Ihealyou |
08-04-2010 04:47 PM |
Abacab (Atlantic; 1981) was released almost immediatly after Duke and it benefits from a new producer, Hugh Padgham, who gives the band a more eighties sound and though the songs seem fairly generic, there are still great bits throughout: the extended jam in the middle of the title track and the horns by some group called Earth, Wind, and Fire on "No Reply at All" are just two examples. Again the songs reflect dark emotions and are about people who feel lost, or who are in conflict, but the production and sound are gleaming and upbeat (even if the titles aren't: "No Reply at All", "Keep it Dark", "Who Dunnit?", "Like It or Not"). Mike Rutherford's bass is obscured somewhat in the mix but otherwise the band sounds tight and is once again propelled by Collins' truly amazing drumming. Even at its most despairing (like the song "Dodo", about extinction), Abacab musically is poppy and lighthearted.
My favorite track is "Man on the Corner", which is the only song credited soley to Collins, a moving ballad with a pretty synthesized melody plus a riveting drum machine in the background. Though it could easily come off any of Phil's solo almbums, because the themes of lonlieness, paranoia and alienation are overly familiar to Genesis it evokes the band's hopeful humanism. "Man on the Corner" profoundly equates a relationship with a solitary figure (a bum, perhaps a poor homeless person?), "that man on the corner" who just stands around. "Who Dunnit?" profoundly expresses the theme of confusion against a funky groove, and what makes this song so exciting is that it ends with its narrator never finding anything out at all.
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