Genesis - The Album by Album Thread

Discussion in 'Music Corner' started by mark winstanley, Oct 15, 2018.

  1. mark winstanley

    mark winstanley Certified dinosaur, who likes physical product Thread Starter

    Dancing With The Moonlit Knight
    This song was originally going to be titled "Disney".[1] The album takes its name from a lyric in the song.
    Chris Jones of BBC Music wrote that the song "gives the perfect snapshot of what Genesis were about at this point".[2]

    The song was developed from several brief piano pieces composed by frontman Peter Gabriel, which were later combined with some of Steve Hackett's guitar figures to make up the song.[3]

    Gabriel contributed English-themed lyrics to "Dancing with the Moonlit Knight", because the music press thought that Genesis were putting too much effort into appealing to the American audiences. He also included some references to Green Shield Stamps in the lyrics.[4] Rolling Stone wrote that the song was an "epic commentary on contemporary England".[5]

    The song's ending, which contains a number of 12-string guitar figures, was originally supposed to segue into "The Cinema Show" (another song on the album) to make a song of around 20 minutes in length. This idea was scrapped, because it was too similar in length to the 23-minute song "Supper's Ready" from Foxtrot, the band's previous record.[4]

    In an interview, Hackett said of the song:

    That tune started off with the influence of a Scottish song, then it moved into something that I think of in a more elegiac way — something nostalgic and wistful, and common to a lot of Genesis tunes. Then it bursts forth, it fights off its shackles, really takes off like a rocket, into another section, which seems to borrow from something that sounds more Russian in a way. It’s European, but then at times, it turns into the jazz that I liked originally — but big band, with the accents.[6]

    When performed live, "Dancing with the Moonlit Knight" had Gabriel dressed in a Union Jack dress, helmet and lance. The song was performed in 1973 and the year after, but was dropped from the band's setlist once The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway was released, and only rarely did it show up afterwards.[7]

    "Dancing with the Moonlit Knight" was performed at the band's 1982 reunion show with Gabriel (Gabriel had originally left Genesis in 1975).[7]

    Genesis' guitarist Mike Rutherford said that he thought the song was a good opener for Selling England by the Pound, but he was less happy about the whole song overall, as he said it was "a bit busy".[8]

    Ultimate Classic Rock wrote that despite the puns in the song being a bit over the top at times, the band performs at its musical peak in "Dancing with the Moonlit Knight".[9]
    --------------------------------------
    The song starts with Peter Gabriel singing the opening lines solo. It is a very effective opening, and really grabs the attention. There is a melancholy that oozes from this song that gets emotional investment almost instantly.
    The guitar joins the vocal first and the end of the sequence has a very memorable little guitar theme that crops up throughout the song.
    The piano comes in and we move into a somewhat more grandiose sound and then the little guitar riff becomes the base of this verse.
    We move out of this section with an injection of ceremonial sounding power the leads into a fast section that if it was all distorted guitars would almost certainly be seen as metal. Hackett blasts out some really nice hammer-ons, Banks answers with some synth, Hackett answers him with a series of volume swells. This leads into a very melodic little lead break that returns us to the hammer-on section.
    This is such a complex song to break down. It moves through several little instrumental sections breaking up various grand sounding vocal sections. The style changes, the tempo changes, this song moves through so many different sections, but still remains coherent. The only reason I can think of for Rutherford's statement up there is as a retort to those complaining that later Genesis was simplistic pop (which it rarely actually was, it's just that so much of their earlier stuff is remarkably complex) ...
    Lyrically this track is drawing pictures of King Arthur, the fate of modern England, the generation gap .. all very poetic and difficult to nail down, but beautifully visual.
    This track really is an excellent track and speaks volumes about how much Genesis had refined their style at this stage. For this song to contain so much music and be so concise is quite remarkable.
    My apologies if this isn't quite as coherent as I would like it to be, but I was having a few beers last night, and as I was only in bed for three hours I have no doubt they are still deep in my system. Although this song is such a remarkable piece of intricate writing I doubt I would do much better even if I had not had any beer.

