Twenty-Two years ago, at an exclusive private school in Britain, five teenage students - Peter Gabriel, Tony Banks, Mike Rutherford, Anthony Phillips and Chris Stewart - formed a band which they called Genesis. As pioneers of art-rock, a combina tion of unorthodox, complex music and theatrical stage presenta tions, Genesis became one of the most influential bands of the early '70s. In more recent years, Genesis' versatility, as well as ability to create a more mainstream sound without compromising the musical talent and grandeur that marked early recordings, has made it one of the great influential bands of the 20 years since the breakup of the Beatles.
Genesis' debut album was an unsuccessful attempt at imitat ing the sounds that were topping the British charts (such as The Beatles and The Bee Gees). After that "the idea was to play music that was, as (Tony) Banks puts it `more imaginative than pop'" (Fricke, 1982, p. 56). Several personnel changes also oc curred in 1971, as Steve Hacketee (guitar) and Phil Collins (drums) joined Rutherford (bass), Banks (keyboards), and Gabriel (flute and vocals) and replaced Phillips and Stewart.
They began writing longer songs (between five and twelve minutes in length), in unusual time sequences requiring great musical ability to play. Robin Tolleson says," The band es tablished a standard for progressive rock, introducing finely tuned grand thematic phrases and darting from off time signatures to even odder ones" (Drums and Drumming, 1987, p. 41), and Fricke comments on "the epic grandeur of Genesis' . . . genius - the towering, cathedral-like keyboards, imperial melodies, complex chops, and deep, imagistic lyrics" (p. 56).
One song which contains all of the aforementioned features is "The Knife," from the 1970 album "Trespass." Peter Gabriel describes it as "a song about this revolutionary figure on a power trip" (Gallo, 1979, p. 36). It opens with a majestic keyboard introdu...