Shenanigans as Gabriel era Genesis fans in the 1980's......

Let’s get back on track

whatever Wally/OP did, the Beatles did it first.

 

I deny that I am or ever have been jup-ist.

 

Perhaps this is the only option to salvaging this thread....

 

I quite like it as a harmless prank. It's not as if Phil Collins singing era Genesis wasn't everywhere then anyway. Someone could have found their way to the good stuff through your prank!

 

Phil Collins was in the 5 man era band also and is one of the greatest drummers in rock history, both with and without Gabriel. He also sang harmony and background vocals along with Gabriel. This anti Phil Collins vitriol and bashing by narrow minded "Gabriel only" fans is one of the great disappointments I have as a Genesis fan of all eras. It's petty, juvenile, and narrow minded. And circa 1986-87, Gabriel himself was all over the pop charts with Motown inspired hits like Sledgehammer and Big Time and lighter ballads like Dont Give Up. So what really was the difference? Anyone who thinks that a 86-87 era Genesis WITH Gabriel still in the fold would be still spitting out Suppers Ready style progressive rock epics is delusional. Gabriel wasn't doing that kind of "good stuff" either.

 

Ok Ok lets be fair to Phil , Peter's stuff by that time sucked too.
Agree with you Some Genesis fans are cray cray.
That's why we became VDGG/Hammill fans.
Anyway, The story was funny but it turned out not as funny
as the river of tears that was to follow.
Now that was funny.

 

I am both a Genesis and VDGG fan. What a wacky concept--it's a big tent, not an either/or proposition. And I never said So sucked. I don't live in an absolutist world.

 

OK, calm down. I personally don't like or dislike any Genesis and think things like That's All, Invisible Touch, Turn It On Again, Follow You Follow Me and Mama are good records, along with Peter Gabriel's stuff from that era. It was everywhere then though, especially Phil's solo stuff. I only used "good stuff" as the sweeping generalisation that you see often and what the OP thought, not me. I don't have any of it. My Dad loves early Genesis though and I keep meaning to give some a listen, but I'm ambivalent at best towards them overall. I agree on Phil's drumming. He's was fantasic and it does sadden me that he can't play anymore. I also agree that Gabriel wasn't doing much different stuff at the same time, but his lyrics have more depth. I can't imagine he'd have released something as dodgy as Illegal Alien or as empty and bland as In Too Deep.

When Phil wrote light ballads they generally had good melodies but were often loaded with typical ballad clichés. When Gabriel wrote one it had a very non typical subject matter, with the killer lines
"For every job, so many men
So many men no-one needs"

They're not really the same thing. As someone who has been long term unemployed and almost certainly will be again in new year, that goes straight to the heart, especially as I've never heard it sung before, or the subject approached with that kind of empathy.

 

To be fair, during high school, we were at this party where the music was being selected from a stack of LPs next to the turntable. Beneath the cabinet were what was presumably the host's parents' collection. So we swapped a Led Zeppelin album with a (the only?) Harry Belafonte album. The reaction of the crowd when Day-O popped on was priceless. There were plenty of "What the F***"s.

 

You'd rightfully and deservedly get stacks of vitriol. Heterosexuals have almost never been heavily prejudiced against, it has never been illegal and has been totally accepted throughout history. Homosexuality and bisexuality are only relatively recently becoming respected by the masses and be portrayed positively in the mass media. So recent that they were generally shunned, legally discriminated against and their sexuality illegal during a lot of people here's lifetimes.

I think it's a great thing that 'nightmare to be hetero' opinion can be voiced publicly and received positively. Plenty of homophobic opinions have been voiced for years and years that have been accepted, so thankfully, things are changing for the better.

 

And with this tripe I am bowing out of my own thread because a ban is surely on the horizon if I stay.

 

Bye bye!

 

Lmao, don't know why you'd think I'm not calm, I'm perfectly calm. Just making a point in response to the kind of stuff I see repeated countless times. And I don't dislike So, as I said above. It's a great album, just more commercial and "accessible" than much of his earlier albums. I used that comparison to point out that BOTH Gabriel and Collins have a love for American r&b, soul and Motown (Gabe does his best Marvin Gaye on Sledgehammer). I think Dont Give Up is a great song (and I am a big Kate Bush fan), but it's not that dissimilar from Collins' tune Another Day in Paradise about homelessness. Again by 1986-87 we weren't going to be getting Suppers Ready or Fountain of Salmacis or The Musical Box, no matter who was in the band.

