Posts by Fabrizio

    First mention of Keep it Dark, I think I've seen here. Always loved that song. Best song on Abacab.

    Well, there are one three songs I like on Abacab, plus one I can live with but KID is certainly top notch. Odd, inventive, quirky a pity they haven't gone more in that direction.

    I will freely confess I am not a fan of Phil the lyricist, of all his talents, and they are many, this is the one I personally rate the lowest, however, songs like You Know what I mean and Please don't ask truly struck a chord with me.

    I was, I believe 16 and coming from two years of absolute Beatlemania, it was time to explore. I borrowed Foxtrot from an older friend, a musician and he extolled the virtues of the band but warned me at the same time the group was over, as the lead singer had left, I think it was 1980. I gave it a listen and obviously I rejected it completely, it was too much to take, used as I was to 4 minutes songs, it really did nothing for me, so I returned it to my friend, holding it with two fingers and plugging my nose. My friend simply smiled. In the following days though, I found myself humming the the 'And it's, Hey Babe, with your guardan eyes so blue' bit from Supper's Ready over and over. I simply couldn't get it out of my head and I decided to give it another go, this time much more determined to invest more time and effort into it. Again I borrowed the album and again he smiled knowingly. It took me a couple of listens but I got into it and was mesmerized, completely hooked. I then proceeded to buy their records in a really random order and was delighted to find out the band was far from over, after Peter's departure. I bought Trespass which fascinated me and then Trick which bowled me over, to this day my favorite album, followed closely by SEPTP. A great musical journey.

    As for Steve? No thanks; that's an area where we'll have to disagree I'm afraid.

    I don't think there was ever any chance of that happening. There doesn't seem to be any chemistry on a personal level there. I don't rate Steve extremely high as songwriter but I really love his playing. As a writer, although he is very atmospheric, he has imo a choruses problem. No punch. Unsurprisingly on two of his best Genesis contributions: Entangled and Blood on the Rooftops, Tony and Phil respectively wrote the chorus. That said, I would have loved seeing a collaboration between Tony and Steve, I think they have musically speaking much more in common than they realize and again, it is not like they were going to record an overly commercial album.

    I agree about their carrying on. I don't like this nonsense of people saying about bands, "why carry on, why not just pack it in?" Because it's their lives, and they want to carry on, numbskull. Yes I think they should have given it another shot, but completely get that they felt that was it.

    Agreed! Besides, I will be the first to admit that Phil was missed but if Tony and Mike can't do as they please with Genesis, then who?

    It's surprising that Tony Smith didn't foresee the problems. He knew as well as anyone else just what Phil meant to the band and its fanbase. I still think they could have had commercial success with Congo and Not About Us as they're both fine pop songs.

    Yes, it is very surprising. He should have pushed the band to release the album much sooner, capitalizing on the interest Phil's departure had generated, instead they slowly fell off the radar. Even with Phil I doubt they would have had the success they enjoyed before, in a changed landscape but without him? Not a chance. Congo, Shipwrecked and Not about us had some commercial potential, no matter what I think of them but there's really no knock-out song on it.

    Were Mike and Tony being naive about believing they could carry on without Phil? Of course. They were replacing a singer, drummer, arranger and frontman who also just happened to be one of the most successful solo performers in the world at the time. But they wanted to carry on and I applaud them for not giving up.

    I think they underestimated the situation or perhaps got too competitive and thought they did it before, twice and they could pull it off a third time which is OK in my view. Only, they should have given up any pretense of commercial success and scale down the tour, particularly in the US. I don't think their management helped them in that particular context.

    I think from a marketing point of view it took them too long to release the album. Whatever interest Phil's departure generated was gone by the time CAS came out and the scenario had changed a lot.

    Financially, it was ill-advised to plan a tour, thinking it was going to be of the same scale of the previous ones. In some younger fans' minds Genesis was Phil's band and commercially speaking, they should have known they were bound to suffer a lot, particularly in the States.

    Musically, they should have picked ONE drummer and rehearse with him. They learned when they found Phil how important a drummer is to a band.

    David Longdon`s voice is very similar to Peter`s. Choosing a singer, that didn’t sound like either Phil or Peter seemed a good idea, as it opened new musical possibilities and paths. Just think of Steve Hogarth and Fish. Two voices (and personalities) as different as can be. It worked really well for Marillion.

    I have to disagree. I find Ray's voice much more similar to Peter's and David's somewhere in between Peter's and Phil's. Not to mention the fact that David has a much wider range.

    I sort of like it, it is not their worst in my book but I believe they made some strategic mistakes. The big problem is obviously Phil was simply missed. He, his vocal lines and the way he and Tony interacted, the spark that came from Tony throwing chords at him and he generating vocal lines and melodies. I omit his playing because at that stage imo there wasn't anything particularly thrilling going on. The drumming served the songs which was OK and the songs didn't require much more than that. Ironically we have a drum solo on CAS. I was OK with Ray, although a limited singer but a fine voice. Still, it seemed to me Tony couldn't get over Peter. I heard then, that the choice came down to Ray and David Longdon and I truly wish they had gone with the latter whom I find a better singer and better suited to sing both Peter's and Phil's material. Still, I enjoy the album but there's a sense of a missed opportunity.

    I can understand being indifferent about this song; I don't really get what would inspire loathing of it .

    I can obviously only speak for myself and I think it's always difficult and sometimes dangerous to substantiate likes and dislikes. Provided that I don't think it is a great song in any genre, not even pop or by any stretch of imagination, I would have been inclined to ignore it, had I heard on the radio, sang by another artist or had it been, say on Face Value, an album I like very much. I simply would have skipped it. There are different genres on that albums and this one simply wouldn't have resonated with me. I think we all have expectations when we get an album by an artist we like. We want certain things we know these artists are about. On Duke, Misunderstanding is between MOOT and Heathaze and one may like or less those songs but to me those are Genesis songs, they are in line with what I expect from them and why I follow them. Misunderstanding isn't, it sounds musically out of place on the album, an intrusive element.

    Hence MY dislike. Now, and here where it gets tricky and dangerous but for objectivity's sake, one might argue the same with FYFM. It's uncharacteristic of Genesis, light and poppy. I just happen to think and it is the height of subjectivity that FYFM is simply a 'better' song, one they are still remembered by even by those who are not fans of the band. There's a simple charme to it, I don't find in MIsunderstanding which to me still sounds like somebody is learning to play the piano and learning to write songs which probably was the case.

    Hi and welcome to my thread Fabrizio. I’d love to hear your nominations for your 10th and 9th favourite Genesis tracks. We’re only posting one per week so you can quickly catch up

    Hello Brindie, I am afraid I will have to pass, at best I could cast a vote for the top three, they have pretty much remained the same throughout the years, the others are just an impossible task: they are too many and they keep changing constantly.