Archive 1967-75by Genesis

Genesis has a storied musical history. The early days featured lead singer/drummer Peter Gabriel performing in fantastic/bizarre costumes and telling long, rambling stories as a way of introducing amazing songs that seemed to be a combination of rock and classical music; the later days had lead singer/drummer Phil Collins guiding the group to massive success with shorter songs leaning closer to pop than classical. Fans generally make this distinction and split the band into two separate eras. This four-disc boxed set covers the first part of the band's career.

Genesis has always been known as a great live band. With this in mind, it was an obvious choice to put a full live performance of "The Lamb Lies Down On Broadway" in the set. The double album was Gabriel's magnum opus with the group. He would leave the band shortly after the release of the album. There had never been an official release of the show, so they took the best recording they had, cleaned it up and included it in the set. The performance is fantastic. Not only does it contain the songs, they also get Gabriel's comments between some of the songs, explaining parts of the story. This really adds something to the show, a grand rock opera with a sometimes confusing story. The band members, including drummer Phil Collins, keyboardist Tony Banks, guitarist Mike Rutherford and guitarist Steve Hackett, are all virtuoso-level players; the music is amazing.

Gabriel's voice does a great job of holding up through the lengthy performance. However, when reviewing it for inclusion in the boxed set, he felt the performance for the finale, "It", was not up to his standards. The costumes he wore often caused his vocals to be muffled. So he re-recorded the song on his own, making it the only full track recorded by Gabriel for the band since he left (he did fill in parts of other songs for sound quality; Hackett also re-recorded some guitar parts).

For the third disc, they reached back to the first live album, "Genesis Live". The album only contained 6 tracks; several more were performed in the concert the album took from. So they included several of the missing tracks here. Included is an amazing performance of the prog classic "Supper's Ready", including Gabriel's introduction to the song. This is the only official live release to include Gabriel singing the song that really put them on the progressive rock map; it's a must-have for any real fan.

Also on the third disc are perennial favorite "I Know What I Like (In Your Wardrobe)", "Cinema Show", "Dancing With The Moonlit KnightC", and "Firth of Fifth". These were all included on the "Seconds Out" live set, but Collins was the lead singer on that album. Gabriel is the lead here for every track, save one: "More Fool Me", a song Collins sang lead on years before he took over the reins for the band.

Two rare studio tracks are included here, in "Happy The Man" (a non-album single release from the early days of the band) and "Twilight Alehouse" (a B-side to the single release of "I Know What I Like"). It concludes with the single version of their first charting single, "Watcher of the Skies". The quality on all tracks is excellent, and the set really delivers exactly what the fans really want.

The fourth disc primarily consists of demos recorded for their first album, "From Genesis to Revelation". While this isn't nearly as interesting as the first disc, this is all unreleased material, and if nothing else is of historical significance, being from the earliest formation of the group. This is not the band they would become, even around the time of their second album, but there are signs of the direction they would take.

Overall, this is the perfect set for any Genesis fan, or any fan of progressive rock. Give it a try, you will be very glad that you did.