Steve Hackett: Genesis Revisited – Foxtrot at Fifty + Hackett Highlights, The State Theatre, Kalamazoo Michigan, March 23, 2024.

Yet again, another Progarchist beat me to reviewing Steve Hackett’s current tour — this time by three months! I can’t complain, though; Connor’s November review and last fall’s CD/BluRay release convinced me to catch Hackett in concert for the fifth time since he resumed stateside touring in 2013. And I’d say this most recent gig — played to over 1500 fans that packed a historic downtown theatre in Gibson Guitars’ original hometown — was the best of the five.

As I mentioned the last time Hackett played West Michigan, his current band is both precision tooled and breathtakingly daring. Craig Blundell’s fleet, thundering drums propel the music forward at a thrilling pace (no click tracks here!); bassist Jonas Reingold anchors the low end with nimble melodic licks and a terrific sense of interplay; self-effacing keyboardist Roger King genuinely deserves the “one-man orchestra” label. The opening blast from Hackett’s brand-new album The Circus and the Nightwhale — dramatic overture “People of the Smoke”, giddy tarantella “Circo Inferno”, classically-tinged ballad “These Passing Clouds” — showed their remarkable range, while Rob Townsend’s woodwinds and Hackett’s lead guitar took off from that solid musical foundation with tasty, direct themes and hyperspeed unison lines.

While the initial set of “Hackett Highlights” contained plenty of reliable crowd-pleasers, my favorite was the deep cut “Camino Royale”. A funky Reingold solo spot merged into a duet with Blundell, suddenly crashing into the bold opening riff; then an extended midsection gave Townsend space to develop his most compelling solo of the night, followed by Hackett’s wildest playing — squeezing out metallic sparks one moment, launching keening, heart-piercing sustains the next.

Still, let’s face it: Hackett wouldn’t have his current touring career if he hadn’t been fervently waving the “Genesis Revisited” banner for the last eleven years. And it was the classic 1972 Genesis album Foxtrot that this audience had come to hear.

Pioneering prog at its hairiest, Foxtrot is a collection of bizarre narratives where aliens land on a deserted Earth (“Watcher of the Skies”), public housing authorities collude with genetic engineers (“Get ‘Em Out by Friday”), and an Olde English King commands the ocean waves to halt (“Can-Utility and the Coastliners”), all set to a constantly shifting, kaleidoscopic soundtrack — not exactly roots rock, either at the time or today. But true to form, Hackett and his band were up to the task. Vocalist Nad Sylvan brought his stylish, powerful voice and theatrical flair into play, evoking Peter Gabriel’s tone and inflections while making the songs his own; Blundell and Reingold consistently gave Mike Rutherford and Phil Collins’ odd-time grooves a dollop of swing; King and Townsend ably covered Tony Banks’ panoply of keyboard colors and atmospheres. And Hackett brought all the elements together and made them flow — interweaving 12-string lines with Reingold, driving the disarmingly straight-up ballad “Time Table” with a ear-catching mix of rhythm and lead work, soaring above the overall musical thrust with his unmistakable tone and touch at every opportunity.

It all came together (as does Foxtrot) with the sidelong epic “Supper’s Ready”. At the climax of Genesis’s ultimate psychedelic sonata, Hackett had the audience in the palm of his hand, riding the aftermath of the apocalypse with shuddering, triumphant fanfares as Sylvan brought home the closing verses (referencing the book of Revelation, no less):

Can’t you feel our souls ignite?
Shedding ever-changing colours
In the darkness of the fading night
Like the river joins the ocean
As the germ in a seed grows
We’ve finally been freed to get back home

There’s an angel standing in the sun
And he’s crying with a loud voice
“This is the supper of the mighty one”
Lord of Lords, King of Kings
Has returned to lead his children home
To take them to the new Jerusalem

It says something for Steve Hackett and his band that, after that big of a finish, the encore (a majestic “Firth of Fifth” followed by a playfully manic “Los Endos”) brought the crowd to an even higher pitch of delight. Well into his seventies, Hackett truly seems to be getting better and better at what he does. In my opinion, whether you’re a long-time fan or a curious newbie, you simply cannot go wrong by catching him in concert — whether on the current North American jaunt, or once he kicks off the next Genesis Revisited tour cycle (starting in Europe this summer and featuring 1974’s concept album The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway).

— Rick Krueger

Setlist:

• People of the Smoke
• Circo Inferno
• These Passing Clouds
• The Devil’s Cathedral
• Every Day
• A Tower Struck Down
• (bass solo – bass/drum duet)
• Camino Royale
• Shadow of the Hierophant (closing section)
• Watcher of the Skies
• Time Table
• Get ‘Em Out by Friday
• Can Utility and the Coastliners
• (acoustic guitar solo)
• Horizons
• Supper’s Ready
• Firth of Fifth
• (drum solo)
• Los Endos/Slogans