When you buy through links on our articles, Future and its syndication partners may earn a commission.<\/i><\/p>\n Credit: Rhino\/Craft<\/p>\n The power of a compelling narrative can propel and album into the realm of myth. The fractious and protracted recording of The Beatles<\/a>\u2019 White Album<\/a>, the bloodshot debauchery of the Stones<\/a>\u2019 Exile On Main Street<\/a>, the antagonism and power plays that fed into Pink Floyd<\/a>\u2019s The Wall<\/a> \u2013 all of those records have gained an additional dimension because of how they were created.<\/p>\n So it is with The Lamb Lies Down On Broadway<\/a>. Had Genesis<\/a> decided in 1974 that their forthcoming double LP should be Mike Rutherford<\/a>\u2019s suggestion of a musical adaptation of Antoine de Saint-Exup\u00e9ry\u2019s The Little Prince, and had Peter Gabriel<\/a> not been shown there was life outside his group, it could have all been so different.<\/p>\n They elected to go with Gabriel\u2019s idea: a concept album about Rael, a Puerto-Rican street punk in New York, who represented a congested cross-section of the singer\u2019s brain at the time. Like his full-to-bursting story on the album\u2019s inner gatefold, he also swamped the music with words, words, words.<\/p>\n Five decades on, this detailed and diffuse double enduringly divides Genesis devotees \u2013 as will this belated 50th-anniversary box set itself, with banks of keyboard warriors already hammering out how much better they would have been at compiling arguably the most anticipated reissues of the 2020s so far.<\/p>\n Like the best of Genesis\u2019 work, this box is both musical and magical. The super-deluxe edition features a remaster of the album by Miles Showell from the original 1974 tapes, various mixes of the original album, including an Atmos mix overseen by Gabriel and Tony Banks<\/a> at Real World.<\/p>\n There\u2019s also a complete live show from January 1975, an assortment of unreleased material and a hefty coffee table book on the making of the album, with input from all five band members.<\/p>\n The new remaster is crystal-clear \u2013 listen to the nuances such as Banks\u2019 electric piano shadings on In The Cage\u2019s breakdown, Steve Hackett<\/a>\u2019s attacking guitar chops on Counting Out Time and Phil Collins<\/a>\u2019 almost doo-wop backing vocals on Lilywhite Lilith. Rutherford\u2019s playing is exceptional throughout; and, given his inner turmoil and how late the project was running, Gabriel\u2019s singing is up there with the best of his career.<\/p>\n Recompiling double albums as single discs is a time-honoured pub pastime. In the case of The Lamb Lies Down On Broadway, it\u2019s easy \u2013 LP one contains some of the greatest and most inventive music the group ever came up with, and the second disc doesn\u2019t. However, in this case both need each other and are impossible to edit.<\/p>\n The idea of making a double-length collection was to stretch out and get all of their ideas across, which is why there are few albums as crammed as this one. There\u2019s little time to marvel over a solo or arrangement before we\u2019re propelled on to the next sonic and lyrical puzzle to unpick.<\/p>\n The live recording comes from LA\u2019s Shrine Auditorium during the second US leg of the Lamb tour. Widely bootlegged before being made available on 1998\u2019s Archive 67-75 box set \u2013 and here overseen by longtime Genesis sound keepers Nick Davis and Geoff Callingham \u2013 it\u2019s a delight. By this point, both group and audience were comfortable with the material; and, aware that Gabriel\u2019s departure was on the horizon, enjoying it while it lasted.<\/p>\n It reinstates Watcher Of The Skies and The Musical Box, which were absent from the previous box set version. Both sound almost prehistoric next to the Lamb material, even though they\u2019re only three and four years old respectively.<\/p>\n The three download-only outtakes offer a glimpse into the group\u2019s working methods. On the title track and Fly On a Windshield, they sound almost like a jam band, while The Chamber Of 32 Doors sees the singer run riot with his Gabrielese, the scat singing he\u2019d perform while lyrics were gestating. If nothing else, it makes clear why Banks must have been so relieved when Collins took over as lead vocalist \u2013 meaning his masterstrokes weren\u2019t constantly sung over.<\/p>\n The hardback book is full of previously unseen photographs (the shot of Gabriel modelling for the slide show is wonderful) and is beautifully assembled. As Guardian journalist Alexis Petridis interviews all five members, marvel again at the ridiculous ambition of a group of young musicians \u2013 none older than 24 \u2013 who came up with this. It underlines again just how it gave Gabriel little option but to leave the band: there was simply nowhere left for him to take it.<\/p>\n With all its many component parts and forward-thinking modernism, this most celebrated yet problematic Genesis album finally receives the release it deserves. It\u2019s even better than the Rael thing.<\/p>\n<\/span><\/div>\n