50 Fun Facts About Genesis (Band)

In which film does Christian Bale's murderous banker lecture his guests on the merits of Genesis and Phil Collins?

American Psycho has Patrick Bateman deliver the speech while In Too Deep and Sussudio play. He reads deep meaning into songs most listeners treat as light pop.

Which 1986 Genesis hit had a video full of Spitting Image puppets and was later covered by metal band Disturbed?

Land of Confusion won a Grammy for its video, which opens with a puppet Ronald Reagan going to bed and having a nightmare.

Genesis drummer Phil Collins played both Live Aid concerts in 1985 by crossing the Atlantic on which aircraft?

Concorde took him from London to New York in time to play in Philadelphia the same day. On board he met Cher and told her about the concerts.

At a 1972 Dublin show, Genesis's Peter Gabriel surprised his bandmates by donning a red dress and which animal's head?

A fox in a red dress was already on the sleeve of the band's new album, and the singer borrowed the frock from his wife. It began his run of ever stranger stage costumes.

Genesis's only US number one, Invisible Touch, was replaced at the top in 1986 by which Peter Gabriel song?

Sledgehammer was also its singer's only American chart-topper, so the former bandmates' sole number ones sat back to back in July 1986.

Which Oliver! character did a teenage Phil Collins, later the drummer of Genesis, play on the West End stage in 1964?

The Artful Dodger was his part in two West End runs of the musical. His childhood friend Jack Wild went on to play the same pickpocket in the film version.

Genesis's Jesus He Knows Me, from the 1991 album We Can't Dance, is a satire of which scandal-hit group?

Televangelists such as Jimmy Swaggart and Jim Bakker were under investigation at the time. In the video Phil Collins plays a broadcaster begging his viewers for money.

On Genesis's farewell tour of 2021 and 2022, which relative of Phil Collins took over on drums?

His son Nic Collins took the drum seat because ill health had left his father unable to play. Nic had already drummed on the Not Dead Yet solo tour.

Genesis's 1969 debut album flopped partly because record shops, misled by its title, filed it in which section?

Religious music was where shops put From Genesis to Revelation, as the band's name was left off the sleeve after an American act turned out to share it.

Which 1978 Genesis album includes the band's first UK top ten single, Follow You Follow Me?

And Then There Were Three followed Steve Hackett's exit, which left Mike Rutherford to play all the guitar parts on the record.

Which Genesis album was the first with Phil Collins as lead singer, made after auditions for outsiders came to nothing?

A Trick of the Tail found its voice when the drummer reluctantly sang one track himself, and did it so well that he became the frontman.

In Genesis's macabre song The Musical Box, young Henry loses his head to his friend Cynthia during which game?

Croquet gave the Victorian tale its murder weapon, a mallet, and gave the album its sleeve: a manor lawn dotted with severed heads.

Which 1977 solo debut single did Peter Gabriel write about a spiritual experience after his departure from Genesis?

Solsbury Hill is a real hill in Somerset. One reviewer heard the song as proof that quitting had lifted a weight from the singer's shoulders.

Mike + The Mechanics, the side band of Genesis's Mike Rutherford, topped the US chart in 1989 with which ballad?

The Living Years is about a son's regret at never settling things with his late father. Its two writers had lost their own fathers around the same time.

Genesis closed the European leg of its 2007 reunion tour with a free concert at which ancient site in Rome?

Circus Maximus drew an audience of about half a million for the free show, which was filmed for the DVD set When in Rome.

Genesis reunited with Peter Gabriel for one 1982 concert to rescue which debt-ridden festival he had co-founded?

WOMAD, the World of Music, Arts and Dance festival, was deep in debt after its first staging. The one-off show at the Milton Keynes Bowl was billed as Six of the Best.

Genesis's Tonight, Tonight, Tonight was used in ads for which American beer, sponsor of the Invisible Touch tour?

Michelob chose a song far darker than a beer advert suggests: its words follow a drug addict struggling to reach a dealer for another fix.

Genesis wrote the 1986 ballad In Too Deep for which British crime film starring Bob Hoskins as an ex-convict?

Mona Lisa brought Bob Hoskins an Oscar nomination, and the song written for it won a BMI award as the most performed song from a film.

Genesis ended its farewell tour in March 2022 with a last show at which venue in London?

The O2 Arena show had been postponed by the pandemic. From the stage Phil Collins told the crowd that it was the band's last.

Which Genesis epic, nearly 23 minutes long, ends with sections titled Apocalypse in 9/8 and As Sure as Eggs Is Eggs?

Supper's Ready is the band's longest recorded song, with words that draw on the Book of Revelation. On stage Peter Gabriel acted out its sections in costume.

Which rebellious New York youth is the hero of Genesis's 1974 rock opera The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway?

Rael is half Puerto Rican and is drawn into a strange subterranean underworld. Peter Gabriel wrote the story, then left the band after touring it.

Which tearful creature of Pennsylvania folklore, said to dissolve when caught, gave Genesis the title of a 1976 song?

Squonk was the track Phil Collins sang to settle who would front the band. The beast of the tale melts into a pool of tears when captured.

A song on Genesis's Nursery Cryme warns of which toxic plant, brought to England by a Victorian explorer?

Giant hogweed is a real menace: its sap reacts with sunlight to blister and scar human skin. The song turns the plant's spread into an invasion story.

Artist Paul Whitehead made his cover painting for Genesis's Nursery Cryme look antique by varnishing it with what?

Honey gave the picture a 19th-century look after the band complained that it did not seem old enough.

Phil Collins's menacing laugh on the 1983 Genesis hit Mama was inspired by The Message, a track by which rap pioneer?

Grandmaster Flash supplied the idea for the laugh, and the single it decorates is still the band's most successful in the UK, peaking at number four.

