The Genesis Songbook is a decent documentary package that chronicles the history of one of the most beloved progressive rock bands of all time, Genesis. Starting from the humble beginnings in the mid-60's when Peter Gabriel, Tony Banks, Michael Rutherford, and Anthony Phillips met in school and decided they wanted to be songwriters, to their peak "prog" period when Phil Collins and Steve Hackett joined the band, to Gabriel's and Hackett's departure, to Collin's arrival as "the man", and to his leaving in the mid-90's to be replaced by Ray Wilson, it's all covered here.
Numerous snippets of archive footage is interspersed with the multiple interviews with band members, sidemen (Chester Thompson, Daryl Stuermer, Bill Bruford), management, and fans. Long-time followers of Genesis will revel in the live footage with Gabriel from the early tours, but sadly, there are no complete numbers shown here, which is a major disappointment. Hopefully some day an official DVD release will include all of the Gabriel era live footage in one complete package. Still, it's cool to see pieces of "The Musical Box", "Supper's Ready", and "I Know What I Like", plus a few seconds of "The Lamb..." here among others like "Afterglow", "Mama", "Turn it On Again", and "Follow You Follow Me".
Much of what is covered and shown on this set has been seen before, but there are some more recent interviews with Collins, Gabriel, Rutherford, Banks, Hackett, etc. that are fun to watch & listen to, and shed more insight into what made Genesis such a great band for so many years, regardless of the era.
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