THE LAMB LIES DOWN ON BROADWAY

by

Genesis

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Lamb Lies Down on Broadway is an incredible achievement of artistic ambition and serious musicianship led on the heals of five very talented head strong men all thinking that they knew what direction the band should go in. The end result is something so confusing to follow yet strangely exciting that people will be listening to it for many years to come wondering about it's mystery just as one wonders about the Mona Lisa's smile. Of course the musicians involved have no answers themselves. The new blend of musical ideas such as Eno-esque soundscapes (Brian Eno actually worked on this album), incredibly inventive drumming by Phil Collins; Peter Gabriel pushing his voice to new arenas of sound (he never sounded better before or since) making each character and emotion have it's own voice; Tony Banks creating amazing keyboard passages that rank with anything that Keith Emerson had ever done; Steve Hackett, always under used but always finding just the right phrase to add to put a song to the top; and Mike Rutherford played great bass throughout the album (check out: In the Cage). The theme of Lamb Lies Down on Broadway itself seems to be too much of an enigma but the bottom line is that it is about the inner turmoil of a young NY punk trying to get it together. There are liner notes in the CD further explaining the story, but you need a magnifying glass to read them and even if you do have good eye sight you still may not see what the hell is going on. But since when in art are you supposed to figure it all out at once. The music is more the focal point anyway- the songs work well individually and as well as collectively baring (at times)the theme. For me the first disc has always captured my attention a bit more than the second. We start out with a manic piano diddle that swirls around until it comes down at hits you "and the lamb... lies down... on broa-wo-adway.." Guitar riffs tripping down Rael's voice is heard- he's a kid that hears all the sounds sees all the sights and is working towards sensory overload. The song works almost like a Bob Dylan type observational song. You get that through this he becomes alienated from his surrounding. As the songs continue the alienation and confusion take more of a hold and they are expressed with such eloquence both in the clarity of the phrasing and the utter babble of the lyrics. The irony is that as degenerately abstract as the first disc gets the second disc is complete madness. The music is all over the place (the chamber was most definitely in confusion), yet there is a sense of cohesion here as well as passage. The songs lend to each other a complementary feeling making the music feel like a '67 Coltrane solo without sounding like one. Which all leads to what Coltrane was trying to talk about, "what is "it"?". In summation Lamb Lies Down on Broadway is better than anything that has been done in the last 30 years (of course that's my opinion), the album is all about alienation and they didn't have to say the word once (take note radiohead). The music is still extremely vibrant and vivid sounding like it was created today- and explains the turmoil of dealing with modern times very well. Genesis never made an album like this before or after. Peter Gabriel left the band after this and made some terrific solo albums but never captured what made Lamb Lies Down on Broadway so alluring and ambitious. Genesis moved on to make some very beautiful albums (that made it sound like L.L.D.o.B. never happened) basically Trick of the Tail sounds like a follow up to Selling England by the Pound. I recommend this to anyone regardless of musical preference who wants a good intellectual challenge and to be highly entertained.

NEWS:

To coincide with the Genesis tour, EMI Records will be re-issuing 14 Genesis studio albums in three stages during 2007. All the releases will be SACD/DVD double disc sets featuring newly re-mastered 5.1 surround sound and stereo mixes. The release schedule is as follows:

March 2007: A Trick Of The Tail (1976), Wind & Wuthering (1977), ...And Then There Were Three...(1978), Duke (1980) Abacab (1981)

June/July 2007: Genesis(1983), Invisible Touch(1986), We Can't Dance (1991), Calling All Stations(1997)

Late 2007/Early 2008: Trespass (1970), Nursery Cryme (1971), Foxtrot (1972 ), Selling England By The Pound (1973), The Lamb Lies Down On Broadway(1974)

I always looked at The Lamb Lies Down On Broadway the same way you could look at The Beatles "Let It Be", or Pink Floyd's "The Wall"- a very good indication that it was the beginning of the end of some aspect of the band. In this case, it was Peter Gabriel leaving. I think what you have in these situations is just a matter of too much genius in one small space of a band. 4 or 5 incredible musicians, all with incredible ideas as to where they feel the band should be going artistically. This is what I feel reflected in The Lamb Lies Down On Broadway. It's not a "bad" album by any stretch of the imagination. The Genesis of that time period couldn't have produced bad music even if they tried. It just seems a little "lost" to me. Not cohesive, like their other early works. If you're new to the "old" Genesis, this would probably be the last album I would recommend picking up. Go to Foxtrot, Selling England, or even Nursery Crimes, before this one.