AFTER THE ORDEAL

Despite what the title may appear to imply, this instrumental has nothing to do with the battle described in the previous song. It was written by Steve, and he’s the main player on guitars: a nylon-string in the initial section and electric later on.

Hackett: “It was really designed as an electric tune, but for some reason we couldn’t make it work. It could have just been a section in another electric song, but we didn’t manage to do that, so we were not going to record it. Then in the studio Tony came up with his part, and on the spot we decided to switch it to an acoustic tune where I would play the electric line on the nylon guitar instead. This was the first time the nylon started to creep into Genesis music, both here and with the return of the theme on Aisle Of Plenty.”

Banks: “I really don’t like it, I’ve never liked it, and I would have liked it not to have been on the album. In the end we compromised by putting everything we had on the album.”

Hackett: “I know Tony hates it and thinks it’s the worst thing that Genesis ever did. I could point out many other moments that I think are a lot weaker, but, as a diplomat, I won’t. All I can say is that in Cinema Show I think the keyboard solo is far too long. There was a contest as to whether we were going to let the keyboard solo be on the album or not. Other people didn’t want

After The Ordeal on. We were all fighting each other, we were all emphatic that we wanted our ideas on. I don’t think they were used to me coming on as strong as them. I was thinking: ‘Fuck it! This is a really strong guitar album and I don’t want to have it diminished just because someone else thinks their part is more important.”