Collins, Rutherford and Banks write another chapter with their new album, "We Can't Dance".

by David Wild

"Calling the new album 'We Can't Dance' is our way of staking a claim," says Phil Collins of Genesis's [sic] latest effort. "We're drawing a line in the sand and saying, 'We're over here. We can't dance. If you're fed up with what you're hearing in the current climate, then move over a little this way and check this out.' We're offering an alternative. Also, it's a title that makes people smile when they hear it."

Collins, Tony Banks and Mike Rutherford are sitting in a hotel room in Los Angeles, where they've come to do some interviews to support _WCD_, the group's seventeenth album and first new offering since 1986's multi- platinum _Invisible Touch_. A smash overseas, _WCD_ seems to be getting a relatively soft sell in the US, where it hasn't performed as well on the charts as the group's past few albums. "It's funny, in a way, to see all the big guys coming out with all the big guns blazing," says Rutherford, the group's guitarist. "It seems so business-like. They all have everything so planned, all these campaigns."

"We, on the other had, just release ours," says singer and drummer Phil Collins with a laugh. "We actually thought of withdrawing the record from the charts here. Our managers didn't like the idea. The record is selling. But it's not being represented in chart position accurately because of the way that they're doing the charts now."

Still, the group - which toured the world for much of 1986 and 1987 - does not plan on supporting _WCD_ by hitting the road right away. Instead, Genesis plans to undertake a tour of approximately sixty open-air shows starting in May. "The idea is that we want to keep ourselves entertained and interested for the length of the tour," says Banks, the group's keyboardist. "I think we felt last time we were overdoing it a bit. So that's one reason to keep it short this time. The other is just to keep ourselves sane. We've all got families, and if you're away too long, you really lose touch."

"It's not like we haven't been around," says Rutherford, referring to the band members' solo outings. "Phil did about one hundred shows on his last tour, and I did about sixty with the Mechanics last fall. So we've been out there."

Asked if the varying levels of success the band members have achieved outside the group are a source of tension and competition, Tony Banks - whose solo career has met with the least commercial response - is the first to answer. "Well, I think it's clear that I can't compete with anyone, obviously.," he says, laughing.

"I think we don't really feel competitive with each other," says Rutherford, who adds that he'd like to continue recording with Mike and the Mechanics. "I don't think music is supposed to be a competitive thing."

Still, considering Collins's [sic] tremendous popularity as a solo artist and given the long layoffs between Genesis albums, there must be lots of time to consider whether it might be a permanent vacation. "I suppose," says Banks, "You get moments of doubt. You think, 'Maybe the guys are going to get fed up with working with me,' or vice versa. Or with Mike having success, they might think that I'm sort of pissed off with the whole business, for obvious reasons. So these things go through your brain. But as far as we're concerned, the band is an ongoing concern, and those sort of doubts are the kind of thing that has happened throughout the band's history, really."

Another constant in the band's history has been bad press. "We never had a good relationship with the press," says Banks. "We've never been hip. We've never been the critics' darlings, you know. It's been a funny thing."

"We know there are people that like us," says Collins, "because the records sell. It's just unbelievable to think that there is no one writing that likes us. There are times when you read a scathing review and you think, 'Well, maybe he's right and I'm wrong.' But then you listen to the music. We were just driving back from a radio appearance, and we were listening to 'Driving the Last Spike', from the new record. And it sounded fucking great. And I was thinking, 'How can anyone hear this and actually not like it?' You don't have to say it's brilliant, but how can you say it's crap? How can you say that? It's incredible."

As a band that's survived a number of major personnel changes over the last two decades - most notably the departure of lead singer Peter Gabriel in 1975 - and evolved from a cultish art-rock outfit to a consistently platinum- producing pop-rock act, Genesis continues to confront its own history. "We are proud of our past", says Collins. "But there is a lot of baggage that comes with the name Genesis that we might prefer not to have sometimes. Genesis is a name - we have to call ourselves something. But because you bring with it all your history, your past comes behind you when you are coming through the door with a new album."

Collins says he's amused when fans still say they don't like hearing the band do short songs. "In fact," he says, "those songs are as much a part of Genesis as the longer pieces and always have been."

_We Can't Dance_ - which combines short, poppy material with some longer, artier pieces - was produced by the band with Nick Davis rather than by the group's better-known longtime associate Hugh Padgham. "We all felt it was time for a change," says Banks.

"Because of the way we work," says Rutherford, "by the time we actually start recording the album, the songs are pretty much worked out. We're open to comments, but really in many ways the songs are self-producing."

As for the future, the band members seem optimistic that Genesis has one. "This was the easiest album to write that we've done," says Collins. "It all just flowed out. The songs seemed obvious, and I enjoyed writing them. So there's reason to do another one."

And so what are listeners to make of the final track on _WCD_, "Fading Lights," which sounds like a big farewell? "In the back of your mind you always think it could be the last one," says Banks. "And if "Fading Lights" was the last track we ever did, it would be kind of poignant, wouldn't it? But it wasn't, so I think that element is there as a kind of question mark."