GENESIS LIVE

First of all, all these live versions are better than the originals. Heck, even the production and sound here is better than, say, Nursery Cryme. What Collins and Hackett do on "The Knife" surpasses what Mayhew and Phillips did on Trespass. Here we see the band at a turning point in their career: before they had a hit single("I Know..."), before Banks used a synth, and before they had any kind of impact in the US. As good as the music is here, one of the best things about the album is the strange story in the liner notes...so bizarre and yet so prog! Possibly the only song that doesn't quite match the studio one is "Get 'Em Out By Friday". But the superior versions of the '70-'71 songs more than make up for that very, very minor flaw. I don't know for sure if there were any overdubs added, but my audiophile ears cannot detect any. This is one of the best sounding live recordings from the early '70s I have heard.

You rarely get a hint of how good a drummer Collins was from listening to the early studio albums. Here he just smokes! Also, for some reason, Rutherford's bass stands out more than on the early albums, where most of the time you barely notice him. He even has a bass pedal solo on here(not really, you have to listen to this to get the joke). Apparently "Supper's Ready" was also recorded but not used. A shame because this should have been a double or triple album like so many other live releases at the time. One of the great things here is that even though this is a live recording, half the time I can't tell if what I'm hearing is Hackett's guitar or Banks' organ/electric piano! Oh yeah, Gabriel is on this too! I'm more of a music guy and think of vocals as just another instrument, so I apologize for not mentioning much about flower- head. I will mention that you do get a taste of his humour here. As far as his singing goes I don't hear much difference from the studio albums.

If you are just getting into Genesis or are only familiar with the post-Foxtrot albums I would suggest you pick this up before getting any of the pre-SEBTP albums. A solid five stars. There are only a few moments on their studio albums that surpass what you will hear here, IMO.