Posts by Dr. John

As flawed as this release was, I still enjoyed it at the time. It was fascinating to hear The Lamb and other stuff live with a 90s Gabriel on vocals. I could at least imagine what a reunion might have sounded like then.

Quote from Backdrifter

Regarding the sudden change from part 1 to part 2 and the feeling that it's something of a shotgun marriage, it's probably mainly explained by the lyric sheet on the original EP back cover. Above the lyrics it says 'INSIDE', below them it says 'OUT'. ie, the upbeat instrumental represents his release.

Ahh, I'm still learning new things from this board. My only version of the EP before the box sets was a mini-CD, where all the lyrics were so tiny that I didn't even both looking at them carefully. OK, so I get that the change in mood and feel was perhaps intentional. Thanks.

I gave it a 12. The main song is good, with its gentle guitar arpeggios and sweet melody. I thought they should have transposed it to a different key so that the whole chorus doesn't have to be in a high falsetto, which weakens it a bit too much. Consider a song like Ripples, where the chorus just soars because it is still mainly in Phil's higher chest-voice range. I've always been a tad uncomfortable with the lyrics. For how I interpret them, a woman initiates a sexual encounter and then a man goes to jail, the implication being that she changes her story and blames him: "If what she says is so..."

My favourite part of the song is the ending instrumental, with a great keyboard solo by Tony and a skittering guitar solo from Steve. My problem with this section is that it sounds just stuck on, with no musical relationship with the main song (if there is a relationship, I can't find it). Obviously this happens with other great Genesis songs, e.g., The Cinema Show. However the transition here is particularly sudden and jarring, whereas the transition in other songs is more smooth.

So many great things about it for me and also some reservations.

Thanks for alerting us. Great to see and hear this in such high quality.

Quote from gianlucavalenti

Slegdehammer Krakow:

Peter Gabriel Kraków 18.05.2023, Sledgehammer, Don't Give Up, Red Rain, In Your Eyes - YouTube

Sledgehammer Verona:

ROCKFANS presenta: PETER GABRIEL live in Verona 20.05.23 [parte seconda e ultima] - YouTube

Find the differences....same hesitations same pauses...very strange....either Peter is a genius or the vocal track is recorded....

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Here's an obvious example of these being live vocals:

In the Kracow performance, he has his mic in the right position to catch the full line of "Come on, come on help me do":

In the Verona performance, he misses getting his mic back close to his mouth to catch the first part of the line, showing he was clearly singing it live and also that these performances were different:

I think it is cool he is playing lots of new stuff. I expect though that he is road testing the new songs in these first concerts. Ones that he feels don't work as well may get dropped over time, so the shows may evolve as the tour progresses. If that happens, other back catalogue songs may make an appearance.

Quote from BillysNumber

I love what I'm seeing there on that possible setlist! Although, I REALLY hope they play Red Rain. If he just includes that one with everything else I'll be so happy! My 11 yr old daughter is coming with me, and Sledgehammer and Red Rain are a couple of her favorite songs!

I imagine it's possible, as he always plays it-it's kind of a live staple!

He played it in Krakow just a short while ago - see that thread.

Sounding pretty good.

This is one of my favourite tracks. It has a lot of complexity in the chords and Tony's double-hand playing, and yet at the same time is very catchy. I have spent a lot of time trying to learn the keyboard part and I still marvel and Tony's ingenuity. Mike's bassline is almost a lead riff for the song. Phil's drumming and harmony vocals are great. Although Steve's presence is harder to hear, he adds a softer texture amongst a lot of harder edges. And while Peter's vocals don't make me think of Puerto Ricans in the slightest, he does inhabit a particular attitude right from the get-go that establishes Rael's character and enlivens this song.

Although I almost always prefer live versions of Genesis songs (more power, more integration), this is one of the few that I prefer the studio version. As others have mentioned, the studio version is more aggressive and has more sharp edges. The Seconds Out version is sped up and light. The versions/snippets from the early 80s and also the Old Medley were better at recapturing the original spirit. The version from Archive 1 is closer to the album, but like all versions, suffers from the lack of an acoustic piano to start it off.

Quote from Blukaos

AN ALMOST (BIG) SPOILER.... MAYBE...

After collecting all the details from recent IG videos/posts, zooming some Tony Levin's photos and re-watching some Bandcamp Full Moon Videos, I came up with a 16 tracks list: don't know if all of these will be the songs in the final setlist, but it's certain all these 16 tracks in the following list have been rehearsed for the tour (behind every title, I've put the the source from which I got the information):

Welcome. And I am impressed by the work put into figuring this out!

Lovely version.

I'm a casual Lightfoot fan, with a few of his early albums on vinyl and a best of on CD. He wrote some great songs. Some are at a personal level, e.g., If You Could Read My Mind or Carefree Highway. Some are great takes on Canadian history, e.g., The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald, Canadian Railroad Trilogy. For the uninitiated, here's a sampling:

Although I get why people love this track, it has never worked for me. The bits seemed stitched together without creating a greater coherent whole. Each bit feels like an underdeveloped idea. So it is one of the few I typically skip on this album.

Didn't Elvis Costello have a Wheel of Songs on one tour, where he would spin it and then play whatever came up?

The challenge for Genesis is that their songs are hard to do off the cuff. Most are complicated enough to require a fair bit of rehearsal and they are also coordinated with visuals that require preplanning. For artists that play straightforward songs with straightforward visuals, it is much easier to mix up the setlist.

I agree that the versions of this medley were clunkier than others. Nonetheless it was cool to hear how EEOM sounded 6 years later, even if it was for only a verse or two.

Rick Beato just put out another interesting analysis of a song from A Trick of the Tail. He previously featured Dance On a Volcano on his What Makes This Song Great series. This time he is focusing on Ripples, analyzing the chord progression of the verses and chorus. It's quite interesting for musicians as I had never given much thought to the relationship of some chords to each other. But even for a casual listener, he really highlights the brilliance of the music and the production. Unfortunately he never gets to talking about the instrumental section, which is also fascinating. Hope this analysis turns more people on to a great song on a great album.

I find this a perfectly enjoyable, non-top-tier, instrumental. Tony sounds like he is having fun. The Simmons electronic drums sound find in this context. And I like Mike's outro guitar solo. Do the Neurotic is good too, but I don't really compare them as they are quite different.

I know we're getting way off topic here, but who cares...

Steam is very derivative of Sledgehammer; it's even in the same key. Kiss That Frog is at least a bit different. I know most people really don't like it, but I don't mind his infrequent forays into whimsy. While it doesn't hold up to the stronger songs on Us, it does provide some contrast and variety.

I think a future tour is about as wishful as wishful thinking can get. A very unlikely, but slightly more conceivable possibility is a one-off performance for a special situation - maybe a charitable event or a tribute. That could result in Peter doing a song or two with Tony, Mike, and Steve. I hear no motivation to get together for old-times sake, but a specific cause or external obligation could provide the spur.

I think it will be simply a business decision. If this set sells like gangbusters, then there will be consideration for what else to release. If sales are insipid, then I wouldn't expect much else down the pipeline.