Genesis` 17th album, ”We Can`t Dance” (Atlantic), is designed to follow comfortably in the footsteps of its immediate predecessors.
Like ”Duke,” ”Abacab,” ”Genesis” and ”Invisible Touch,” it blends more accessible shorter tunes with a number of longer tracks, all of them sung in radio-friendly fashion by Phil Collins.
”Driving the Last Spike” and ”Fading Lights” both check in at better than 10 minutes, and ”Dreaming While You Sleep” exceeds 7 minutes.
In each case, the tracks don`t sound bloated or cumbersome, perhaps because the instrumentation-drums, keyboards, guitar-is relatively sparse.
The leaner, more streamlined direction that Genesis has taken in the last decade gives ”We Can`t Dance” an organic feel that eluded the band during its earlier, art-rock phase.
Sonically, the album holds a couple of surprises, notably the recurring
”elephant noise” (actually a guitar sound ”sampled” by a keyboard and then slowed down) that serves as an unlikely hook for the first single, ”No Son of Mine.” And there`s the raunchy guitar riff that drives the tongue-in- cheek ”I Can`t Dance.”
Much of the rest is a rather predictable pastiche of Collins` melancholy ballads (”Never a Time,” ”Hold on My Heart,” ”Since I Lost You”) and soft social commentaries that take aim at easy targets (televangelists in
”Jesus He Knows Me”) or throw up their hands in resignation: In ”Way of the World,” Collins sings, ”We all agree as far as we can see/It`s just the way of the world/That`s how it`s meant to be.”
Pitted against the usual Top 40 fodder, ”We Can`t Dance” sounds fairly substantial, and fans of post-Peter Gabriel Genesis will doubtlessly enjoy it. But those who like their music with a rawer, more challenging edge should look elsewhere.
Rating for ”We Can`t Dance”: (STAR)(STAR) 1/2
