Author: Peter Podbrežnik
Artist: Genesis
Label: Virgin Records
Released: 1981
Rating: 2/5
With “Abacab,” Genesis finally steered into pop/new wave waters, and the result was one of their most commercially successful records, but in terms of pure musical quality, one of their worst. Banks’s keyboards are now built entirely on the synthetic synths of the 80s, while organs and Mellotron are long gone, a distant memory. So forget his epic 70s masterpieces: the keyboard genius decided that in the 80s he’d become a totally “ordinary” new wave keyboardist. Rutherford’s guitars are only there for show on this album, especially compared to the previous records. The sound on “Abacab” is almost entirely new wave, with the odd touch of soul and funk and the drums pushed hard to the front, including Collins’s drum machine, which became standard practice on Collins’s solo records too. Without a doubt a letdown for those of us who know what this superb drummer is capable of, but for the time it was totally established practice among drummers, especially in pop rock. Many bands in the 80s started copying Collins’s approach. Right around then Collins firmly established himself as the leader of the band and its main writer of lyrics and music. After the start of his solo career and the huge success of his first album “Face Value” (1981), Genesis increasingly became a playground for his more “experimental” ideas, the ones he didn’t “dare” put on his own albums. If I’m being a little snarky, the band was starting to become his backing band. This also contributed to the popularization and commercialization of their music, and to a radical change of musical style, one already openly hinted at on the previous album “Duke” (1980). It’s perfectly understandable that the band, like many similar bands of the 70s, had to adapt to new times that weren’t kind to prog rock. But such a big musical swerve is undoubtedly shocking and a slap in the face to everything the band had created in the past.
“Abacab” is an extremely inconsistent record that chronically limps when it comes to an even level of quality across the individual songs. The first half of the album is noticeably better than the second. The title track, “No Reply At All,” “Me And Sarah Jane,” “Keep It Dark” and “Dodo/Lurker” are average to good, while “Who Dunnit?,” “Man On the Corner,” “Like It or Not” and “Another Record” range from below average to catastrophic. Given that apart from the title track, “Dodo/Lurker” and, conditionally, “Me And Sarah Jane,” “Abacab” has no ties to progressive rock, I treat it as a pop album, and only as such can I praise it. But even as a pop album, “Abacab” is far from a masterpiece of its time, and the band did a better job writing this kind of music on the following albums. It would be pointless to blame just the band, or Collins, for a desire for more profit and fame. It wasn’t so much about fame and more money, since they already had plenty of both, it was more about discovering new boundaries for their music in the “trendy” 80s, which unfortunately didn’t always yield the best results. All my criticisms aside, Genesis didn’t completely give up their prog roots in places, on a few songs, and you can still feel it there. For example on the title track, “Dodo/Lurker” and “Me And Sarah Jane.” As pop rock songs, or rather the big hits that took them to the top of the charts back then, “Abacab,” “No Reply At All,” “Me And Sarah Jane” and “Keep It Dark” are very solid. Most Genesis fans will quickly forget most of the other songs, since they’re certainly no credit to the band.
The opening title track, with Collins’s sampled drums, extremely minimalist and synthetic Banks synths and a solid Rutherford riff, is one of the better songs on the album, even though with its repetitive rhythm it’s nothing special and sits very close to new wave. It’s one of the few signs on the album that classic 70s Genesis ever existed. “No Reply At All,” which is built on a disco rhythm (the disco sensation of the day, Earth, Wind & Fire, actually plays on the track), is still a pleasant pop rock song if we ignore the band’s past. “Me And Sarah Jane” is one of the few interesting songs on the album, with a fairly branching structure, an intriguing central reggae motif and rhythm, unusually varied vocals from Collins and an “awakened” Banks on keyboards, who toward the end of the song conjures up some of that esoteric magic that vanished who-knows-where after “Duke” (1980). Maybe even the best thing on the album, cheesy lyrics notwithstanding. “Keep It Dark” again has an extremely repetitive, synthetic rhythm, keyboard textures unworthy of a master like Banks, and an infantile lyric. Judged against the quality of the whole album, the song is solid as a pop rock piece, though most people will be sick of it after two listens. The 7-minute-plus “Dodo/Lurker,” which tries and fails to be progressive, has some good Rutherford guitar parts in the intro, but then the song gets watered down and turns into yet another boring new wave experiment with a repetitive rhythm line and painfully electronic, predictable keyboard textures. The sad fact is that this is actually one of the better and more creative compositions on the album. The only thing worth praising here is Collins’s vocals, which are varied by his standards. Next up is the total fiasco “Who Dunnit?,” a genuine catastrophe and by far the worst song they’ve ever made, unworthy of being counted under the band’s name. It’s a disastrous Collins proto-rap attempt that gives me the “creeps” every time I listen (if I manage to make it to the end). It’s as if the band wanted to negate everything they’d created up to then and make fun of themselves in the worst possible way. The remaining three songs, despite their exceptional mediocrity and dullness, are a real balm for the wound left by listening to the horror mentioned above. “Man On The Corner” sounds like a forgotten ballad from some Collins solo record. If it were on one, it would undoubtedly be one of his better pieces, but as it is, it’s a very average ballad that most of the band’s fans will quickly forget after a few listens. “Like It Or Not” is a rather shallow half-ballad. The title sounds like a message to all the band’s old fans that they just have to come to terms with the new sound or else stop following them. Yet another fairly dull pop song that would be more at home on Collins’s solo albums. “Another Record” has a good intro on electric piano until it degenerates into repetitiveness and turns monotonous. And that’s the end of the record, and after listening to the dull last three songs you almost fall asleep and forget all the better moments from the first half of the album.
As a thoroughly solid pop album by “commercial” Genesis, “Abacab” is worth buying especially for fans of Collins’s solo career and lovers of 80s pop rock. On the other hand, it’s only interesting to the band’s most fanatical devotees, who understand and even partly forgive their 80s commercialization. Everyone else, especially fans of classic Genesis who happen to expect some progressive compositions of epic proportions on “Abacab,” will be seriously disappointed. As a pop rock album, “Abacab” is a good piece of work, but as prog it’s a total fiasco and ranks among the band’s worst creations. With the next studio album the band noticeably redeemed itself and proved it can make a quality pop album with some progressive elements mixed in, ones it never completely gave up on, after all.
Lineup
Phil Collins – vocals, drums, percussion
Mike Rutherford – guitar, bass guitar, backing vocals
Tony Banks – keyboards, backing vocals
Production
Genesis
Tracklist
1. Abacab (7:01)
2. No Reply At All (4:40)
3. Me And Sarah Jane (5:59)
4. Keep It Dark (4:31)
5. Dodo / Lurker (7:28)
6. Who Dunnit? (3:22)
7. Man On The Corner (4:26)
8. Like It Or Not (4:57)
9. Another Record (4:28)
Album length: 46:52
