I mentioned upthread that I heard the "World Premiere" of 'MAMA' as well, albeit in Poughkeepsie, NY (major metropolis that we are) so I think it was some sort of promotion by Atlantic Records. I wound up working for that very station a few years later but never bothered to ask about it
I remember CD singles were around aplenty those days (some shops had entire walls/sections exclusively dedicated to them) but I absolutely didn't remember that multiple issues of thee same single were the standard. Not that I payed that much attention, though. Still, while Radiohead were at the top of their form and had lots to offer, these double singles look more like a collection of fillers or throwaways to me. Oh, well... !!!
I quite like the mellotron-ish keyboard on "Shipwrecked". The backing track sounds too mechanical, though. I know Tears for Fears did the same thing with some of the singles from 1995's Raoul and the Kings of Spain. Sadly it didn't help sales either...
Shipwrecked B-side "Phret" "7/8" "No Son of Mine" "Lover's Leap" "Turn It On Again" Released 1 December 1997 Format CD, 7" vinyl, 12-inch vinyl Recorded The Farm, Surrey Genre Alternative rock Length 4:23 Label Atlantic (US & Canada) Virgin Records (rest of the world) Songwriter(s) Tony Banks, Mike Rutherford Producer(s) Genesis, Nick Davis "Shipwrecked" is the second single by British band Genesis, appearing on their 1997 album Calling All Stations. It was a minor hit, reaching No.54 in the UK[1] and No.82 in Germany.[2] The song is classified as a break-up song. The song sings about someone who has recently broken up with his significant other, and now feels "shipwrecked", hopeless, and alone. Some single versions featured acoustic versions of "No Son of Mine", "Lover's Leap", and "Turn It On Again" as B-sides. CD single, part 1 Virgin / gendx14 1. "Shipwrecked" 4:26 2. "No Son of Mine" (Acoustic Version) 3:21 3. "Lover's Leap (From Supper's Ready)" (Acoustic Version) 2:20 4. "Turn It On Again" (Acoustic Version) 2:33 CD single, part 2 Virgin / gensd14 1. "Shipwrecked" 4:26 2. "Phret" (Non-Album Track – Instrumental) 4:05 3. "7/8" (Non-Album Track – Instrumental) 5:08 ------------------------------------------------------------- Ok, so I guess I am going to be against the grain here again. I like this song. I'm not sure how Genesis the song is ..... perhaps it belongs on a Phil solo album? .... hey settle down I was just joking. This is an easy paced ballad and aside from the over-repeating at the end, I think this is arranged a lot better and written a lot better. They almost get the fade right here, but it is still a little wobbly, but if the first two hadn't been so bad, I probably wouldn't have noticed this one. We start with some radio dial adjustments (somewhat like Floyd's Wish You Were Here) and then the guitar comes in with an eq setting to make it seem distant, and then the song proper kicks in. I think this type of song suits Wilson's voice and I think the guys actually gel here. I think they got the mix pretty much right. I also think they arranged the song well. I know most on here are not really very fond of ballads, love or otherwise, but for me this song works from start to finish, and although certainly not in my favourite Genesis songs ever, it is a decent track that I enjoy.
Shipwrecked It didn't even register at the time, both as a video and as a song. When I got back to the album years later, I had a brief moment of enthusiasm, immediately frustrated and dismissed (again). Reason? Wasted potential in the lyrics. Musically, the song it's fine. I like the mood, the arrangement works to me, I don't find it overlong as others. Or sappy. (Is it just me or there is some britpop aftertaste in it? Anyway, I feel it could blend with the times a little better than Congo). The melody of the verse has the common dullness that plagues lots of the writing, but only slightly, not in a way to make it obnoxious. Again, it prepares the chorus well, and the latter works pretty fine to me. But again, the lyrics... Ok, they're fine if I go into "listen and don't bother - pop mode" but otherwise... I like the shipwrecking metaphor, it's a good start, a good image to center upon; it's visual and capturing, moody, slightly unusual. And not that weird and out of the blue like the Congo thing. For a while, I had the illusion Genesis were tacking into deeper tales, talking about depression, sense of loss and failure, life crisis, all that jazz. Great, right? And up to date, right? But no: it's all about a damn breakup (again). The most trivial, uninteresting and (relatively) easy to recover from, among all the possible traumas that make a man go "shipwrecked". I feel like the potential of the imagery is thrown into the sewer, reduced to this simplistic origin. It could have been so much better to leave it undetermined, to concentrate on the feelings without specifying any reason, even adding some indetermination like Tonightx3. The lyrics are so uneven, too. One moment, some lines seem to be crafted with at least a little care but just immediately after, they revert to 13-year-old syntax and vocabulary. The repetition in the chorus is not fine poetry, but at least it works fine with the melody and acts as a reinforcement and as nice, soft hook. It's the most memorable moment. - So, all in all, I can work with it, if I'm in the mood. More of a background song or a "song to make you company" than a dedicated listening, but it's ok. Yet, it could have been much better lyrically, with proper focus, care and will. Which is this album's main theme, apparently. ---- The "Is it my imagination" bit has a trademarked Tony's sequence that is Genesis enough I hand't connected the two songs (maybe unconsciously refusing to). Now that I do, I like the start even less. It's a lazy production move for the sake of it, whether it is an homage or a steal. Ha!
