Genesis (band) - Criticism

Criticism

Early incarnations of Genesis were often targets for criticism during the 1970s. An article in Q Magazine describes a 1977 Ray Lowry cartoon which depicted an arena of "either asleep, moribund, comatose" fans watching a live Genesis performance, with the band's name emblazoned on a banner above the stage reading "GENESNOOZE".

More specifically, some in Britain — especially supporters of the punk movement — regarded Genesis in particular, but also the genre more generally, as overtly middle class (paying particular attention to Gabriel, Banks and Rutherford's private education), and claimed that rock music was being taken away from the working class, whom they regarded as its core audience. But Peter Gabriel claimed that their audience was a "mixture of social classes" and that accusation was a fabrication of the critics.

Gabriel's theatrics were unpalatable to some of the mainstream rock audience, resulting in a cult following rather than mainstream. This was exemplified during live performances of Gabriel's last Genesis album, The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway, during which he appeared on stage as various characters in the album's lyrics. The elaborate storyline for The Lamb proved difficult to understand and accept, and caused a bit of friction within the band. Collins later recalled that Gabriel would "be in a Slipperman costume trying to get a mic anywhere near his throat, and be out of breath—all twisted up. Towards the end I felt the singing wasn't really being heard; the songs weren't really being heard".

Conversely, the band's transition from lengthy, complex songs to more compact, simplistic, radio-friendly material was not welcomed by critics; Rolling Stone''s review of ...And Then There Were Three... read: "...this contemptible opus is but the palest shadow of the group's earlier accomplishments." "I don't feel we've bastardised the way we were", Collins remarked in an interview with Music Express: "on a generous day I'll blame me for the change, but I just think it is us growing up, listening to different things".

In a 1982 interview in Sounds, Phil Collins talked about the band’s reputation in the music press and claimed that he only knew of one music journalist, Hugh Fielder, who openly liked Genesis.

Reviewing Genesis 1976–1982 in Q, Andy Fyfe wrote: "... in spite of 150 million album sales the bottom line is that little of the band’s output has aged well ... There are moments of impressive songwriting, such as the tender "Many Too Many", the darkly tragic "Duchess" and the epic "One for the Vine", but little of Genesis’s music transcends in the way real classics do, and that is why they will remain perennial whipping boys for decades to come."

Music critic J. D. Considine wrote of the band:

Genesis has had a hard time getting respect. In the early '70s, when the group specialised in ambitious, theatrical story-songs, it attracted an avid cult following but was largely ignored by the rock press and public at large. Later in the decade, lead singer Peter Gabriel was finally recognised as a major talent - but only after he'd left the band, who were at this point being derided as middlebrow throwbacks still in thrall to the pomposities of art rock. Even in the early '80s, when Genesis did finally shed its art-rock inclinations and move toward pop, becoming international stars in the process, the press was unimpressed, dismissing the group as easy-listening lightweights. By the '90s, even the solo success of members Phil Collins and Mike Rutherford was being held against the group, by then one of the best-known rock acts in the world. All of which, to be honest, has been grossly unfair to the group. Granted, Genesis has made its share of mediocre albums - perhaps even more than its share, considering how long the band has been around. But bad albums? None to speak of."

In a 1991 interview with Rolling Stone during the promotion of We Can't Dance, Tony Banks admitted, "Well, we've never been fashionable. We've never been the critics' darlings." Phil Collins summed up in the same interview, "We know that people like us, because our records sell."