PLEASE DON'T TOUCH!

Prog fans often point to the departure of Steve Hackett from Genesis as the point where that band became locked on to an increasingly commercial trajectory. That may well be the case, but it's clear from Steve's first post-Genesis solo album that he was hardly the torchbearer of the progressive spirit within the band he's sometimes made out to be - whilst some tracks here veer towards the sort of proto-neo-prog Steve would pioneer on subsequent albums, others descend into simplistic whimsy or indulge in classic rock/pomp rock shallowness.

Perhaps my problems with this album are related to the involvement of members of Kansas - a perfectly good band which I personally find unbearable, to the point where I've refrained from reviewing them on here because I just can't even approach a fair assessment of them. But even where Steve Walsh's bland vocals are absent, the album comes across as a grab-bag of styles rather than presenting a cohesive vision for Hackett's solo career. Like Peter Gabriel himself, Hackett was still searching for his distinctive solo sound in 1978, and on Please Don't Touch it really shows.