stephenray

What a lovely weekend. Ani and I had our Christmas since we won't be seeing each other over the holidays. Both of us have raging colds (mine has been hanging on for 3 weeks) so it was lots of nose blowing, laughing, coughing and listening to her talk with a voice like Nick Nolte/Marge Simpson. Fun!

She gave me a gift that's going to keep on giving for years to come. The Genesis 1970-1975 remastered boxed set. What? Genesis? You mean like "I Can't Dance?" or "Invisible Touch?"

NO.

I mean GENESIS. I don't know what that other band is called (the phil collins project or something? I dunno)



Yeah see, that's my Genesis. They were the apex of the prog rock holy trinity for me flanked by Yes and King Crimson. Each band has it's merits, but Genesis was my D&D music, my pot music, my youth. However, if King Crimson does a 5.1 remastered boxed set, I'll just "jizz in my pants" as they say.

This boxed set is AMAZING. 5 albums remastered in Dolby 5.1 surround sound. These recordings were digitally cleaned with a fine shammy. All the hiss from ancient analog has been removed leaving the music in sparkling condition. The mixes themselves were left fairly unaltered save for spreading them into 5 channels and blessing it with modern day equalization. Its absolutely stunning.

The early Genesis recordings suffered from flat production that I felt never did their live sound justice. That has been FIXED. So, I've got Trespass, Nursery Cryme, Foxtrot, Selling England by the Pound and The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway. Each disc has lengthy interviews with the band about the specific album as well as some live rarities.

My eyes got moist on the first notes from the song "Dusk," and stayed that way while we listened to many selections. I waved my arms about like a chimp and yammered in some old stoner lingo. I dunno what I said. It's just so beautiful to hear this music in such condition. It's like it's all brand new again. It's magic.

Thank you Ani, this is so much more than a Christmas present.

<3