Overrated Genesis? - Progressive Rock Music Forum

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Harold Dupont View Drop Down

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Joined: June 27 2005
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Posted: February 03 2006 at 23:10

gentletull wrote:

dark side of the moon and wish you were hear are overrated :)

Aboslutely not

Harold Dupont View Drop Down

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Posted: February 03 2006 at 23:09

Personnaly, I think they're overrated. I think they're a good prog band, but they don't deserve that much honor. Their music sounds oftenly the same and they don't have so much innovations, emotions and originality (in my opinion of course)

raindance

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Posted: February 03 2006 at 22:55

Tales wrote:

R_DeNIRO wrote:

I will NEVER understand people giving Foxtrot 5 stars. Supper's ready is fantastic, but the rest of the album...

I agree with that statement!

I also agree. Genesis only have one classic album in thier repotoir IMO and that's Wind and Wuthering. Gabriel went on to make much better music as a solo artist.

Tales

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Posted: February 03 2006 at 22:32

R_DeNIRO wrote:

I will NEVER understand people giving Foxtrot 5 stars. Supper's ready is fantastic, but the rest of the album...

I agree with that statement!

Edited by Tales

R_DeNIRO

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Posted: February 03 2006 at 22:30

I will NEVER understand people giving Foxtrot 5 stars. Supper's ready is fantastic, but the rest of the album...

For me only Nursery Cryme deserves 5 stars, but SEBTP and The Lamb are great too.

We were always be much human than we whish to be.

Pseud0

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Posted: February 03 2006 at 22:23

foxtrot is the most complete album of all time.

Progger

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Posted: February 03 2006 at 22:21

I agree that 'The Lamb' is only a three star album! The second disc lets it down badly! There's a great article about it in the latest addition of classic rock magazine and the band were in turmoil when it was recorded. Peter Gabriel left and rejoined during it's recording, Tony Banks dosn't speak too highly of it and Hackett says it was so unatural when they were recording it. They also rushed two or three songs as they were running out of studio time, hence the fillers on the second disc!!!

The Wizard View Drop Down

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Joined: July 18 2005
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Posted: February 03 2006 at 20:08

erlenst wrote:

Well, you're completely wrong. Nursery Cryme, Foxtrot, Selling England are all 5 star masterpieces.

However, The Lamb is grotesquely overrated and does not have the wonderful, magical "Genesis-atmosphere" at all. 3 stars.

The Lamb may not have that 'Genesis atmosphere' you speak of, but it's still a killer album and my favorite. I say 5 stars, hands down.

richardh

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Posted: February 03 2006 at 20:03

bertburt wrote:

I do have a question regarding ratings that ties into this thread regarding Genesis.

I find the compositions on Nursery Cryme and Foxtrot to be absolutely great. Superb songwriting. However the production flaws are something that I've never been able to ignore. I find Nursery Cryme to be very muddy-sounding, especially the drum mix. And even though I think Supper's Ready is a phenomenally-written song, the studio version sounds very cold and stiff (IMHO). For that reason, I far prefer listening to the Seconds Out or the Archive versions much more.

Now it has been argued that it is this production that contributed to the Genesis 'sound', and that's fair. I just find it hard to handle.

Anyway, my question was: How much should an album's production factor into a rating? Does rating an album take into account primarily the written quality of the songs and how they're performed, or the end-use, which of course is the listening pleasure? I assume the latter. So in my case, I love the songs on Nursery Cryme (nearly 5 stars for me), but the sound quality is quite distracting to the point that I don't enjoy listening it very much. So as far as Nursery Cryme's 'end-use' for me, it would rate about 2 stars overall.

I guess it seems unfortunate that a well-written and well-executed album loses points due to its ultimate 'presentation'.

IMHO, as always

I totally agree about the 'Muddy' sound on Nursery Chryme ,but whenever I've mentioned it before people always come out with comments along the lines of ''You can't polish a turd'' .I don't find any flaws with Foxtrot though and every song is great (unlike any other Gabriel era albums IMO).I also agree with your point on taking account of production when rating an album.This is an element of music and prog in particular that is very important but most people chose to ignore it entirely when rating an album.

Progger

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Posted: February 03 2006 at 18:00

stan the man wrote:

gabriel genesis is amazing. i dont think anything is over rated. its just people's opinions. i am especially annoyed when people say that dark side of the moon is over rated. but thats not hte point.

