Today is Steve Hackett’s birthday. Tomorrow is Peter Gabriel’s birthday.
Let’s listen to some Genesis while wishing them both a happy birthday.
I’ve probably posted this video before. It’s actually pre-Peter Gabriel wearing costumes on stage. Not by much, but it is. Weird, huh?
It is 81 degrees out here in Westwood, MA.
I am sitting at my desk, shivering with cold.
Effing air conditioned nightmare*
Here’s a cat to make us all feel better about how cold it is in the office.
*That’s a Steve Hackett reference.
I have a co-worker with me at my desk right now.
In other news, my stomach is in revolt at the moment. Fun. It’s a gastric bypass side effect kind of thing and it will pass, but I just gagged up some icky stuff and had a full blown case of “the foamies” (look it up). Having said that, there is no complaint here. I ate my lunch too fast and my new redesigned digestive system slapped me on the wrist for it. Post operation side effects like this are 100% worth it, I promise you. Trust me, it’s not an issue at all.
In other other news, I checked the bookfayce page of the Luthier I brought my guitar to last Saturday and earlier today he posted a bunch of pictures showing the progress he’s made. There are pictures of my beloved Gibson ES-335 Pro without any frets, pictures of it with some new frets, and a picture of the neck with a full boat’s worth of lovely, shiny new frets. It still needs a new nut and a new bridge, and he didn’t mention anything about cleaning out the electronics (which is a major bitch of a job to do on an ES-335 as you have to squeeze everything in and out through the F-hole), but the new frets are in! I don’t know if I will share any of the photos he posted. I think I did when he worked on my Les Paul Custom, but not until a few days had past. We’ll see.
Try to picture this guitar with shiny new frets:
In other other other news, I am listening to Steve Hackett’s new album, which was released today. It is called The Circus and the Nightwhale. I am listening while I work and therefore not able to give it my full attention. My initial gut reaction though is this: Steve Hackett’s guitar playing gets exponentially better with each passing day. His songwriting improves in a similar manner. His singing… yeah, he’s better than he used to be but sometimes I still wish he’d hire a full time singer for his recording line up. I’m enjoying the new album. Check it out.
Okay, that’s it for this post. Lunch break is over. My stomach is settling down. Get back to work, Red Head!
I read a story about this earlier this morning. The old 70’s TV show The Midnight Special has a YouTube channel and they released a video of Genesis playing The Musical Box in 1973. The article mentioned that the show originally included them playing Watcher of the Skies as well but that hadn’t been released on the YouTubes. I went looking for The Musical Box at lunch today and Watcher of the Skies actually came out this morning as well.
Enjoy watching Peter Gabriel play dress up!
Figures that the camera panned up off of Steve Hackett’s hands just before he played one of Earth’s first examples of two hand tapping. Oh well.
Yeah, I said I was done with this, but I totally lied.
Scenes from a cart corral.
I drove to Market Basket and back. I took the long way around and listened to Supper’s Ready all the way through. That reminded me that Peter Gabriel is coming to Boston in September, and Steve Hackett is coming in October. Also, Steve Hackett is supposed to be playing the Foxtrot album in it’s entirety, which means he’s going to play Supper’s Ready, which means I HAVE to be there. I have to see at least one member of Genesis play that perfect piece of music, all 23 minutes of it, live at least once before I die. I have to.
Mood music… now and forever.
As expected, after a migraine on Tuesday and a bad gastric bypass stomach on Wednesday, I feel pretty good today. A little warn out but mostly okay. I drank a nice chunk of water while getting in my exercise this morning, and then had a protein bar breakfast afterwards. No issues so far. I overslept a little and I am still tired but I think that’s to be expected.
I have three hours of sick time this morning. I’m going to see my primary care doctor to talk about migraines and see what I need to do to try and get it all under control. I had one on the drive down to Florida just after New Year. I had another one, a minor one, on our last night on that trip. I think I had one in February, but was it two? I had one on the first night of the kids’ spring break. That was March 10th. Then the last one on March 21st. I don’t think this qualifies as chronic, or regular, or whatever the correct medical term for “lots and lots” might be. It’s enough to scare the shit out of me though. I mean, to quote Woody Allen, my brain? That’s my second favorite organ!*
Okay. Time to go start my morning. Shower, shave, dress, go see the doctor, go to work, listen to a lot of Peter Garbriel and Steve Hackett and try to talk myself either into or out of going to see them both in concert in the fall.**
*Quoting Woody Allen bothers me. It was bad enough when he cheated on the mother of his kids with her adopted daughter, but at least they are still together so we can argue that as gross as the relationship is it was apparently something along the lines of real, or if not real then lasting? I don’t know. I can’t get past the child molestation allegations though. I haven’t watched one of this movies since hearing about that, even though there have been a couple that I really wanted to, and some of his early 70’s movies are among my favorites ever (including the movie the above quote comes from). I try not to quote him the way I did back in the 90’s when I couldn’t go a full sentence without dropping something of his. They still slip through now and then when they fit too perfectly to ignore. I feel disgusting every time though, in case you were wondering.
**Peter Garbriel at the TD Garden in Boston on September 14, 2023. Steve Hackett at the Wilbur Theater in Boston on October 12, 2023. Like… how can a 70’s Genesis fanatic say no? Both of them within one month? I’ve seen Steve Hackett once, in one of the last shows I went to before the pandemic, back in September 2019. I’ve never seen Peter Gabriel. I’ve never even investigated the possibility before. I’ll never see Genesis in any of it’s forms as Phil Collins is physically unable now and there’s no way they’ll tour without him. My chance to see all five of them evaporated in 2007 when Gabriel backed out of the proposed Lamb Lies Down on Broadway reunion tour, which really never seemed like something he would have done anyway. Still… I’ve only seen one of the five of them live, and the chance to see two of them within a short space of time just seems like destiny in a weird sort of nerd way.
I’ve never seen Peter Gabriel live before. Steve Hackett is the only member of Genesis I’ve seen.
Peter Gabriel is coming to Boston the day before I leave for a week long vacation in September.
I really want to go to the show. I don’t have the money but I really want to find it and go to the show but I am going away the next day.
If we can talk Steve Hackett into sitting in then I’ll 100% go, otherwise I have to think on it for a while.
Slight change of subject, have Steve Hackett and Tony Levin every played together before? That would be friggin’ amazing, with or without Peter Gabriel on the stage with them.
Genesis ended their reunion tour with a show in London the other night. Phil Collins announced from the stage that it would be the final Genesis show ever. Not surprising given the mess he’s in health wise.
He also announced that Peter Gabriel was in the audience and wondered if he was the guy yelling out requests for Supper’s Ready. I like to think Pete would have been requesting The Knife, or maybe Twilight Alehouse instead.
It doesn’t sound like Steve Hackett or Anthony Phillips were there. Hackett just had to postpone a bunch of shows due to someone in his band catching Covid. Maybe he was quarantined?
I always hoped the five of them would play together one more time, but Phil can’t play the drums anymore and if he can’t play then it’s not the real thing. That makes me a little sad, but we still have those records.
Steve Hackett was just all like don’t mind me I’m just shredding like a muthatruckin’ legend over here.
Kneel in awe.
Inside the Red Head's Head 