The people who love to slag Phil forget that if it wasnt for his incredible talent, his ability to sing that well and come out from behind the drum kit to take on (reluctantly at first) the lead vocals, Genesis may have ceased to exist in 1975. And then we don't get the masterpieces of Trick of the Tail and Wind and Wuthering and Seconds Out and all that followed, as well as decades more of seeing Genesis play live in concert.

So on the 1982 tour, I was gladly willing to take the trade off of hearing an occasional Misunderstanding (actually a really good pop tune) or Man on the Corner along with the complete 23 min Suppers Ready, which was absolutely sublime. That's called being an all eras Genesis fan.

 

One of the big frustrations on a forum is that posts can be read or misinterpreted unlike how they were intended. I apologise for that. I thought you were having a go at me, but it seems not.

I've got to admit, I'm not a Phil Collins fan overall, though I'd never deny his talent or achievements. Another Day In Paradise has never sat comfortably with me, one reason being the 'you and me in paradise' lyric, it was hard being unemployed and I had far less money to help the homeless than Phil Collins did. The other reason being the obvious, but no less true one, that the multi millionaire didn't give any of the royalties for this song to homeless charities. It suggests he wasn't really all that bothered, rather it was a subject he could sing about for money.

Looking back, as a teenager I didn't like Phil Collins, that era Genesis and Peter Gabriel at all (though I did like Big Time, an undeniable groove!). Now I'm a lot older, I respect them a lot more. They weren't bad records at all for the most part, just massively overplayed and not my thing. Phil and Peter both seem like decent people in interviews too.

 

You are wrong about Phil Collins not giving money--a lot of money--to homeless charities or causes. I don't know if or how much of the royalties from the single went to shelters, but I would love to know your source for claiming that NONE went to the homeless. That would not be consistent with Phil's persona. I saw Collins solo in concert about 3-4 times, including the tour when that song was huge, and I remember specifically that a portion of the concert proceeds on that tour went to homeless shelters or causes. He even talked about that in introducing the song. On top of that, Collins was all over the place in the 80s and 90s doing benefit concerts for various charitable causes (Live Aid, Knebworth, Princes Trust concerts etc). So I'm going to call you out as not knowing what you're talking about.

 

Things are moving rather fast. Ask a certain best selling author (or the person she supported) about what happens when voicing a public opinion.

 

I'm glad to not know what I'm talking about if it means he's doing good! He obviously has done a lot. I know he did the charity concerts, who could miss him at Live Aid? He certainly was getting flack for not making that single a charity record at the time. regardless of what he did otherwise, it really should have been, but it also that goes to show that a lot of the more 'alternative' and indie originated music press, which I was reading, were very selective in what they reported. He said, or is supposed to have said that partly the song was inspired by him walking and looking away from homeless people in the US where there were a lot. Then to not make the single a charity one didn't look good at the time. Yes, he has done a lot of high profile charity concerts and self promotion was undeniably a big factor in that too, but you shouldn't really have to be an expert in all things Genesis to know where the proceeds from a single about the homeless from a multi millionaire went. Of course it's possible he could have quietly donated it all.

 

Which author?

 

Did you not see where I specifically said that a cut of all his tour concerts that year when the single was huge was being donated to homeless shelters? I was there. You weren't. So lets say that amount alone amounted to 3 million dollars to homeless shelters. Would that satisfy you? How much constitutes being charitable? Google the list of charitable causes Collins has been involved in and contributed to--it's substantial.

Also, you've screwed up why he wrote the song. He was in Wash DC near the Capitol bldg and he saw some homeless people living in some cardboard boxes nearby as they drove by. He was struck at people just walking by and going on about their lives as these homeless people lived in squalor mere blocks from the US Capitol bldg. He did not just "look away"--he shed light on the issue and put a spotlight in it by writing the song! And he includes himself and all people of means in his song re the "you and me in paradise" aspect. And you still haven't cited any source for your claim that NO $$ from that song went to charity.

So what I'm hearing is that you were probably a spiked hair snot nosed sneering teen or preteen circa 86-87, you hated commercially successful groups and artists like Genesis and Collins that were popular, and you formed your entire world view from what a few underground "alternative indie" writers said about Collins, and accepted it all as truth, and still do.

 

That's funny because my buddies and I did something similar but opposite at parties circa 1976-78. When everyone and their sister hopped onto the disco bandwagon we hated it. We would take off the Sat Night Fever soundtrack or dreck like KC and the Sunshine Band and put on Yes' Close to the Edge or ELP's Pictures at an Exhibition. Needless to say that didn't help us with the chicks....