     
  2. bob_32_116

    bob_32_116 Forum Flaneur

    Location:
    Perth Australia
    The puns and references to English culture are part of this song's charm.

    Funny how some people will criticise a band for too many references specific to that band's home country - as though that were a bad thing - except that criticism never seems to get levelled at Americans.
     
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  3. HiredGoon

    HiredGoon Forum Resident

    I love Dancing With The Moonlit Knight (the opening vocal, the guitar line that's soft at first then played harder later, the piano's entrance, the mellotron, the hammer-ons, etc). It does get a bit overly busy and jazzy at around the 5 minute mark, just before the ambient coda, with that weird synth sound.

    I'm assuming that Marillion was influenced by this song for the solo vocal that starts Script For A Jester's Tear?

    --Geoff
     
    Last edited: Nov 18, 2018
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  4. Rick Robson

    Rick Robson

    Location:
    ️️
    Dancing With The Moonlit Knight

    I like a lot this superb opening track, and I love the way it starts off the album, just a majestic opening section where Peter does shine highly (one of the few times that I really love Peter singing); also delightful the drives the song takes veering from one mood to another, while Hackett too shines highly with an awesome guitar attacks adding more dynamics to this really great song. This opening track rocks in its own right!
    .
     
  5. Victor/Victrola

    Victor/Victrola Makng shure its write

    I love the fact that Genesis embraced their English-ness so well on this track. It brings the "kings and queens of old" to the present and is an excellent commentary on how things were in the early 70's. As a Yankee, some of the puns go right past me, but "digesting England by the pound" was one I always admired.

    This is a complicated song musically and Gabriel doesn't shy away from the challenge with the lyrics. Just about everything that came before is encapsulated in this opening track. Both Collins and Hackett are starting to feel very confident alongside the other three and their influences (I think especially Phil's jazz instincts) come across in how the two of them play their parts.

    Also, the sound quality of this opening track is SO much better than anything they'd done before. Tony's parts are not overblown to the point of saturating the tape, and they boost Mike's bass parts enough so you can actually hear what's going on in his part of the world.

    The little call-backs to Cinema Show do give a hint at another side-long suite, but I'm glad they broke it up so those musical references are more of a reprise at the end of the record instead of one really long piece. (They'd do the same thing later on "Duke", which also works very effectively there.)

    As good as this track is, and it's definitely good, we're about to see the dam burst wide open in a couple of days.
     
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  6. Eleventh Earl of Mar

    Eleventh Earl of Mar Somehow got them all this far.

    Location:
    New York
    Probably one of their most perfectly written songs.

    The first verse starts with only Peter only vocals, with a little acoustic guitar during the 2nd part.

    The second verse adds the piano melody and ends with Peter saying "selling england by the pound" adding some urgency to the proceeding before really starting off proper and getting right into it all.

    The third verse drops back the instrumentation with more pronounced vocals than the introduction and storms off with Tony using the first Mellotron choirs in Genesis thanks to the new to him M400 with the "chorus" leading right into raw part of the song.

    The instrumental here starts with some low Mellotron brass with Phil's drumming keeping it together and then Hackett goes mad with one of the rare solos in the Genesis catalog, but turns it straight back to the original "chorus" melody with the brass and then...

    The huge choirs are back in and Steve has a guitar groove here I adore, Peter still going deep with the vocals before going back to the "chorus" and breaking into what essentially amounts to musical breakdown of the lyrical themes with the guitar and keys growing more paranoid right as Tony ends with some nice Hammond work - that part about the music fitting the lyrics is subjective of course but I feel like it works well given the story around the entire track. It then ends with a slow burn of some acoustic guitar work, Peter getting the flute out and a really un-Genesis esque ambient section that fades out the track - they'd rarely go into this mood but it ends the track with enough time for it to not feel like a waste of ending the song on some big chord or striking lyric.
     
