio

I just heard Penny Lane on the radio while driving. Never fails to put me in a good mood and automatically makes me smile and sing along.

I wish they would release the rare version with the final piccolo trumpet line over the last few seconds. I have it on vinyl on Rarities but I don't think it was released subsequently.