The Afterword

Musings on the byways of popular culture

Menu

Navigation

You are here: Home / Forum / Supper’s Ready

Supper’s Ready

by 81 Comments

I was going to wait until the monthly Blogger Takeover thing to post about what I have been listening to this month, but I couldn’t wait. I’m going through a particularly fertile period of discovering old-but-new-to-me music and I’ve decided (a mere 50 years too late) that Supper’s Ready by Genesis could be the Greatest Song of All Time. Where has this masterpiece been all my life??

I have so much to say about this song, but equally I find it hard to organise my thoughts and articulate them. I know I know I know that at its heart it’s overblown prog nonsense at its deadliest, but that over-the-topness is the thing that makes it great.

I always think of Spielberg’s response to (I think) George Lucas expressing doubt about the ridiculous scene in Jaws where the shark jumps on to the boat. Spielberg said (from memory) something like, if I can keep the audience with me for 90 minutes until that point, they’ll buy anything. And that’s what Supper’s Ready is like, a bit: it draws you in, it keeps you with it, so when it gets to the truly overblown ridiculous stuff towards the end (even ignoring the bit halfway through where Peter Gabriel dresses up as a flower) you truly feel it has earned the right to go all apocalyptic and religious.

I wasn’t born when it came out, but I think if I had been around to hear it in 1972 it would have been everything I ever wanted from rock music.

I feel slightly apologetic here. Unbridled enthusiasm can come across as a bit unsophisticated and juvenile, so I don’t like over-praising something unless I can be analytical about it. But there you go. A 50 year old song, probably the hoariest and shop-worn example of the hoariest and shop-worn genre of them, has gripped me and has me in its clutches, and I can’t get enough of it.

So, The Massive, what do we think of Supper’s Ready? I don’t remember anyone on here name-checking it or praising it, or even slagging it off. Maybe it’s just considered one of those beige things that aren’t worth talking about, like Jack Johnson or Coldplay?

0

Comments

  1. One of my favourite Genesis tracks. I believe Foxtrot & Selling England were the peak of their powers as a composing & performing group. I’d be interested to hear what you think about SEBTP.

    • Selling England is next month! I’m making a concentrated effort to listen to music “the old way” (with occasional lapses – I’m not a monk) – no streaming, buy physical copies of what I want to hear, read the sleeve notes, give everything a real chance and don’t overbuy.

      So far it’s working because honestly I’ve never felt so connected to music or excited by “new” music since I was about 20 years old. But I’m wary of saying thie, because unbridled enthusiasm can come across as a bit unsophisticated and juvenile, so I don’t like over-praising something unless I can be analytical about it…. 🙂

  2. What PG does with his voice at the end of this is one of the greatest things in rock.

    Like you I had to lay aside decades of prejudice to even listen to this music, and work pretty hard at it (hurr) when I finally did. Both this and Pound are fantastic. i’m less convinced by Trespass and Broadway is to be admired more than enjoyed but I shal return to them anon.

    • I never took to his voice at first, but once you get used to it, he’s amazing. The key moment in Supper’s Ready might well be the moment at the end of the apocalypse section, when he screams about Pythagoras writing song lyrics in blood… then the organ riff changes into that wonderful spiraling pattern. Goosebumps!

      • I perhaps ought to say this quietly, but I prefer the Phil Collins version on ‘Seconds Out’ to the the ur-Gabriel one.

        However, if I have a funeral with music, the final section will be the exit music, starting from ‘And it’s’. Hackett’s guitar soaring over the top of everything around ‘with a loud voice’ never fails to get me.

  3. “Unbridled enthusiasm can come across as a bit unsophisticated and juvenile, so I don’t like over-praising something unless I can be analytical about it.”

    Peak Afterword.

        • This is where not having the physical product is your friend. Not having the artwork (which in Foxtrot’s case is really crap) and the lyrics (which are usually absolute bloody nonsense) it becomes a set of tunes. You can listen to it on shuffle if you want, don’t be told what to do by hairy old men, that’s what did for the Roman Empire.

          For me the gateway was Peter Gabriel’s first solo album, which really doesn’t pretend to be anything other than a set of tunes bloody good ones too.

          • I was quoting American Psycho, as is always the requirement when asked about Genesis.

            I actually have dabbled a little in PG-era Genesis previously. For me, the gateway was Jeff Buckley covering Back In NYC on Sketches For My Sweetheart The Drunk, which lead me to The Lamb Lies Down On Broadway, which lead me on to a few of the other albums. TLLDOB remains my favourite tho, because it has Here Comes The Supernatural Anaesthetist and Broadway Melody Of 1974 on it.

            Like Bateman, these days I prefer Phil Collins.

            • Not a cultural reference I’m likely to get. The only impingement of BEE on my consciousness was the appearance of Bring the Noise in the film of Less Than Zero. Such an odd place for such an iconic (sorry) track to make its first appearance, like Joy Division spaffing Atmosphere on a French single nobody could buy.

