INVISIBLE TOUCH - LIVE AT WEMBLEY (DVD)

Genesis at the height of their commercial success. This concert was recorded at Wembley stadium (of course) induring their Invisible Touch tour in 1988. A friend gave me this DVd and I must say it took me quite a long, long time to finally have the patience to watch it. Yes, patience, since I had already their double DVD The Way We Walk that has a much better tracklist. One look at the cover of Live At Welbley and any prog rocker will cringe: only one song (Los Endos) is from their ´golden era of prog´. the remaining stuff comgion directly from their most popish phase (the 80´s). So I was quite surprised of how much I ended up enjoying it after I finally put it on.

Maybe is because I was not expecting much. But the fact is: even at their most commercial, Genesis still is good. And they are way better than most of prog bands that tried to go pop at that decade (only Yes came close, but Genesis did it more consistenly and the transition was much slower too). So while I missed the ´oldies` (which I found out later they did play, but were not included on the DVD), they still prove they could outperforme almost any pop band in terms of professionalism and musical prowness. And Phil Collins, love him or hate him, is a tremendous showman. He knows how to handle the public very well.

It is disturbing to see a fine musician like guitarrist Darryl Stuemer playing the bass 90% of the time, but on the few moments he does play guitar, he shows why Genesis chose him to replace Steve Hackett. And the band is very tight, doing some surprsingly good jammings on some songs (Abacab is a good exemple of how they can rock). the sound is perfect and the lightning is great. The only track I really didn´t like is, ironic enough, the instrumental The Brazilian (one of their weakest numbers ever). However, they did have the good sense to play Home By the Sea, their most progressive and powerful tune in several years (it could be on Selling England By the Pound). that song alone is worth the price of the DVD. But there is more.

Conclusion: if you like their 80´s stuff, this DVD is quite good and recommended. I still think The Way We Walk is way better (sorry for the pun), but Live At Wembley does have some charm. Not essential in any way, but good. 3 stars.