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  7. MikeF63

    MikeF63 Forum Resident

    Location:
    Derbyshire, UK
    First song on which Banks uses a Synthesizer I think. And uses it nice and sparingly (in contrast to later SEbtP tracks like Firth and Cinema Show), leaving a lot of space for Hackett doing superb work. The playing and arranging go up a notch on this album, even if the songwriting already reached great new heights on Foxtrot. Great opener to one of the best albums ever recorded.
     
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  8. mx20

    mx20 Enthusiast

    Location:
    Raleigh, NC
    I'm quite sure "Disney" was never intended to be the real song title, just a working title because the end of the song "goes all Disneyland" (read: dreamy, ethereal, etc.).
     
  9. abzach

    abzach Forum Resident

    Location:
    Sweden
    Wow, Selling England By The Pound - what a masterpiece! One of the absolute best albums ever made by anyone!
    The original UK vinyl sound amazing! Best sounding CD: Genesis - Selling England By The Pound
     
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  10. Giant Hogweed

    Giant Hogweed Senior Member

    Location:
    Exeter, Devon, UK
    I'm on a train so can't write at length, but I was just listening to 'Cinema show' whilst looking at the English countryside shooting by out of the train window on a lovely sunny afternoon. This is one of my favourite pieces of music ever, not a note out of place.

    SEBTP is probably my fave Genesis album along with Trespass, I like that it's still very pastoral and the much improved fidelity really makes the band shine. An amazing and beautiful piece of work.
     
  11. mark winstanley

    mark winstanley Certified dinosaur, who likes physical product Thread Starter

    Yea in places it certainly does reflect elements of trespass
     
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  12. Godbluff

    Godbluff Forum Resident

    Location:
    UK
    I'm going to swim against the tide of popular opinion here: I know for many it's their crowning achievement, but it's always been my least favourite of the Gabriel-era Charisma albums. I first heard most of the material on the first night of the Selling England UK tour in Manchester, a week ahead of the release of the album. Originally Glasgow should have been the opening night of the tour but was cancelled at the last minute due to electrical problems. There really was too much to take in on first listen, so I was still full of optimism when I got my copy on the day of release and rushed it home. A year earlier I'd done the same with Foxtrot and been blown away by it, but with Selling England I was, for the first time, faced with something that left me a little cold and unimpressed. Up to that point Genesis could do no wrong for me, the trilogy of Trespass, Nursery Cryme and Foxtrot were just about perfect, but this was something else. The band have said it was a difficult album to make and to me it sounds like it, lots of really good ideas but they don't hold together in the same way as they did on the previous albums. Dancing With the Moonlit Knight also introduced a degree of over-playing that wasn't really typical of the band - some jazz fusion influences and some high speed unison playing get a little self-indulgent for me - there was some great playing on the previous albums but it always served the song, here it sounds flash for the sake of it. Firth of Fifth has a great middle section but Tony's lyrics are too 'wordy' and just a bit clunky. After the Ordeal is pleasant enough but doesn't really go anywhere and More Fool Me is a nice idea that sounds a bit half-finished. The Battle of Epping Forest was the number that the press picked up when the album was in the recording stage, and expectations were high that it may have been this album's Supper's Ready, but there's just too much going on - listening to the instrumental rehearsal recordings it sounds like a Genesis classic in the making and I love Gabriel's clever wordplay but put the two together and it's just too busy.

    Over the years my views of the album have mellowed a little, compared to a lot of what came later it's a masterpiece, but first impressions are not usually wrong when it comes to me and Genesis and this is one album where I came to it with very high expectations and it ended up falling well short.
     
    Last edited: Nov 18, 2018
  13. DMGuy

    DMGuy Forum Resident

    For me, this album is a mixed bag. The highs are very high and there are what I would consider to be 3 great songs in Dancing With the Moonlit Knight, Firth of Fifth and Cinema Show.

