DUKE

Ok. First of all I have say that DUKE, by GENESIS is an exceptional yet  brave piece of work. I say brave because GENESIS were able to fuse pop and prog together and make it freakin work! A Daring task indeed given their previous history. I hear some naysayers out there that say DUKE is not prog at all and I say to the negative nancy's out there that your wrong. Dead wrong! DUKE is what we call a progressive pop masterpiece. Tony Banks still offers up some of the sweetest soundscapes on keyboard and Phil Collins drumming is nothing short of exceptional. And alas we do not forget the wonderful Mike Rutherford, who gives you a bit of everything using a more simple approach on bass and 12 string guitar. This can be found throughout the whole album. Every track works like one big connective piece. The album could be a 47min en suite. After all, DUKE is a conceptual piece and a good one at that. Let's also be very clear that this album is not a sell out at all! Genesis have decided to usher in a new, fresh and flavorful genre of  music. Yes. It's got the word POP in it and it's combined nicely with progressive tendencies that, in my opinion really works and offers a nice exciting start to the 80's generation of music. DUKE is an innovative, smart classic that surely brought a lot of surprise to a ton of proggers who were heavy fans of the bands earlier works. Suffice to say, eventually people came around and DUKE became a hit. It's simpler yes, but still technically brilliant. For me, BANKS has never sounded better. It just sounds like he's having so much fun, especially on the opening track, BEHIND THE LINES. Overall I feel that this is an album where GENESIS just let lose and started having fun again. Rumor has it that DUKE was Banks favourite album he recorded and played on in the band, period. Although I know a lot of people feel that this album is like watered down prog, but you have to remember that DUKE was an album that created and started something so new, so inviting and fresh by commercializing  their progressive sound. It was a new beginning, but unfortunately didn't last long because the next 3 albums ABACAB, GENESIS and INVISIBLE TOUCH were far too saturated with the pop aspect in their overall sound. DUKE remains,still to this day, as a classic and it was the only perfect blend of prog and pop  that the band ever really did create. And I think that DUKE will still be largely misunderstood by a lot of proggers out there, but I see it as an innovative and smart piece of work that characterized an entire generation of music. That is the 80's of course.  Thus, DUKE is not an essential prog album but because of its strong innovation I am going to give it 5/5. I have my reasons and I'm sticking with them. Happy listening to all! Give DUKE a spin for old times sake. It'll surely put a smile on your face. 👍

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