SECONDS OUT

Seconds Out is a difficult album for me to review, I had wanted this album for months so when my girlfriend brought it for me a couldn't wait to give it a spin. What I heard however left me somewhat disappointed being that Genesis are my favourite band of all time.

Where the hell is Steve Hackett in this album, his guitar solos and overall sound are drowned out by the other members. His guitar solo for Firth of Firth barely noticeable and sounds very weak. Lets be honest drums and bass should not drown out a hackett guitar solo!! ha ha.

The drumming in this album is far too busy and over the top even for a live album. The bass playing is nothing special, apart from Los Endos. Bank's keyboards are ok but again I ask myself where is Steve Hackett and his sound in the midst of things.

Some of the choice of tracks are poor, especially Carpet Crawlers which is a poor song by album standards. The Cinema show is too slow and dragged out to make it as a live song and Robbery Assult and Battery sounds much better as an album track.

The live set does not contain enough to satisfy you if your a Wind & Wuthering fan. Tracks such as 'Eleventh Earl of Mar' and 'In The Quiet Earth' would have made perfect sense to have as live tracks instead we are treated to a poor version of 'AfterGlow'

On a positive note however Phil Collins does quite a good job of singing the Gabriel pieces such as 'Suppers Ready' and 'I know what I like'. The fact that Hacketts sound was not remastered properly unlike the rest of the members really lets this album down badly. Guys you should be throughly ashamed of yourselves for doing that to him.

To sum the album up I would put it under the heading 'Not bad but could do a lot better'