              I’ve been saying I don’t like Phil Collins all my life, but I’m listening to Before and After Science right now and of course there he is, and sounding bluddy good too. The problem with prejudices is that they’re such high maintenance. You’ve got to be “on” them all the time.

          • Ooh I take exception with your exception to Foxtrot’s artwork. It’s a bit amateurish, a bit clumsy, yes (like the band themselves)… but the sheer enthusiasm of it and pride in what it is make it rise above the competition (like the band themselves). It looks a little bit weedy and cluttered on a CD, but the LP looks… well… as good as any LP ought to look from a time when LPs looked good.

            I can’t help comparing Genesis to Yes (go on Arthur, they’re still listening): Yes have a shine and professionalism that Genesis lack, both visually in Roger Dean’s album covers and musically in the studio with all the polish and layering. Genesis seem a bit cheap by comparison (in the early 70s I mean). But they just work in their own ways, both of them.

            • Steve Hackett is doing a fairly extensive UK tour in the autumn celebrating Foxtrot at 50 as well as other Genesis/Hackett tracks
              Saw him last year doing selling england and it was brilliant – he has a terrific band, well worth seeing.

  4. I loved Foxtrot and especially Supper’s Ready when I first heard it, around 1974 I guess. For a few years Genesis were the only prog band I really liked – Selling England and Lamb Lies Down were favourite albums as well. But I doubt I have listened to Supper’s Ready for around 45 years. For some reason, unlike a lot of other music I listened to in the mid 70s, Genesis just dropped off my radar. So I am listening to it right now. Thanks for taking me back to it, Arthur. Gabriel’s performance is terrific from the get-go, and there are moments as I listen which I remember clearly loving back in the day. It is great stuff, so long as, as Moose says, you can ignore the lyrics. But I don’t think I love it. It’s powerful, but it doesn’t move me. I love that it has moved you, though Arthur – we can’t have too much unbridled enthusiam here.

      • I would certainly be willing to take a stab at it. It can’t be any tougher than Edge of Seventeen.

        Apropos of not much, this is an excellent excuse to reveal what I have established by some considerable trial and error to be the 20 best (or at least, most consistently rewarding) karaoke tunes of all time.

        1. I Want To Break Free – Queen
        2. Say It Ain’t So – Weezer
        3. Love In This Club – Usher
        4. All Of The Lights – Kanye
        5. Never Too much – Luther Vandross
        6. Unchained Melody – Righteous Bros
        7. Changes – Tupac
        8. Sign of The Times – Harry Styles
        9. Sicko Mode – Travis Scott
        10. La Bamba – Richie Valens
        11. Yeah! – Usher
        12. Welcome to Jamrock – Damien Marley
        13. A Design for Life – Manic Street Preachers
        14. Life on Mars – David Bowie
        15. Fat Lip – Sum 41
        16. Sexual Healing – Marvin Gaye
        17. Mr Jones – Counting Crows
        18. Glory Box – Portishead
        19. This is Hardcore – Pulp
        20. Boys of Summer – Don Henley

      • Not exactly. Just remembering that I once had a web page with the track list of the karaoke machine from hell.
        Can’t remember the details apart from Supper’s Ready, Mouldy Old Dough and Airships from the first Spizz album.

  7. SR is a masterwork of course but I think they bettered it several times over the course of their next 3 albums, although not perhaps on the same scale, and I have to say that A Trick of the Tail contains three of my favourite ever Genesis tracks, but it’s inconsistent. Foxtrot and Selling England are uniformly great albums.

    Loved it all as a teenager and still love it all now. Gush away, Arthur

  9. I share your marveling at the recent discovery. It’s a bit good that.
    I think it’s run close by Dancing With The Moonlit Knight for the best Genesis track. But, with Suppers Ready in place, Foxtrot may well be their crowning glory
    (ignore those who say “what about The Lamb?”)

    I once asked a work colleague what their favourite Genesis song was.
    They thought for a second and said: Against All Odds

  10. Lasted 5 minutes before I fell to wondering if I’d had me dinner. Unlike you I’m old enough to remember when it came out, didn’t speak to me then and still doesn’t. Sorry Arthur, it’s peak prog but it’s no Pressed Rat and Warthog, is it?

  12. An unashamed Genesis fan here and one that likes all phases of their career.

    Suppers Ready is certainly a masterpiece and one of their best, but I still go with Selling England By The Pound as their greatest, with both Firth Of Fifth and Cinema Show being amongst my favourite ever tracks (the bit towards the end in Cinema Shwo where the keyboards reach a peak still makes the hairs on the back of my neck stand, even after many years of listening).

    I was actually listing to their last Phil Collins album “We Can’t Dance” yesterday and I still reckon that “Driving The Last Spike” is up there with their best – another 10 min epic……

    • All the recommendations for Selling England are whetting my appetite. As I said above, that’s my album for next month, then after that I’ll tackle The Lamb (which I’ve already had a big spoiler for as I fell for Carpet Crawlers in a big way).

