FOXTROT

Foxtrot is often seen as an improved and more complete album than Nursery Cryme, and a slightly weaker album than Selling England By The Pound. I'm not a big fan of Selling England at all, and I really don't understand why people love it more than Foxtrot, a truly perfect album. Foxtrot is a lot like Nursery Cryme I think, but it's better. Where Nursery Cryme had some filler, Foxtrot only has good tracks, and all of them do have a big role in making the album what it is.

"Watcher Of The Skies" opens the album with beautiful and at the same time powerful mellotron chords. This goes on for a while and powerful drums and a bassline come in, Peter Gabriel's vocals on this song aren't my favorite, but they are good. The song is completed by Hackett's great guitar playing and Bank's lovely organ during the verses. "Watcher Of The Skies" is the perfect opener for this album.

"Time Table" is my least favorite of the songs here, and the only one I now and then skip. It is the most accesible of the songs on Foxtrot and lacks the power and passion that the other songs on this album have, it is an enjoyable song however, and it's not bad at all.

The next song is "Get 'Em Out By Friday", a short mini-epic that makes us listen to a Gabriel singing about a short and not very comlicated story in a not too distant future. The song opens pretty powerful and the vocals change between agressive and soft constantly (Peter Gabriel moves himself into the different people in the story), which makes the song an unique experience. The song also has a very soft mid section with some beautiful flute playing. "Get 'Em Out By Friday" is an amazing song with lots of different moods in only eight minutes.

"Can-Utility And The Coastliners" is next. The song start with great vocals by Peter Gabriel over some acoustic guitar playing. What starts as sounding like a nice little song turns into everything beyond your expections. Mellotron comes in and the song gets epic and very powerful. The second half of the song contains amazing istrumental playing and Gabriels powerful vocals, this song really is a true masterpiece.

The next song is a short one. "Horizons" is a classical acoustic guitar piece by Hackett. The piece is very soft and calm, it gives you a short break between the epic "Can-Utility And The Coastliners" and the 23 minute long "Supper's Ready".

"Supper's Ready" is the longest song Genesis has ever made, being a seven part suite. The seperate parts all aren't really special, with the exception of "Lover's Leap" and "Apocalypse In 9/8", but combined they all are incredibly epic. As it's a 23 minute suite, it takes us through several different moods. The love of "Lover's Leap", the roughness of "Ikhnaton and Itsacon and Their Band of Merry Men", the eccentric "Willow Farm" and the rise of doom in "Apocalypse In 9/8". Apart from Gabriel doing a wonderful job making you feel the emotions of the song, some fantastic instrumental parts are heard. For example a great fuzz solo by Steve Hackett, a truly amazing organ solo by Tony Banks and of course Phil Collins is a master of the drums. "Supper's Ready" is often said to be Genesis' best song, I think it isn't, I like songs as "Can-Utility..." more than this one, but "Supper's Ready" definitely is the most epic made by Genesis ever.

What can I say? Foxtrot is Genesis' best album made, it has no weaknesses (though "Time Table" isn't as strong as the other songs) and everything about this album just feels good. Because of Foxtrot being such an outstanding album it deserves absolutely nothing less than five stars, it's a true masterpiece of progressive rock.