PETER GABRIEL WAS/IS INDEED A VISIONARY! WITHOUT HIM GENESIS WOULD'NT HAVE GOT OUT THE STARTING BLOCKS!

Guests

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Posted: February 03 2006 at 18:00

dark side of the moon and wish you were hear are overrated :)

stan the man View Drop Down

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Posted: February 03 2006 at 17:55

gabriel genesis is amazing. i dont think anything is over rated. its just people's opinions. i am especially annoyed when people say that dark side of the moon is over rated. but thats not hte point.

true as a lobster in a pteredaktyl's underpants.

Progger

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Posted: February 03 2006 at 17:32

GENESIS never made a masterpiece! They were considered second rate to YES, ELP, PINK FlOYD and the like in the 70's. These five star reviews and top ten placings are a joke. Go to any other prog site and you will see GENESIS has only one top ten album and that's Foxtrot!

iT'S ABOUT TIME THIS CORRUPTION ENDS AND A NEW REVIEW SYSTEM INTRODUCED TO STOP GENESIS FANS RUINING WHAT OTHERWISE IS A GOOD PROG SITE!

labbai

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Posted: February 03 2006 at 17:22

Hmm.. All Peter Gabriel-era albums are so...good!

BebieM

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Posted: February 03 2006 at 17:20

Just came home from a Musical Box concert and I can tell you Genesis really isn't overrated

what an experience

labbai

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Posted: February 03 2006 at 17:19

Genesis was the best band ever, with some other bands at the time... With Peter Gabriel... got all Genesis that I love, same with Yes...Yes Album was the last I liked... Yes made 3 albums with Tony Kaye...
Rick Wakeman is a keyboardist without a soul

laztraz

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Posted: February 03 2006 at 17:13

Selling England by the Pound is overrated. The best prog album?? There are three or four GENESIS albums I'd rather listen to.

anael

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Posted: February 03 2006 at 17:09

GENESIS IS OVERRATED, OF COURSE.

Ounamahl

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Posted: February 03 2006 at 17:05

haha I dunno what is this hate against Collins' Genesis

Or am I just listening to bad music? Anyway Duke is a 5 star album, We Can't Dance 4½
and Genesis 4... Hmm anyway Duke is an AWESOME album.

plaah Abacab 3
Invisible touch 2½, too "experimental", dunno, weird it is.
And then there were three is almost a four star album, really great songs indeed!
Calling All Stations is ok :D little weird being a genesis album but nobody cares anyway

This is an electrified fairytale

MarxNutz

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Joined: May 20 2005
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Posted: February 03 2006 at 17:05

Having started with Genesis on a live performance on "The Midnight Special", I was in a way spoiled... It took me two years to find anything by them in the record shops, so you know I had to have been obsessing about this odd band from England. So, I have a special place in my heart for Foxtrot... Especially after hearing 'Supper's Ready'. I have to say SR is my favorite track of all time! It had everything one could want from a band like Genesis, and delivers it in such a way that blows the young stoner mind. I didn't have a clue that the production values were substandard until I heard the Phil version on Seconds Out... He actually did the song justice, IMO.
SEBTP almost did the same for me as Foxtrot... From the first a cappella bars to the fading coda the album swept me away! I even forgave them for 'More Fool Me', because it seemed an appropriate bridge to 'After the Fall'... But the biggest pleasant surprise to me was 'The Battle of Epping Forest'. The center of the song was a sort of free form jazz-fusion thing to me, a pg story-telling in the middle of the song (as opposed to the 'normal' interlude story) All in all, I think the album was well-balanced in their offbeat way, and certainly worthy of 4 1/2 stars (again IMO)
Lamb was a strange duck to me... It didn't seem to sound anything like the pg era Genesis I came to know and love, but after a few listens I realized that yes indeed this was still my Genesis, just on some post-modern joyride instead of telling the tales of yore. Only much later did I learn of the writing arrangements of this album, which made me understand the Lamb experience better. With each listen I appreciate Lamb more, and I would say because of the scope of the story and the intricacies of the music and lyrics I would give Lamb at least 4 stars.
Genesis Live did suffer from serious lack of sound engineering, and the wife just announced that we have to get going to go visit friends, so I'll just say IMO pg era Genesis is my FAVORITE and deserves 5 stars! More later... MarxNutz

"Live long and fester!"