FOXTROT

Foxtrot is the 4th studio album by symphonic progressive rock legends Genesis, and the 2nd to feature what to many would be the classic lineup for the band with Peter Gabriel (lead vocals, flute, oboe, tambourine?), Phil Collins (drums, percussion and backing vocals), Steve Hackett (guitars), Tony Banks (organ, piano, mellotron, backing vocals) and Mike Rutherford (bass guitar, guitars, cello and backing vocals).

Another album so classic and perfect that does not deserves to be reviewed by an amateur like me, but that will not stop me from sharing my extraordinary experience with this band and their early music. Everything here is perfect, there's no other way to put it because everything I like (and feel attracted to) from progressive music is here, every band I like nowadays has grabbed something from this band, from this album. Now I do understand a lot, I can finally see and enjoy the great influence these guys had in everything that came after. The opener Watcher of the Skies is grandiose, rapid, furious but melodic, symphonic and even kind of danceable while Time Table brings different layers of beauty and greatness, both songs accompanied by masterful lyrical content, as the rest of the album.

Get ''em Out by Friday is simply magnificent, the narrative, the impersonation Gabriel does for every character thy participates in the vocals, literally one of the best songs I've heard ever, dramatic but beautiful, storytelling but so realistic at the same time. Perfection.

Can-utility and the Coastliners is classic symphonic prog song and even though is a "mostly" Hackett song is Tony Banks who for me results a the MVP with his different keys layers and imputing that very particular atmospheric sound (kind of spacey at spots) so many times reproduced for so many more modern bands (Anathema, Anekdoten, IQ, The Watch, etc). Perhaps the underdog inside this outstanding group of songs.

Horizons (another Hackett track) serves as instrumental conductor for the unearthly magnificent 7 part suite Supper's Ready. Genesis does in minutes what other bands need a full capacity album to achieve, the story, the beauty, the drama, the anxiety, the happiness, the anger and even musical freedom, all of that is here portrayed in less than 23minutes, the instrumentation and arrangements are five out five stars! I came late to this game and I'm so happy it happened that way, when I'm mature enough (musically speaking) to fully understand and enjoy this masterpiece.