    I Know What I Like is pleasant enough, but forgettable, as is After the Ordeal. Where the album breaks down for me is the end of side 1 and beginning of side 2. More Fool Me is just fluff and Battle of Epping Forest is a song I could just never get into. That wouldn't be a huge deal if it was 3-4 minutes long, but 11-12 minutes of that prevents me from calling this one of my favorite Genesis albums. There's some great ideas in Battle of Epping Forest but this is a case where the parts are better than the whole.

    Firth of Fifth and Cinema Show both are improved on Seconds Out, even if I prefer Peter's vocals and miss the piano intro of Firth on that album. But, the instrumental power is captured so much better on that live album. Sure, Tony's lyrics on Firth of Fifth are pretty bad (by his own admission), but who cares....the music itself is sublime. Dancing with the Moonlit Knight has great lyrics, and some of Steve's best ever playing. I could live without the short instrumental passage at the end.
     
  14. Rose River Bear

    Rose River Bear Senior Member

    Dancing with the Moonlit Knight

    The song starts with a folk melody that would make even Sandy Denny proud. Peter alone, like he is a street busker filled with desperation. A somber tune in C sharp minor...not typical for a rock band....maybe LVBs Moonlight Sonata influenced the key and the title. At :22 we hear one of the hooks of the song .....a chord driven melody in C sharp minor that floats between the C # minor and G # minor chords in a melodic push and pull. It ties together the entire song. At :26 the verse sounds like it will go the relative E Major cadence wise to get our attention.....Paper late.... but then subtly returns to C # minor as if we just walked by the newspaper vendor and off into a dream. The verse at :54 stays in C # minor and Tony adds in beautiful piano work. Peter sings a variation of the guitar hook in the melody. At 1:21 the guitar hook is now played in ostinato fashion in a pre chorus section and played a little more staccato with an insistent bass note at the end. A chorale slowly emerges. The song's chorus enters at 1:59 and is given royal treatment in the key of B Major and the chorale is in full bloom. The chorus ultimately rises out in Tony Banks trademark fashion. At 2:24 an interlude enters first based on F# minor with a great hook sounding like a crazy train but then quickly shifts to A Major for Steve's solo. Steve's solo is in A mixolydian and the G natural note at 2:38 and 2:40 give it a slightly somber tone. Tapping and pulloffs abound. At 2:45 a cool wide interval jump lick. At 3:05 a turnaround adds some flavor to the interlude with a trademark Tony descending line and then it is back to the groove at 3:30. At 3:41 the F # minor riff returns and then one of my favorite Genesis moments.....in orchestral fashion using part of a B major scale to add to the mystery, the riff rises out and then the song's pre chorus section is reset in amazing fashion. Back to somber C # minor with the guitar hook heavier on the bottom strings and now with another beautiful chorale section added by Tony....breathtaking and desolate feeling. Peter is in perfect voice and the ironic lyrics are some of his best. Phil adds a lot of drama playing in unison at times with Steve. Yep...it rocks. The chorus follows at 4:17 and is given some additional lines in a post chorus at 4:31. At 4:53 the F # minor hook returns and then a transition section follows. At 5:12 the song returns to A major but then goes thru a couple of key changes until at 5:43 the song's energy starts to dissipate. At 6:00 Peter adds some flute to give the song a pastoral sound. The quiet keeps going with an almost musical box sounding guitar alternating between G and A 7th chords-no cadence (D Major) giving it a dreamy sound. Steve plays some serene sounding violin like fills and the song fades.

    One of their most brilliant works. Genius use of themes and sections that get various arrangement treatments. So much going on is such a short amount of time but they make it all cohesive. Top notch understanding of tension and release....and that is what it is all about in Prog and Genesis were one of the best at it. The handle on dynamics is beyond most bands. An incredible mix of the beautiful and the edgy. My favorite song on the album and in the top five of mine by the band. And the lyrics are some of the band's best and encompass a broad range of issues.
     