Genesis's No Reply at All and Paperlate both feature the horn section of which American soul and funk band?

Earth, Wind & Fire's horn players also appear on a Phil Collins solo track cut at about the same time. In one video the band's trio mime the brass parts in disguise.

Genesis's founding guitarist Anthony Phillips quit in 1970, soon after recording Trespass, largely because of what?

Stage fright grew worse for months while he hoped it was a passing phase. Steve Hackett later credited his 12-string style with shaping the band's sound.

Genesis found both Phil Collins and Steve Hackett through adverts in which British music weekly?

Melody Maker ran the band's own notice seeking a drummer, and later a notice placed by the guitarist himself, which Peter Gabriel spotted.

Which 1980 Genesis album, home to Turn It On Again and Misunderstanding, was the band's first UK number one?

Duke drew on songs Phil Collins wrote alone after his first marriage ended. Others from the same burst of writing went onto his solo debut, Face Value.

Which 1973 Genesis album gave the band its first charting single, I Know What I Like?

Selling England by the Pound took its title, suggested by Peter Gabriel, from a Labour Party slogan, so the British press could not accuse the band of pandering to America.

Ray Wilson, the singer on Genesis's 1997 album Calling All Stations, had earlier fronted which Scottish rock band?

Stiltskin topped the UK chart in 1994 with Inside, a song first written for a television advert. Wilson's spell as Phil Collins's successor lasted one album.

Which former Yes and King Crimson drummer toured with Genesis in 1976 so that Phil Collins could sing out front?

Bill Bruford wished to move on after that single tour of North America and Europe, so the job passed to an American player the following year.

Which American drummer, a veteran of Frank Zappa's band and Weather Report, became Genesis's touring drummer in 1977?

Chester Thompson was hired after Phil Collins heard him on a Frank Zappa live album. He played every tour from 1977 to 1992 and came back in 2007.

Which former Roxy Music member treated Peter Gabriel's vocals with synthesiser effects on a 1974 Genesis double album?

Brian Eno was working on his own album, Taking Tiger Mountain (By Strategy), at the same studio when the singer asked for his help during mixing.

Who, already known for Pink Floyd sleeves, designed the stark cover of Genesis's The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway?

Hipgnosis swapped the colourful, pastoral paintings of earlier sleeves for a monochrome storyboard of photographs showing scenes from the story.

Genesis guitarist Steve Hackett was an early user of which technique, later made famous by Eddie Van Halen?

Tapping, with a finger of the plucking hand pressed straight onto the fretboard, is on the band's 1971 album. Hackett has claimed Van Halen learned it at one of their concerts.

Genesis was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2010 by Trey Anastasio, guitarist of which American band?

Phish also performed two of the band's songs at the ceremony in New York. Anastasio has named the group as a major influence on his own early material.

The video for Genesis's 1991 hit I Can't Dance pokes fun at the models in television adverts for which product?

Jeans adverts also inspired the music: the guitar riff came from a Levi's commercial, and the song's working title in the studio was Blue Jeans.

Which 1983 Genesis single, written as a simple Beatles-style pop song, became the band's first US top ten hit?

That's All reached number six in America in early 1984. Phil Collins has described his playing on it as an attempt at a Ringo Starr drum part.

In Genesis's 1983 song Home by the Sea, a burglar who breaks into a house is taken prisoner by whom?

Ghosts seize the intruder and force him to listen to their stories for the rest of his life. The song runs straight into a largely instrumental sequel.

Phil Collins moonlighted from Genesis in the mid-1970s as the drummer of which British jazz fusion band?

Brand X grew out of jam sessions at Island Studios in London, and its first album carried the fitting title Unorthodox Behaviour.

Which 1973 Genesis song opens with a classical-style piano solo by Tony Banks?

Firth of Fifth plays on the Firth of Forth, the estuary of the River Forth. Steve Hackett's prominent guitar solo reworks a flute theme heard earlier in the song.

Which Genesis concert opener, known for its huge keyboard introduction, borrows its title from a John Keats poem?

Watcher of the Skies grew from wondering what an alien visitor would make of an empty planet, an idea sparked by the deserted airfield where the band was rehearsing.

A Genesis song inspired by a news story about two rival East End gangs sets their battle in which woodland?

Epping Forest is where the gangs of the song meet, and the story ends with the whole dispute being settled on the toss of a coin.

Which 1977 Genesis live double album, taped mostly in Paris, was the last release with guitarist Steve Hackett?

Seconds Out was still being mixed when Hackett walked away to pursue a solo career, leaving his bandmates to finish the record without him.

Tony Banks bought which keyboard, once used by King Crimson, to thicken the sound of Genesis in 1971?

The Mellotron pulls a length of recorded tape across a playback head for every key pressed. This one was sold to him by King Crimson's Robert Fripp.

Genesis recorded every studio album from 1981 to 1997 at which studio of its own in Chiddingfold, Surrey?

The Farm began as a dairy holding with a 16th-century farmhouse and a single cowshed. The band bought it in 1980 to escape the costs of commercial studios.

Chris Stewart, Genesis's original drummer, later became known for which memoir about settling in rural Spain?

Driving Over Lemons describes El Valero, the remote property he bought in the Alpujarras of Andalucia. He played on only the band's first two singles.

Genesis signed in 1970 to which label, founded by Tony Stratton Smith and also home to Monty Python?

Charisma was nicknamed The Famous Charisma Label, and its founder was a former journalist who had managed Van der Graaf Generator.

Which song from The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway did Genesis's classic five-man line-up re-record for a 1999 hits album?

The Carpet Crawlers was remade with producer Trevor Horn, and has Peter Gabriel and Phil Collins sharing the lead vocal.