With years of hindsight, it’s safe to say that Phil Collins has earned his spot as an icon of music history.
Although there are countless people who would rather never have to listen to a song like ‘Sussudio’ again, there are plenty of other moments throughout his career that have changed the way most of us look at music production or soundtracked the greatest moments of people’s lives. But for all of the distinctions that Collins earned throughout his career, he never once apologised for having a knack for creating hits.
Because while Genesis was a great band before Collins bothered to get behind the microphone, it tends to become a touchy subject whenever people talk about the post-Peter Gabriel era. Collins was still a fine drummer and could keep the odd time signatures going right alongside the pop hits like ‘Follow You Follow Me’, but when he started his solo career, that’s when people started to raise their eyebrows.
Which is strange, considering that Collins didn’t want the solo career he ended up getting. When he envisioned making a solo record, he wanted to sound more akin to bands like Weather Report than what turned up on Face Value. But once ‘In the Air Tonight’ became a huge hit, the damage had been done. Everyone knew he was poised to be a superstar, and so began either the start of his dynasty or his reign of terror, depending on who you talk to.
There are more than a few great moments throughout Collins’s career, but the number-one complaint about him was how overexposed he could get. He was never looking to be one of the most in-demand artists in the world, but after hearing a Genesis on the radio followed by one of Collins’s solo hits to seeing him play with Led Zeppelin at Live Aid to watching one of his videos, most people would have rather listened to literally ANYONE else.
But that didn’t stop Collins from becoming one of the most decorated artists of all time, and he wouldn’t have traded any of those sales for the world, saying, “People just thought I was an unbearable show off. Meanwhile, the radio was playing my songs like a conveyor belt, so people simply got sick of me. [But] me, Michael Jackson and Paul McCartney are the only people who’ve ever sold 100 million records solo, and 100 million records with their previous band. That’s something I will take to my grave.”
And while most people would find that statistic even more insufferable, it’s not like his music was bad by any means. Going through his entire discography, there are too many classic pop songs to consider him one of the least interesting artists by any stretch. He wasn’t afraid to take risks, and while a song like ‘You Can’t Hurry Love’ is unbearably cheesy, it’s hard to listen to ‘Against All Odds’ without feeling something.
Even when working with Genesis, a lot of the commercial material they made was fantastic for its time. Peter Gabriel had already carved out his space as a solo star, but when comparing Invisible Touch to So circa 1986, it’s actually a much closer race than most people would like to admit.
So, despite having one of the most omnipresent faces on MTV throughout the 1980s, the fact that Collins carved out a path for himself as a solo artist can’t be denied. There are plenty of peaks and valleys going through his catalogue, but given how much work he did to become a superstar, it’s not like he hasn’t earned a spot among the legends of rock.
