Genesis Reissues

Mike Rutherford, Phil Collins and Tony Banks at the O2 London, 26/3/02

 Genesis jumped on the Baby Boom-era buyout bandwagon that began with Bob (Dylan) and sold their publishing and masters to Concord. Just a couple months ago, their back catalogue was reissued on CD on Rhino, which is part of Warners, who own their longtime US/Canada and Phil Collins's solo label Atlantic. While the rights are now under Concords counterpart to Rhino, Craft Recordings, I thought that the indie powerhouse would have the CDs as well as new LPs be distributed by Virgin, once the bands international and Collins's UK solo home and now Universals distribution division for independent labels, of which the original Virgin was until it was sold to EMI in 1992 so Richard Branson could keep his airline from entering administration and compete with British Airways.

 While it takes a period for these buyouts and transitions to bear fruit, I found out when I saw a new CD of A Trick of the Tail at Barnes & Noble. Then saw on Discogs that most of the studio albums are now available on the new label. Now we wait for new LPs, even though I just need the last two because they originally came out in the '90s, when fewer people bought them anymore, and later albums and editions can be expensive, new or used. The first two albums are an exception. From Genesis to Revelation has been reissued a thousand times and was not owned by the band. Trespass is still controlled by Universal in North America as they are the successor to original label ABC (until the sale, it was under the same roof globally). Then the label designs since there's no scans of the new versions available and I have all the old CDs from different parts of the world, so unless the original release had a custom label like Duke, could the Charisma Alice in Wonderland one be used (Universal and Warners have licenced each others labels for Beatles and Syd Barrett reissues since EMIs split in 2013). Then there are the live albums and compilations (including boxed sets), as well as solo releases from the three longtime members. Now we wait and see which of their peers will cash out next.