Genesis

The Way We Walk - Volume Two: The Longs)

 

  1.Old Medley:
    Dance on a Volcano
    The Lamb Lies Down on
    Broadway
    The Musical Box
    Firth of Fifth
    I Know What I Like
  2.Driving the Last Spike
  3.Domino
  4.Fading Lights
  5.Home By The Sea/
    Second Home By The Sea
  6.Drum Duet 
  

Released a few months after its companion piece, The Way We Walk: Volume Two – The Longs was a welcome and rather magnanimous gesture toward the faithful. Genesis, now at the commercial summit of their career, might easily have opted for expediency—issuing a single disc of hits, or a bloated double album priced accordingly. Instead, they offered choice. With Volume One satisfying the casual listener, Volume Two catered directly to the loyalists—those who remembered Selling England by the Pound as vividly as Invisible Touch.

The format itself was telling. No radio singles, no crowd-pleasing singalongs—just extended compositions, old and new, given room to breathe in a live context. And Genesis, more than most bands of their era, had always excelled at expanding and enhancing their long-form material on stage. Earlier live documents like Seconds Out and Three Sides Live had set a high benchmark. Happily, The Longs rises to meet it.

The centerpiece here is the Old Medley, a brilliantly woven tapestry of pre-1983 material, performed with both affection and precision. Though the individual songs—Dance on a Volcano, Firth of Fifth, I Know What I Like among others—had already featured prominently on past live albums, there is a freshness to their presentation here, a renewed energy that elevates them above mere nostalgia. It's not a note-for-note rehash, but a reimagining that rewards attentive listening.

The newer material holds its own admirably. Driving the Last Spike and Domino both benefit from the live setting, where dynamic shifts and instrumental interplay add layers not always evident in the studio versions. Phil Collins, often dismissed during this period as a pop merchant, reminds the audience of his considerable vocal range and stamina, while Tony Banks and Mike Rutherford remain as solid and inventive as ever.

Then there is the Drum Duet—a staple of the band’s live shows by this point, and a thrilling example of musical camaraderie. Collins and long-time touring partner Chester Thompson trade licks with effortless syncopation, proving yet again that Genesis was not a studio-bound creation but a performing unit capable of genuine excitement. It’s an interlude that could have felt indulgent; instead, it’s electric.

Notably, the band used these two volumes to present nearly the entirety of their We Can’t Dance tour setlist—excluding only a few tracks, notably Dreaming While You Sleep and Turn It On Again. But even these omissions seem minor when one considers the overall generosity of the release. For those seeking the full visual and chronological experience, a live video from the same tour was also released, offering the complete show in sequence.

Volume Two is not for the casual listener, nor was it meant to be. It is a carefully curated homage to the band's progressive origins and a demonstration of how those roots still informed their later work. If Volume One was the public face of Genesis in the early ’90s, Volume Two was the heart—and, arguably, the better of the two.

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