WE CAN'T DANCE

We Can't Dance is not without its flaws, but I always feel that there are also flaws in how it is approached by the majority of fans and reviewers. If one accounts for these flaws, there is actually a pretty good Genesis album to be seen here. One which maybe not entirely hearkens back to the old days, but does return to those and reinvents them to a certain extent, and as such would have been a satisfying and exciting start of a new chapter in Genesis' development, had the band continued to exist in this form.

First, let's address the obvious flaws. Yes, it is bloated, and it is so because of the advance of the CD-era, which led bands and artists all around to experiment with album length, in the assumption that it would be great to just put almost everything that came out of their recording sessions on the album. That idea has since proven to be mostly false, and the average album length these days (writing this in 2025) is almost back where it was during the vinyl years (albeit still a little longer). The problem with this argument is, obviously, that everyone who says it is bloated would leave different tracks off. Some would ditch Hold On My Heart, for being too much like Phil Collins solo, but that could be countered with the fact that the chord progression and interplay between chords and bass notes are unmistakenly the work of Tony Banks and would never have even occured to Phil. Others would leave off Since I Lost You, but even though Tony Banks has since almost disowned the track, back in the day he would call it one of the most satisfying ones on the album for the fact that it just sprung up in the studio spontaneously. Some people call Driving The Last Spike a boring version of old Genesis, or would simply leave off I Can't Dance because of its hit- quality, even though both songs actually break new musical ground for the band and are lyrically much more aligned than one would think and would fit on an other, more concise version of the album, with the songs more thematically connected (of which more later).

The other flaw is, simply, that by this time, Genesis' prime as a playing band is really over. That prime occured between 1972 and - depending on who you speak to - 1983, 1981, 1980 or 1977 (my money is on 1982, the release of Three Sides Live). It is ironic that, by their own word, Genesis built The Farm to capture how they sound in the rehearsal room, and subsequently used it to produced heavily edited albums like Genesis and Invisible Touch, which, however one feels about them, don't sound like a live band at all.

This is where my appreciation for We Can't Dance comes in though. An effort is made here to sound like a live band again. Gone are the electronic drums, the guitar synths, Mike and Phil are sounding like they play an actual instrument, keeping their sound really really simple. Even Tony is sounding more like he is in a room, rather than plugged into the board. This is completely in line with where pop music was going at the start of the 90s: away from the synthesized sound of the 80s, towards a more natural, rehearsal room sound. Genesis were entirely part of this shift on We Can't Dance, but because the album wasn't followed up (I mean, it was, but not in this formation), it stands alone and this timely quality of it gets a little bit obscured.

Another way the album was timely at the same time as classic, was in the lyrical content. There is a very strong current of critique of commercialism on the album, maybe not from a thorough theoric anticapitalist point of view, but certainly from a more layman desire for realness and honesty. 'Jesus He Knows Me', 'Driving The Last Spike', 'I Can't Dance', 'Living Forever' are direct jabs at commercialism and the exploitation of the common man by feeding on and playing into the common man's desires. These songs could have been the backbone of a more thematically concise album, with other songs about longing for realness weaved around it: 'No Son Of Mine' (wanting to speak truthfully with an abusive father), 'Never A Time' (wanting to speak truthfully with an estranged partner), 'Dreaming While You Sleep' (the fear of speaking truthfully about a grave harm one has committed), 'Hold On My Heart' (the fear of speaking truthfully to an impossible love), and 'Fading Lights' (speaking truthfully about the end).

The fact that this thematic consistency is achieved in what are mostly story-songs, is a feature that only few reviewers, past and present, seem to acknowlegde as a return to a form that Genesis traditionally employed. The beautiful thing is that this return to old ways, is at the same time a renewal of them, because the stories are not about goblins and faeries, but are thoroughly rooted in reality, often social reality. This is where the traditional Genesis story-song connects to the current of the times, with songs like Pearl Jam's 'Jeremy' (who 'spoke' - truthfully - in class), all these grungers wearing their hearts on their sleeves and critiquing commercialism, and a few years later Soul Asylum's 'Runaway Train', an obvious distant cousin to 'No Son Of Mine'.

Did the lyrics - mostly penned by Phil - always work? No. Case in point is 'Tell Me Why', which sounds like a rich man feeling guilty when watching the news, just crying out that everything is so bad, but neglecting to think about why that is. This song must be one of the most spectacular failures in the Genesis canon, because not only is it musically very very good, sung very well, it also reportedly started out lyrically as a cry of solidarity with the plight of the Kurds, before morphing into the generic philantropic misandric form we hear on the album. Oh, what could have been!

Overseeing the words that I typed here, I would say that probably 'Tell Me Why', 'Way Of The World' and 'Since I Lost You' could be axed from the album, at least thematically, although I must say that I really do love 'Since I Lost You' for what it is: a beautiful, heart-wrenching song about the death of a child. Speaking truthfully here. Other voices always want to include one of the B-sides, 'On The Shoreline', but while that is a fine, quirky song, I feel it fits neither with the directness of the album, nor with it's ideological content. It's nice, but it wouldn't have made the album stronger. This also goes for the other B-side, 'Hearts On Fire', but for very different reasons.

Finally, something about the title. Clearly, this title is there because someone must have said that like 'Invisible Touch', the album should be named after what was expected to be the biggest hit. I've heard rumors that the albums was originally going to be called something like 'Fathers, Sons', which would fit not only a thematic current running through a number of the songs (and which would render 'Since I Lost You' a vital part of that current), but also with themes running in Phil's solo work around that time. Also, it would make the beautiful artwork actually make sense. 'Fathers, Sons' would have had as thematic backbon: 'No Son Of Mine', 'Jesus He Knows Me', 'Driving The Last Spike', 'Since I Lost You'. Augmented by a couple of other tracks, maybe along the lines of the anti- commercialism theme, and/or speaking truthfully, with of course the brilliant 'Fading Lights' as the inevitable closer, the potential of this album would have come out more than it did.

That's not what happened though. We have the album as it is. Still, I think this could have been the start of a regenesis of Genesis in the 90s. No, it's not a perfect album. Yes, it is their best since Duke or at least Abacab. And yes, it is a return of sorts to what makes Genesis Genesis, a return that also renews, and therefore could have served as the spring board for the band to stay relevant in the 90s.

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