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  15. MisterSquishy

    MisterSquishy Well-Known Member

    Location:
    Chicago
    The beginning half is one of the band's most gorgeous & moving sections in the catalog. I love the steady build from just a vocal to full British bombast. Here's compilation of about half a dozen demos that float around: It starts with Peter writing at the piano & then moves to the band rehearsing & developing the busier parts.
     
  16. MisterSquishy

    MisterSquishy Well-Known Member

    Location:
    Chicago
    Also, from one of my favorite live shows ever, Uptown Chicago 1978 (I know, I know, wait for it), comes the one-time medley into The Musical Box (greatest segue ever):
     
  17. Rose River Bear

    Rose River Bear Senior Member

  18. Rose River Bear

    Rose River Bear Senior Member

    Interesting to note that the studio version is one half step lower than the rehearsal clip. They must have done that for Peter?
     
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  19. Godbluff

    Godbluff Forum Resident

    Location:
    UK
    This was going to be promoted by Rikki Farr, who will be familiar to anyone who has seen the film of the 1970 Isle of Wight Festival, where he was compare and memorably had a rant at the section of the audience that wanted to turn it into a free event. His brother Gary led The T-Bones , who included Keith Emerson in one of their later line-ups. The band said they were planning a set that drew on all their albums, going back as far as From Genesis to Revelation - considering how static their setlists were becoming from this point onwards, how amazing could that have been, even if Wembley Arena (or Wembley Empire Pool as it was known at the time) seemed a bit ambitious for a band that were only just beginning to break into the big time. Sadly the whole thing was derailed as they couldn't get tickets printed in time, otherwise I would have been there.
     
  20. Rufus rag

    Rufus rag Forum Resident

    Location:
    UK
    SEBTP is a very mixed bag indeed. Love Hackett but his solo on After the Ordeal is poor. More Fool Me is a dire song ; shame they left it on. Battle of Epping Forest is Gabriel with verbal diarrhoea . The rest is stunning!
     
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  21. HiFi Guy 008

    HiFi Guy 008 Forum Resident

    Location:
    New England
    Genesis - early CD versions thread (Ver. 2)
    Go to post #6
     
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  22. mark winstanley

    mark winstanley Certified dinosaur, who likes physical product Thread Starter

    It pays to look after your singer. If you have everything too high, ten shows into a tour they'll be shot to pieces lol ... been there, done that hahaha
     
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  23. Rose River Bear

    Rose River Bear Senior Member

    For some folks SEBTP is their favorite Genesis album. I am not in that camp as some others here. I cannot say it is weak in any way and it is tough to criticize it in any way though since the playing and writing is still very good. However, some of the songs don't grab me and are too laid back for my taste. I like Genesis when they rock a little more. There is enough rock in the opening track but after that things get a little too pastoral for me. I put NC and Foxtrot above the album overall even though I like the opening track as much as anything else on any of their albums.
     
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  24. mark winstanley

    mark winstanley Certified dinosaur, who likes physical product Thread Starter

    I reckon I would agree. I like the album more than I did, now I have really given it a serious listen. I actually have grown to love Epping Forest.
    Like I said earlier I tended to reach for the albums i knew I really liked and Selling England tended to be neglected.
     
  25. wildstar

    wildstar Senior Member

    Location:
    ontario, canada
    The song wasn't "originally going to be titled Disney." A section of the song had as a working title (a temporary placeholder/dummy title meant only for the band's own purpose of referencing a song - or part of a song - during the writing process, before lyrics were written/a proper title was given) of 'Disney' (the instrumental coda IIRC)

    Gotta love wikipedia :rolleyes:

    PS - could you imagine the lyrics if the "fact" that they were going to call the song "Disney" was actually true?!
     
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