BRAND X: PRODUCT (1979)
1) Don't Make Waves; 2) Dance
Of The Illegal Aliens; 3) Soho; 4) Not Good Enough/See Me!; 5) Algon (Where An
Ordinary Cup Of Drinking Chocolate Costs L8,000,000,000); 6) Rhesus Perplexus;
7) Wal To Wal; 8) ...And So To F...; 9) April.
A good title indeed. Not «commercial product»,
or «soulless product», but just «product» — this and the following album were
the results of a bizarre rotating line-up where Goodsall would essentially play
with two different bands. One included Percy Jones on bass, Morris Pert on percussion,
and newcomers Mike Clark on drums and Peter Robinson on keyboards; the other
had John Giblin on bass and, surprisingly, Robin Lumley on keyboards and our
old pal Phil Collins, back on drums and, yes, on vocals.
So put together the fact that we actually have
«Brand X» and «Brand Y» here, and also the fact that we have two Collins-sung
pop songs on the record, and you can see why it is a «product», in the sense
that there is hardly any pretense at spontaneity and getting carried away on
the wings of inspiration. Not that the two playing ensembles sound all that
different from each other, or any different from what they used to sound — in
fact, if anything, this fresh-blood-mix approach shook everybody up a little
bit and made Product an overall more
interesting LP, I think, than Masques
before it. But the approach is not without its problems.
First, many fusion fans went berserk at the
idea of including ʽDon't Make Wavesʼ and ʽSohoʼ, both of which really sounded
more like contemporary Genesis than genuine Brand X; all the more curious that
the first song was actually written by Goodsall, and the second co-written by
him with Collins. It is true that both are no great shakes — overproduced
pop-rock without any particularly interesting hooks or enthralling messages —
and neither of the two agrees thematically with the band's general fusion
sound. But it's not as if their presence here is particularly annoying, and
it's certainly not as if their
inclusion blocked the way of any instrumental masterpieces, judging by the
quality of what else we got. At the very least this presence comes across as a
surprise — are Brand X gearing up to become a daughter project of Genesis? Is
Phil Collins capable of turning fusion into adult contemporary pop as expertly
as he does with prog?
Well, for the moment it just looks like a timid
experiment, because the rest is quite traditional. Amusingly, the first of the
two long jams is called ʽDance Of The Illegal Aliensʼ, presaging the title of a
well-known Genesis pop hit several years later — hardly a coincidence, even
though the track was written by Jones, does not feature Phil at all, and has
nothing to do with illegal aliens outside of the title (but a lot to do with
Jones' magnificent «rubber bass» patterns, though apart from of that, I cannot
applaud or remember much of anything else). Likewise, the second of these jams,
ʽNot Good Enoughʼ, is almost completely about Percy and his bass — occasional synth
and guitar solos surrounding it are simply keeping it company.
Of the last four tracks, three are
unremarkable, but ʽ...And So To F...ʼ is a bit of a standout: although an
instrumental, it is credited to Collins, and it's got serious art-pop overtones
that remind one of Genesis' style on Trick
Of The Tail (particularly ʽLos Endosʼ). Thus, ironically, Product turns out to be the only
non-Genesis album on which you can get a taster of circa-1976 Genesis and circa-1982 Genesis at the same time,
even as they peep in and out of a generally fusionistic environment. This is
weird, and if at least half of these tunes were as catchy or emotionally captivating
as classic Genesis, and the other half were worthy of Brand X's early days, I
would have certainly awarded the album a thumbs up. But on the other hand, it's
«product», and the careful manufacturing does not seem to leave a lot of space
for genuine inspiration, so I guess I'll pass.
No comments:
Post a Comment