      After that, I’m not sure whether to explore the two early albums or push on into the Phil Collins years.

    • Horses for courses, as, much as I love side 1, Epping Forest and Cinema ruin side 2. Mind you, my pleasures are the 1st album* ( minus the Knife) side 1 of Nrsery Crymes and side 2 of Foxtrot, so another man ready for supper.
      *not the Jonathan King FGtR…..

  13. Back in the early to mid 70s I adored Genesis, seeing them 5 times in the Gabriel era, and 3 times in the eatly post-Gabriel era (after which I lost interest as they increasingly became a pop band). SR was always, of course, the big climax of the shows (apart from the Lamb tour, which consisted solely of the 90 minutes of Lamb, plus encores). At the time, bearing in mind I was only in my mid- to late teens, SR was probably the nearest I ever got to a religious experience. To be honest, I don’t think I ever need to hear it again, I heard it so many times it lost all its ability to surprise me, moving into the aural pipe and slippers of comfort music. But it certainly once meant a great deal to me.

    • I was transfixed by that video I posted of Supper’s Ready being performed live. I would have loved to see that back in the day with Gabriel’s costume changes and all that. I hadn’t actually realised how visually striking they were as a band – all sitting down (to show how serious they are!) with this flamboyant frontman prancing around.

      I never really previously saw much in Peter Gabriel as a performer, but he makes sense to me now. He’s incredible, isn’t he? Some confidence he must have had (at what, 21, 22 years old?) to throw himself into the performance aspect of it so much, right down to that head shave!

  14. Vote up from me. Not a Genesis fan, despite my like of Peter Hammill and VDGG, but I bought a copy of Foxtrot in a sale and think SR is their very own “Plague of Lighthouse Keepers”, if you will. “Willow farm” is my favourite poptastic part (as once played by Radcliffe and Riley on their Radio One show). Had to buy the entire album again on iTunes to get the track mind. The lyrics are 6th form TS Eliot pastiche, but that is forgivable.

    • Nothing wrong with TS Eliot pastiche! I unashamedly LOVE the lyrics. None of this shyness or sophistication from Gabriel: just get straight to the surrealism and biblical imagery.

      I especially love the “hey babe”, “hey now babe”, etc bits at the start at the end: like a little gesture towards normality in amongst all the Revelations stuff.

      Willow Farm: I love it in the context of the song, but I think if I just heard it as a standalone tune I would think it was third rate psychedic rubbish. My White Bicycle and all that: I get very tired of that stuff very easily. But in the context of Supper’s Ready… genius, a fabulous little interlude. (Plus I love Gabriel’s flower costume and dancing at that bit).

      • Gabriel’s lyrics = “T.S. Eliot pastiche”?

        Let’s investigate:

        First, here’s Gabriel:

        “Take a little trip back with father Tiresias,
        Listen to the old one speak of all he has lived through.”
        (from “The Cinema Show”)

        Now here’s Tommy Eliot:

        “I Tiresias, though blind, throbbing between two lives,
        Old man with wrinkled female breasts, can see
        At the violet hour,”
        (from “The Waste Land” Part I)

        Well … erm … it’s a tricky one.
        They both mention Tiresias, so let’s call it an honorable draw!

  15. It’s funny, I like Peter Gabriel solo very much, I don’t like Phil Collins solo much at all. I know they weren’t necessarily the primary songwriters on all or most material, but I prefer the early Phil Collins on vocals era to the Peter Gabriel on vocals one. Stuff like Wind and Wuthering and Duke, they are not really up there with my favourite albums but I find them to be a more enjoyable listen than most of the earlier stuff. No interest after that.

  16. I like the Pete and Phil eras and really think of them as different bands, especially after Steve Hackett left. I gave Then There Were Three a listen yesterday actually and enjoyed it a lot.

    Back to the OP, SR is a masterpiece in my humble.

    • Different bands, but a fairly seamless transition. A Trick Of The Tail is as good as the Gabriel years, and as you sat And The There Were Three ain’t a bad listen.
      Duke is pretty good too. Abacab is where the dividing line is to me. But 1983s Genesis attempts to muddy that line,

  18. I remember seeing Genesis performing SR when Foxtrot first came out. It was probably the same show that started with Watcher of the Skies with Peter Gabriel wearing ‘that bat thing’ on his head. It was all very exciting for a loon-panted, gormless teen like me. I pretty much lost interest in them after that.

    Fast forward almost 50 years and, based on other things I had been watching, You Tube ‘recommended’ one of Steve Hackett’s performances of SR. By the heck it was good, not least the addition of a knock-out guitar solo at the end. I guess also that the musicianship and quality of the instruments themselves had improved a tad over the intervening years. Whatever, if you enjoyed Genesis’ version, then have a look at this as well. The singer (Nad Sylvan) looks like a proper proggie vocalist as well!

    Maybe in another couple of decades I’ll have a look again. Meanwhile, I’ll carry on exploring my recently bought Allman Brothers Band box set and the like.

Leave a Reply