Genesis – Calling All Stations Re-Assessed

Following on from last week’s blog identifying the new Trevor Horn album as a ‘marmite’ album well here’s another one. This is Genesis' marmite album, fans either love it or hate it, there’s no real middle ground which is a shame as it’s a decent album. Its different from other Genesis albums, but a good one anyway.

The album, released in 1997 was Genesis’ studio curtain call. At this stage in their career, Phil Collins had departed and Stiltskin (remember then?) front man Ray Wilson became the new vocalist. The album was musically very different to the previous couple of almost bubble-gum pop albums. The style and sound of Genesis changed. I do love the early Collins era, however from the late 80's onwards the quality of a lot of the tracks was ditched for the sake of singles success and radio airplay.

Calling All Stations was easily their best album since 1983's rather good self-titled ’Genesis’. What we had was a much moodier and darker Genesis album than previous ones. You can still tell it's Genesis but with an added extremely refreshing roughness of Ray Wilson's voice that is very different from the pop-orientated style of Collins. The vocals are actually more akin to Peter Gabriel’s but without being as quirky. I must admit that it’s an album that doesn’t grab you on the first listen, but it does grow with repeated listens.

Tracks
For me the main strength of this album lies within the harder-edged and longer musical pieces like the title track; ‘Alien Afternoon,’ ‘The Dividing Line’, and the highly underrated ‘One man's fool’ which borders hard rock in places.

This doesn’t detract though from some of the shorter, slightly more commercial tracks like ‘Congo’; ‘Shipwrecked’ and one of my favourites ‘Not About Us’, a song which has the hallmarks of some of Oasis’ ballads like 'Talk Tonight' or 'The Masterplan', its got the feel of something Noel Gallagher might have written. 

In my opinion, ‘The Dividing Line’ is up there with some of the best stuff that Genesis did, certainly post Duke, it hankers back to very early tracks such as ‘The Knife’. Following it is ‘Uncertain Weather’ a short, perfect little track that has lots of things happening in it. ‘Uncertain Weather’ surprises us with an unusual intro that goes on to be one of the most “un-Genesis” tracks on the album – to its benefit.

One thing that did grab me was the drum sound, there’s a real raw energy about it. Nid Zidkyahu does sterling work here and there’s hardly a drum machine to be heard. I would dare to say Nid sounds even better than Phil Collins on some tracks. Just listen to ‘There Must Be Some Other Way’ if you don’t believe me, Ray Wilson also contribute a very ‘rock’ vocal to that track, especially on the chorus where he sounds not unlike David Coverdale.

The only real turkey of a track on the album for me is ‘Small Talk’ which just sounds dated and out of place. 

Ray Wilson
When Phil Collins left the band, his replacement Ray Wilson was picked out by Mike and Tony ahead of other more obvious candidates like Paul Carrack. This was off the back of Ray’s recent success with Stiltskin, achieving a number one single – ‘Inside’. Indeed it worth noting that apart from Phil, Ray is the only Genesis band member ever to have had a number one single! I really liked Wilson's vocals, they offer something different whilst still being a bit reminiscent of Peter Gabriel's.

Personally I think Ray Wilson was completely robbed, and it's the one black mark I have against Mike and Tony, that they lost faith because of the moderate response to Calling All Stations. They should have stayed the course and followed it up. Indeed Ray has since stated he was contracted to make 2 albums.

They really should have learnt the lesson from Marillion after Fish left by opening up fully to the influence of their new member. Whilst I don’t particularly like the Steve Hogarth fronted Marillion he did take then down new avenues that still go from strength to strength and I feel that Wilson could have done the same for Genesis.

Ray is quoted as saying “I look at it as an unfinished job. We made a good start and then they gave up, that’s my view. When replacing someone as talented and famous as Phil, it’s going to take time and patience. However, I think we did a good album together, so that’s what really matters to me.”

Brand Genesis
In my view they would have been better releasing Calling All Stations under a different band name altogether. If you heard some of the tracks on the radio and didn't know who it was by, you'd probably rate them well above average. However, because they kept the name they were saddled with the legacy and with people saying "isn't that Phil Collins' band?" which killed the album from the start.

Brand image was obviously more important to Mike and Tony than moving into a new, different musical territory. It's a real shame that they didn't stick with it. I think with a bit more input from Wilson and a bit more patience they could have built a new mature brand into something great, just maybe not so stadium-dominating as they had been. If they had chosen a new name and put Ray Wilson prominently at the front it would have had more chance of success. Brand-protection made them too risk averse I guess.

A good ‘prog’ example of where recording under another name can bring some quality recordings is Icon, the moniker adopted by Asia’s John Wetton and Geoff Downes who produced a number of excellent albums of their own work with some Asia tracks inter-weaved into the live shows. 

Calling All Stations
Calling All Stations is still intensely disliked and forgotten within some realms of the music business, media critics and fans a-like. I'm of the overall opinion that Calling All Stations is a slow burner, in-which the true architect and beauty requires time and patience in-order to appreciate the full all rounded musical experience. It’s dark, brooding, powerful and musically superb.

As an album Calling All Stations largely succeeds on its own merits. Just don't approach it with unrealistic expectations that this is the old Genesis reborn, and you may well enjoy it. If you just dismiss it you’re missing on a good Rock album, it might not be a total Genesis classic but forget its actually Genesis and you’ll find its much better than you think and still stands out a few decades later.

I truly think Calling All Stations is as good as any other Genesis work, just in an altogether different way. When seeing it mentioned among the band’s worst studio albums, I can’t help but raise my eyebrows in confusion. I’m sure I’m not the only who feels this way about it.

My conclusion, Don’t be put off by the critics, this is a fine album. If you approach it with open ears and an open mind it's pretty good - It's certainly not the worse prog album I've ever heard.