Anyway, apparrently Phil dislocated his vertebrae last September, it's unclear but he might not be able to play drums anymore. :(

Fine, fine band. Foxtrot was my intro and still my favorite album, though Selling England and Trick are both albums I constantly play and enjoy. I'm a little indifferent to Lamb Lies Down, which has some brilliant songs like "Carpet Crawlers" and some that are less than memorable. I read somewhere the Hackett felt the record was incomplete because some of his guitar parts were left off. I've been meaning to give this record another listen to try to get a firmer opinion.

I love The Lamb, being a double album it's not the most consistant Genesis album, but the sheer ambition makes even the lesser tracks interesting and it has one of the weirdest and most interesting stories of any rock opera record, I love that weird mystique and theatricality Gabriel added to the band.

Though I won't deny that sometimes the lyrics get really over the top during the second half, The Colony of Slipperman is about how the protagonist turns into a slipperman (aka giant hemmerhoid) and the only "cure" is castration and removal of his manhood, this is pretty well emphasised by the big ripping sound at the 3:50 mark, and then at the end of the song a Raven swoops down and steals his "Shoobedoobe". :laughing:

The title track, Cuckoo Cacoon, In The Cage, Back in NYC, The Carpet Crawlers, Lilywhite Lilith, Supernatural Anaesthesit, The Lamia and It are the highpoints of the album. Those are brilliant songs. It has some of the tightest musicianship the band has ever done, especially Hackett's guitar work.

It's also worth noting that Brian Eno was involved with this album and it does have a lot of weird ambient moments for a Genesis record. It's probably their most challenging LP for that reason.

Eno is the key to fully appreciating that album. It's as if he temporarily replaced Hackett on that one. It doesn't have the immediate impact of some of the other albums, but it's certainly a "grower".

EDIT

I gave this another spin, and Hackett does have some fine guitar parts throughout. Eno is more or less like the 6th man.

Eno is only involved with a few tracks I think, I'm not for sure, and Hackett is very present on the album, he's just very restrained. Banks writes the majority of Genesis material and Hackett always had the least amount of creative input so it's not a surprise that Banks was the real lead instrumentalist of the group.

Sometimes I have a hard time telling Hackett's guitar apart from Banks' synths.

I've been thinking about starting a thread solely for analyzing the Lamb, but I'm not sure many people would participate. It's a disappointment since it is really easy to get sucked up in analyzing what the story means once you really delve into the album.

There's probably websites devoted to the subject.

Man if I think about it too much my head will explode.

Yeah I agree. There aren't too many albums out there that do that to me.

With rock musicals being such a hot thing now maybe it'll be made into a musical.

Now THAT is a rock musical I'd totally pay to see.

They've also been trying for a few years now to get the original lineup back together to do a Lamb tour. The only issue is Phil Collins back isn't in such a great condition to be drumming.