Shipwrecked “Even standing on the corner of a busy city street I still feel so lonely Why d’you say you wanna be with me Then the next day... Say you don’t” Okay; I feel like this is an easy target but this is quite probably my least favourite Genesis song of all time. (Yes, even less favourite than “Hair on the Arms and Legs” or whatever daft schoolboy stuff is on Archive 1.) “Never a Time”? Fine. “In Too Deep”? Great. “Taking it all Too Hard” - an absolute frigging masterpiece in comparison. @Rfreeman put it extremely well - it’s a turgid, insipid, nausea inducing, snooze fest. At least we get a bit of a break from the BANG... BANG of the 4/4 “big rawk drums” for the first time on the album (albeit they’re just a bit reduced in volume)
Phret This is an instrumental track and starts with a gentle feel. We have a somewhat melodic keyboard theme going on that has minor leanings and then that bounces into a major key more beaty section, with a poor sounding guitar. We then go back to the intro section, that is extended a little. Then we go back to the section that has a beat and that is extended also and runs out to a fade. To my ears on a first ever listen ... this is an ok idea, that sounds like a demo, but I don't feel I missed anything having never heard it before.
7/8 This is another instrumental outtake. This sounds a little more Genesis to my ears melodically. Again this isn't bad but it is the base of a song that is unfinished to my ears. It could have been a decent song, but it is an average to somewhat boring instrumental.
No Son Of Mine - Acoustic I'm not sure if this is the correct version, I couldn't find one that seemed to be off the actual single... I assume it's close
The "Instrumentals" I'm gonna indulge a little bit on these ones. As you may have noticed, I'm a sucker for Genesis instrumentals. I put every official ones (and some of the outtakes) easily among the best things they did. So you can imagine my interest when I saw not one, but TWO tracks listed as instrumentals in the outtakes. But again, "missed opportunity"... I should have asked myself... Why the need to specifically mention those (instrumental) aside the title (and in brackets)? They never did that before. Why they now feel it's necessary? (Not to speak of the titles seeming like working ones). Answer: because that's the nickname frequently (even not exclusively) used by pop music market to indicate a song lefts at the stage of backing tracks. Which is, unfortunately, what these two things are: unfinished songs without a melody and a lyrics set written for them (or at least recorded). Also known as the ultimate barrel scraping. We already noticed that almost every outtake since Duke sounds less produced that the album tracks from the same sessions, and sometimes they feel not fully worked out in writing. But this is one step further, it's one peek right into the recycle bin. - Anyway, let's talk once again about wasted potential, because both tracks, as they are, show a great deal of it. 7/8, for starters, has a refreshing time signature, that could have been hugely welcome in the flat 4/4 world dominating the album. There's no trace of melody: it's pure backing tracks. But it's good. It has drive, contrast, balance, a slight jam feel to it. And I ask to myself: why does it feel so good to me compared to the rest, even that unfinished? Is it because imagination is open to every possibility? Because there's NO lazy and simplistic melody over it? Because there's NO trivial and repetitive lyric writing? Because there's NO Ray's voice on top? Could this be an involuntary counter-proof of what weakens the entire album? Would I react the same to "karaoke" versions of official tracks? I can't answer for sure. Phret was dropped in a later phase, apparently. Or maybe the guys were not sure about what to make of it: instrumental or song? Whatever the case, there's more melodic content, both in the keys figures of the "verse" than in the strange bass line of the "chorus", that covers such an unusually wide range for the instrument, acting as sort of a lead voice. This content is enough to give the piece identity and make it work as a musical discourse, despite the production bringing it back to a demo or raw stage. The minor/major dark/lightened contrast is by-the-book, but it's nice nevertheless. There's less obvious space for vocals here, like in old Genesis times. How to put them in? Maybe they could double the melodic line (making it act as a reinforcement in turn) or they could be totally different, making an extra layer of the instrumental melodies. As they are, the sounds used and the bass lines are not strong enough to properly support a lead role, they feel like "temp" tracks like that banjo line. But the melodic content itself, that could work, with some extra sound design. As a properly worked out instrumental, I could see it in the album, providing a much needed variety, maybe even an uplifting ending.
I couldn't find any reference. I am assuming that they are just the Vh1 performances because there doesn't seem much else and Genesis fans seem to youtube everything.
Shipwrecked. Probably the worst example of Tony ruining a song. Not that any lyrics help. Sounds like some manufactured teen pop waste, with that said I kind of like it...
Just you wait until I start defending "If That's What You Need"... people are going to use the Shipwrecked post against me, I know they are
Unfortunately my CD singles are in a box, but I seem to remember they might be from RTL Studios in Paris?
By the way, if Mark doesn't mind, I would like to ask which song/s from "Calling All Stations" do you guys think it would have been nice to have heard in the 2007 farewell tour, sung by Phil?
Due to my ever increasing intolerance towards human voice and its idiosyncrasies, i once made a cd-length compilation of Genesis instrumentals. In fact, i actually put together every existing instrumental track, i even included Ravine and the second half of the Jackson Tape, so go figure! But Phret and 7/8, no way! It's a really good playlist, it flows pretty well, and it's got the advantage of not getting on my nerves because of the vocals.
I think Shipwrecked is at least a good performance and a nice production - I like the "sound" of this one, more than some of the other tracks on show, but it doesn't deliver much else unfortunately. I also spotted the Wish You Were Here beginning and it feels like a finished performance but outside of that, well it's a nice enough tune, I don't hate it as much as some others but neither am I drawn to it. It's one of those songs I always think I like, then I listen to it and I can't quite remember what it was I liked about it!
As much as I like CAS, I think I would like the tracks less with Phil singing so I am glad they did not make that move in 2007. Of tracks so far, Congo would have been a better choice than the other two. Will let you know if answer changes as we go through the tracks.
