Genesis (Band)
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50 free Genesis (Band) trivia questions with answers — music quiz, new questions added Oct 2026.
Few bands have had two lives as different as Genesis. In the early 1970s the group made long, theatrical progressive rock with Peter Gabriel out front in ever odder costumes. After he left, drummer Phil Collins stepped up to the microphone, the songs grew shorter, and by the middle of the 1980s Genesis was one of the biggest acts in pop. This quiz covers both lives. There are questions on the albums and which songs belong to which record, on what the lyrics are about, on sleeve art, tours and reunions, and on the people who passed through the line-up, from the school friends who started the band to the hired hands who toured with it. A few follow Collins, Gabriel, Tony Banks, Mike Rutherford and Steve Hackett into their projects outside the group. It is written for anyone who knows the radio hits, with harder questions further in for listeners who can tell one side-long epic from another. The lyric questions describe a song's story and ask you to name it or explain it.
30 of 50 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01In which film does Christian Bale's murderous banker lecture his guests on the merits of Genesis and Phil Collins?
American Psycho
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.
Q 02Which 1986 Genesis hit had a video full of Spitting Image puppets and was later covered by metal band Disturbed?
Land of Confusion
Land of Confusion won a Grammy for its video, which opens with a puppet Ronald Reagan going to bed and having a nightmare.
Q 03Genesis drummer Phil Collins played both Live Aid concerts in 1985 by crossing the Atlantic on which aircraft?
Concorde
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.
Q 04At a 1972 Dublin show, Genesis's Peter Gabriel surprised his bandmates by donning a red dress and which animal's head?
A fox
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.
Q 05Genesis's only US number one, Invisible Touch, was replaced at the top in 1986 by which Peter Gabriel song?
Sledgehammer
Sledgehammer was also its singer's only American chart-topper, so the former bandmates' sole number ones sat back to back in July 1986.
Q 06Which Oliver! character did a teenage Phil Collins, later the drummer of Genesis, play on the West End stage in 1964?
Artful Dodger
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.
Q 07Genesis's Jesus He Knows Me, from the 1991 album We Can't Dance, is a satire of which scandal-hit group?
Televangelists
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.
Q 08On Genesis's farewell tour of 2021 and 2022, which relative of Phil Collins took over on drums?
His son
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.
Q 09Genesis's 1969 debut album flopped partly because record shops, misled by its title, filed it in which section?
Religious music
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.
Q 10Which 1978 Genesis album includes the band's first UK top ten single, Follow You Follow Me?
And Then There Were Three
And Then There Were Three followed Steve Hackett's exit, which left Mike Rutherford to play all the guitar parts on the record.
Q 11Which Genesis album was the first with Phil Collins as lead singer, made after auditions for outsiders came to nothing?
A Trick of the Tail
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.
Q 12In Genesis's macabre song The Musical Box, young Henry loses his head to his friend Cynthia during which game?
Croquet
Croquet gave the Victorian tale its murder weapon, a mallet, and gave the album its sleeve: a manor lawn dotted with severed heads.
Q 13Which 1977 solo debut single did Peter Gabriel write about a spiritual experience after his departure from Genesis?
Solsbury Hill
Q 21Which rebellious New York youth is the hero of Genesis's 1974 rock opera The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway?
Rael
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.
Q 22Which tearful creature of Pennsylvania folklore, said to dissolve when caught, gave Genesis the title of a 1976 song?
Squonk
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.
Q 23A song on Genesis's Nursery Cryme warns of which toxic plant, brought to England by a Victorian explorer?
Giant hogweed
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.
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.
Q 14Mike + The Mechanics, the side band of Genesis's Mike Rutherford, topped the US chart in 1989 with which ballad?
The Living Years
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.
Q 15Genesis closed the European leg of its 2007 reunion tour with a free concert at which ancient site in Rome?
Circus Maximus
Circus Maximus drew an audience of about half a million for the free show, which was filmed for the DVD set When in Rome.
Q 16Genesis reunited with Peter Gabriel for one 1982 concert to rescue which debt-ridden festival he had co-founded?
WOMAD
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.
Q 17Genesis's Tonight, Tonight, Tonight was used in ads for which American beer, sponsor of the Invisible Touch tour?
Michelob
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.
Q 18Genesis wrote the 1986 ballad In Too Deep for which British crime film starring Bob Hoskins as an ex-convict?
Mona Lisa
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.
Q 19Genesis ended its farewell tour in March 2022 with a last show at which venue in London?
The O2 Arena
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.
Q 20Which Genesis epic, nearly 23 minutes long, ends with sections titled Apocalypse in 9/8 and As Sure as Eggs Is Eggs?
Supper's Ready
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.
Q 24Artist Paul Whitehead made his cover painting for Genesis's Nursery Cryme look antique by varnishing it with what?
Honey
Honey gave the picture a 19th-century look after the band complained that it did not seem old enough.
Q 25Phil Collins's menacing laugh on the 1983 Genesis hit Mama was inspired by The Message, a track by which rap pioneer?
Grandmaster Flash
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.
Q 26Genesis's No Reply at All and Paperlate both feature the horn section of which American soul and funk band?
Earth, Wind & Fire
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.
Q 27Genesis's founding guitarist Anthony Phillips quit in 1970, soon after recording Trespass, largely because of what?
Stage fright
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.
Q 28Genesis found both Phil Collins and Steve Hackett through adverts in which British music weekly?
Melody Maker
Melody Maker ran the band's own notice seeking a drummer, and later a notice placed by the guitarist himself, which Peter Gabriel spotted.
Q 29Which 1980 Genesis album, home to Turn It On Again and Misunderstanding, was the band's first UK number one?
Duke
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.
Q 30Which 1973 Genesis album gave the band its first charting single, I Know What I Like?
Selling England by the Pound
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.