SUPPERS READY (GENESIS TRIBUTE)

Few days ago I reviewed "Top Musicians Play Genesis" and mentioned this one as far better of the two. Now looking at the previous reviews & ratings I'm surprised about 2,2 stars average. The main fault seems to be the performances being too close to the originals. That's quite true, but still I'd say this is above the average level of tribute albums (not that I've heard very many). Track selection is fairly good and balanced, spread pretty evenly over the Genesis dicography except that the newest song is 'Mama' (1983). Does someone miss Invisible Touch or We Can't Dance songs here? Me neither.

Faithful soundalike attempts surely aren't the ideal thing on tributes. However, I don't have big complaints about the openers, ROBERT BERRY's 'Watcher of the Skies' or OVER THE GARDEN WALL's 'Firth of Fifth'. The vocals in the latter are a bad Peter Gabriel clone which disturbs me. DAVID HENTSCHEL (the Genesis producer!) with JAY TAUSIG on vocals do a good, and again, quite faithful, version of 'Undertow'. Fantastic ANNIE HASLAM from Renaissance is a perfect performer for 'Ripples'.

And as in the aforementioned "Top Musicians" CD, 'Back in N.Y.C.' is just a bad song to me even though KEVIN GILBERT does a good job with it. RICHARD SINCLAIR (of Caravan fame) gives a charming version of 'For Absent Friends', backed only by David Rees-Williams on keyboards. MAGELLAN's carbon copy of 'Mama' clearly loses to the powerful original, especially for the vocals. Sadly one of the worst Duke songs is represented, 'Man of Our Times', and the vocals resemble of bands like Toto.

'Many Too Many' is a pleasing one, sung excellently by Nick D'Virgilio from Spock's Beard, and so is SHADOW GALLERY's 'Entangled' or 'Carpet Crawlers' by the Brand X guitarist JOHN GOODSALL with MICHAEL ZENTNER on vocals. Again, these stick close to the originals but are fairly good nevertheless. CAIRO have chosen 'Squonk' and manage to add some new things in it. Probably my least fave here is 'I Know What I Like' by CRACK THE SKY. For a closer, WORLD TRADE (ie. Billy Sherwood on vocals, bass, guitar and keyboards) have chosen a surprising track from Abacab album but 'Keep It Dark' turns out to be interesting.

The leaflet kindly lists all the musicians and the cover art is nice. On the long run this isn't as clearly better than "Top Musicians Play Genesis" as I first thought, because there's so little originality in the performances. Therefor there aren't many songs I want to save to myself. Good, but non-essential.

Supper's not included!

Released in the same year as the Yes tribute album Tales From Yesterday and part of the same series of tributes to major progressive Rock acts of the classic era released by Magna Carta in the 1990's, this tribute to Genesis involves many of the same performers as the Yes tribute. As I mentioned in my review of Tales From Yesterday, these tribute releases from Magna Carta are special in that they do not only include a bunch of younger generation bands and artists paying tribute to their childhood heroes, but also involve some contemporaries and peers of the celebrated band itself. On the present album we find, for example, Peter Bardens of Camel, Richard Sinclair of Caravan, and Annie Haslam of Renaissance doing their versions of Genesis' music. These people's three respective numbers are actually among the most enjoyable even though the songs they are covering are not among Genesis more progressive songs.

Bands and artists that were also involved in the creation of the aforementioned Yes tribute Tales From Yesterday include World Trade, Cairo, Shadow Gallery, Enchant, Magellan, and Robert Berry - all of which were signed to the Magna Carta label at the time. I like several of these bands, but not all of them fit here. Shadow Gallery, for example, is an excellent band, but they are out of character on Entangled; they are just not right for that song.

With the exception Wind & Wuthering (which is my personal favourite Genesis album), every album from 1971's Nursery Cryme to 1983's Genesis are represented. In almost every case, it is the less progressive songs from the respective albums that are being covered. While I can only applaud that they don't ignore underrated, post-Steve Hackett albums like 1978's And Then There Were Three and 1980's Duke, most fans would certainly have preferred to hear more songs from the band's earlier albums at the expense of 80's numbers like Mama and Keep It Dark. I personally don't mind these latter two songs too much, but they are hardly among Genesis better songs or even the best songs from the albums from which they originate.

Supper's Ready is nonetheless a half-decent tribute album to one of my all-time favourite bands, but it is not as good as the Yes tribute Tales From Yesterday. (If you feel nostalgic for Genesis, you would be much better off with Steve Hackett's recent Genesis Revisited releases, especially the live albums).