Log #67 — From Prog To Pop, The Transition of Genesis
Many bands of course change direction during their careers. Sometimes this is a natural progression or development. Sometimes it’s an unavoidable result of changing personnel or a result of burnout leaving bands bereft of new ideas (how many bands shoot their loads completely with a tremendous first album which has in essence been many years in the making, but then understandably fail to follow up with a decent sophomore six months later?).
With the advent of punk and new wave in the mid to late 70s, many existing bands such as prog rock giants Genesis became “dinosaurs” and had to adapt to survive. The Genesis transformation appeared dramatic and sudden with the release of Duke in 1980 but in actual fact had really begun a few years and albums earlier with the departures of key personnel setting in train subtle changes well before that transformative album.
German Krautrock trendsetters Can were already ahead of their time when they launched in the late 60s — their change in the mid-70s was a little more gradual as rather than punk and new wave, which they were already close to in the beginning and arguably influenced, they began to introduce elements of reggae and world music into their sound (being ahead of their time again).
The results were less than impressive though and like Genesis their core fans deserted. Genesis carried on obtaining unbridled commercial success with a new set of fans who had never heard Supper’s Ready and didn’t care. Meanwhile Can disbanded in 1979 leaving their original legacy largely intact notwithstanding a disappointing and short lived reunion album at the end of the 80s.
1. Beck — Colors
2. Neil Young — Hitchhiker
3. Bruck — Violin Concerto №1
4. Genesis — Turn it on Again, The Hits
5. Can — Anthology 25 Years CD 2
6. Handsome Family — Honey Moon
I have two greatest hits/compilations/anthology CDs in the player this week from these two important bands. As regular readers know this is not normally something I advocate. But sometimes these catch all releases serve a purpose — for example you may not like the band enough to buy all the albums so just want a sample, or you just want to sample as a beginner before venturing deeper.
In the case of Can, I do love the band (I was even named after them!), but this Anthology seemed a good choice in order to cover a lot of ground economically (having bought many of the albums before on vinyl which I no longer hold, I don’t always replace all like for like with the CD formats). In particular this anthology has a good selection of their latter day material (post 1975) that doesn’t really warrant purchase in its entirety (the key music from Can can be found on their first half a dozen albums or so starting with Monster Movie and ending with Landed in 1975) (but do check out the band members’ solo albums too). Subsequent albums had their moments as the band dabbled with world, disco and reggae music, but the core Can sound which had made them so exciting and influential had gone.
Where a band is famous for extended improvisations a compilation album will also run the risk of inappropriate edits. How exactly can Hallelujah or Mother Sky for example be cut down to 5 minute samples? Having said that this compilation does it pretty well and the shortened tracks are not too grating — of course you’ve got to make sure you do hear the full versions of Hallelujah and Mother Sky on their original albums (Tago Mago and Soundtracks respectively), but note this CD does at least have the bonus of the unedited 20 minute You Doo Right from Can’s debut album.
Similarly, yet more marked and (un)celebrated, was the change in Genesis around the same time. There can’t be many bands who became so different as music fashions (and personnel) changed. This hits compilation is very heavily weighted to the latter day Genesis beginning particularly with the 1980 Duke album (although the change set in with the departure of Peter Gabriel and then Steve Hackett in quick succession following their Lamb Lies Down on Broadway (1974), and Wind and Wuthering (1976) albums respectively) — there are only two Gabriel era tracks on this 18 track album!
Unlikely Rock Trivia: Genesis were discovered by now disgraced record producer and radio presenter Jonathan King.
In fact being far from a fan of Phil Collins I have never had any desire to hear any post Gabriel Genesis. However this CD was a gift. Also my interest was piqued somewhat by an excellent ranking rundown I read here > http://www.prog-sphere.com/specials/genesis-albums-ranked/ which encouraged me to reassess (notice how the album covers deteriorated with the music too!).
What do I think now? Well, much the same really although I would say the chasm between the two incarnations is possibly slightly narrower than I had realised. They are still completely different bands and Collins is no Gabriel (keener prog era Genesis fans will also not underplay the influence of Hackett too). The prog era band produced some amazing original music with a charismatic front man. The pop music version went soft and became a vehicle for Phil Collins’ constipated singing, thumping snare and syrupy love songs, covered in Tony Banks’ synthesized cheese.
Are there any fans out there who like both the prog-Genesis and pop-Genesis?
However it’s not so bad and without the comparison of the original band Genesis Mark 1.5 may have been a perfectly reasonable pop band. Duke which was an affront to the existing fans was not such a bad album in itself (similarly time has been kind to King Crimson’s 1980 comeback album Discipline for example which was a shocking release for their prog fans at the time but now seems quite revolutionary).
To be fair, and in hindsight, Genesis did enjoy a prog swansong of sorts with three good post Gabriel albums that have each aged well — A Trick of the Tail, Wind and Wuthering (both 1976) and And Then There Were Three (1978), while downsizing from a five piece to an eventual trio (remarkably neither Gabriel or Hackett being replaced). In fact the former tops many a fan’s best Genesis albums of all time list.
A few other new entries this week which may warrant more words at a later date. We have Beck’s latest Colors which is very poppy and dare I say quite shallow compared to his usual work. I do love Stay Up All Night though. Neil Young’s Hitchhiker is a solo acoustic album from the mid-70s featuring slightly altered versions of songs from Rust Never Sleeps and various other previously unreleased tracks. The title track is excellent and I love the version of Powderfinger which gives the song a completely different atmosphere. Best of all is Campaigner though with its famous refrain — “even Richard Nixon’s got soul”.
(This blog entry originally appeared on 8th January 2018 at https://6albumsunday.blogspot.com/2018/01/genesis-from-prog-to-pop-gabriel-collins.html)
