THE PLATINUM COLLECTION

I enjoy most of Genesis's work from Trespass to Wind & Wuthering - - the Hackett era - - plus a handful of songs after that, mainly on Duke and Abacab. But I'm not an expert. It seems like there's nothing on Platinum Collection that fans won't already have, even recognizing that many of these are remixes that only appear on more recent remastered CDs. So I'm working from the notion that this is clearly not a collection for serious Genesis fans; on the other hand, you have to be a little serious, don't you, to buy a 3-disk set, especially when there's a single-CD album with all of the group's hits?

There doesn't seem to be much point in quibbling over song selection on a set like this. Platinum Collection contains the kinds of songs that also appear on Genesis live albums, so when I picked it up in 2004, I knew most of the songs just from owning Seconds Out and Three Sides Live, and from having listened to the radio since the early 1980s. But I hadn't heard many of the studio versions of the songs on the second two disks, and I eventually bought nearly all of Genesis's studio albums. So in that respect, Platinum Collection served its purpose; it was like a gateway drug that got me into the hard stuff.

It's true, by the way, that the first disk is has the weakest material, and the mixes of only two of its 16 songs differ from the standard CDs. But overall, across the three disks, the material is very good, and the sound is too - - the new mixes vary in subtle ways from the originals, but on the whole they're warmer, which is something sorely needed on many of these songs,especially from the 1970s.

In all, Platinum Collection is a nice overview of Genesis's studio albums, only excluding the band's debut LP. Recommended for any fan of progressive rock who isn't already a Genesis fan or who doesn't already have most of their albums.