 

You're pretty spot on with the age in the last paragraph, though I remember Genesis were quite popular with kids in my school. I was more a rock / metal fan than anything and more shy and insecure than rebellious. I wasn't and never have been cool! But later I was reading NME, Select, Melody Maker etc.

I didn't dislike Genesis and associated as a kid, in the Invisible Touch, So and No Jacket Required era, they were just there and not very interesting to me. I disliked them more later on along with Mike and the Mechanics. I just found them musically bland and overplayed by the late 80s. I said earlier I have a lot more respect for him as a musician, though I don't think everything shows him in a great light. Ignoring the lyrics of Another Day In Paradise, which are effectively direct, the music sounds cheap and plastic. The drums and keyboards in particularly. But that kind of thing was hardly exclusive to him. I had the 'Genesis' and 'Invisible Touch' albums and liked The Last Domino and Home By The Sea, but things like In Too Deep, Sussudio, Tonight Tonight Tonight and especially the Against All Odds style ballads bored me and still do.

If you think I haven't changed since I was that age you're very much mistaken. It's more I haven't paid very much attention to Phil Collins and Genesis because there hasn't been anything to grab my attention, all I'm aware of is his relative flop - Testify, a Disney soundtrack and a Motown covers album, but I have seen and heard amazing drumming from him and watched interviews in which I found him likeable. Yes, I'm almost certainly wrong about that, I'm happy to be. You came in with the antagonistic approach anyway.

Seeing as you're making preconceptions about me, right from your initial reply, you seem to be the one who hasn't moved on from music or got into other genres from what you liked decades ago. Going by the use of the word 'chicks' neither has your vocabulary. Until this I haven't made any negative assumptions about your upbringing or personality.

 

Lmao. I was being purposefully lighthearted in that post and putting myself back into my teen years. Should I have said "young maidens" instead?
And I have a very wide and diverse taste in music. Most people tend to like the music they grew up with in their formative years, that's hardly unusual. I am trying to understand why someone so uninterested in Genesis both back in the 80s and since then is commenting so stridently in a Genesis thread.

 

No you're not, you're making negative presumptions about my personality and have been since you first quoted me.

I have wide and diverse tastes too, I admit that early Genesis are possibly one of the only major UK rock bands I haven't listened to a lot by. I'll have to change that, I could love them!

With prog rock I tend to gravitate towards Caravan, early King Crimson (along with Red), McDonald and Giles, Meddle era Floyd, rather than ELP and Yes. I'm not so keen on classical style prog and the only Yes LP I like is The Yes Album, some of Fragile too. I'm also a big soul / R'n'B fan.

Let's agree to disagree on the 80s era and to be more harmonious, what early Genesis do you recommend I start with? Considering how I've been in this thread it might surprise you that I have an near original pressing of From Genesis To Revelation (a 1970 UK Decca pressing), but I know that's barely representative at all.

 

wow, living on the edge!

 

I didn't make any negative presumptions in my first post to you, I was responding to your negative take that the Collins era was not good and the "good stuff" was only in the Gabriel era, which is false. So your initial take was negative, and since it was kind of typical of the "pro Gabriel-anti Phil" comments that are quite common, I used your initial negative comment to extrapolate and expand and try to educàte that viewpoint with some facts.

My ELP and Yes anecdote was to show some of what prog we were listening to circa 77-78 at the height of the disco explosion. In fact my first ELP concert was 77 and my first Yes concert was 78. That certainly does not mean those are my only interests. I am an avid Crimson, Floyd fan also, Echoes is my favorite Floyd track of all time, and I have seen King Crimson, Caravan, Floyd, Yes, ELP, Genesis, VDGG, all in concert as well as countless other prog from Magma to Porcupine Tree to Tortoise and everything inbetween.

My favorite type of Prog is symphonic prog, which Genesis is, so if you don't like that style, you might not like early Genesis. But the album I'd recommend is Selling England by the Pound, their most revered classic from the Gabriel era. It's symphonic prog rock at its best.

But if your tastes are more avant or alternative then I would try Lamb Lies Down on Broadway, it's a flawed and excessive masterpiece of surreal progressive music making. It's dense and bizarre and contains some of Gabriel's most creative wordplay, and it sounds fantastic on headphones. But as a double LP it takes some patience and tolerance.

The first Genesis album without Gabriel was Trick if the Tail and that is actually my favorite and most played Genesis album. It's what turned me into a diehard from the moment I heard it in 1976, and for them to put out that great an album mere months after Peter left the group, with Phil transitioning to both drummer and singer, is nothing short of astounding. That's because people didn't realize or understand what great songwriters Banks and Rutherford and Hackett were back then, especially Banks. Musically Banks was always the core of the band.