The Last Domino?

Genesis

UMC/Virgin/Rhino, 2021

http://www.genesis-music.com

REVIEW BY: Benjamin Ray

ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED: 09/27/2021

Another tour, another compilation album. It’s old hat by now, and yet Genesis keeps doing it, hoping people will pay yet again for the same songs they already own.

A brief reminder: The first Genesis compilation was a 1999 one-disc affair, Turn It On Again, that covered all their pop hits and basically ignored the Gabriel art-rock years. The second comp, 2004’s Platinum Collection, was a three-disc overview of the band’s entire run and remains the gold standard, giving equal weight to all eras of the band. If you’re not one to delve into the individual albums, this is the best place to start.

But then, 2007’s Turn It On Again (Tour Edition) revamped the original disc with a ton of album tracks seemingly picked at random from the Collins years (seriously, “Pigeons,” “Many Too Many,” and “Happy The Man,” a Gabriel single?), and the affair was trotted out just to have merch to go along with the world tour (a live album also followed, of course). Then, in 2014, my_heart_sings_the_harmony_web_ad_alt_250 R-Kive came out, another three-disc affair that mixed in solo tracks from all five band members with the expected tracks. It was a clever idea, even if it repeated most of Platinum, because it showcased how good the individual members were as well as the chemistry when they played together. Either one is good.

But then news broke that Genesis would be touring in 2021/22, ostensibly a farewell tour, with Collins’ son Nic playing drums and Collins singing from a chair. Obviously, no Gabriel or Hackett. Obviously, no reason except to make some retirement money, since the tracklist will likely be the same as 2007 and the same from show to show. And, as expected, there are no surprises in this compilation, and no real reason to own it.

Sure, there are plenty of photos of the band, if that’s your thing. But that doesn’t justify purchase. The tracklist is 98% songs that have already been on the previous four compilations and that get played at your local dentist’s office regularly: “Invisible Touch,” “Mama,” “No Son Of Mine,” “I Can’t Dance,” “Afterglow,” Jesus He Knows Me,” “That’s All,” “In Too Deep,” “Follow You Follow Me,” and so forth. Nothing is here that hasn’t already been released elsewhere, long ago.

As for the Gabriel years, nothing from Trespass, Foxtrot or Nursery Cryme shows up. The usual suspects “Cinema Show,” the superb “Firth Of Fifth,” “I Know What I Like,” “The Lamb Lies Down On Broadway,” and “Carpet Crawlers” are here (but they were on the other comp as well), and nothing from A Trick Of The Tail is present. The only mild surprise is the Gabriel tune “Dancing With The Moonlit Knight,” a fine prog tune, but not one that the Genesis trio really performed live in the ‘80s and ‘90s (or 2007, as far as I know). Still, not worth the purchase.

So what you end with is two discs of great songs that have been released multiple times in multiple permutations. If you have no physical Genesis and don’t want to pay for a triple-CD comp (even though you should), I suppose this will do. But it’s little more than a cash grab to get people excited about a tour that shouldn’t be happening.

Rating: C-

User Rating: Not Yet Rated


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