A Revelation! Genesis Footage Finally Made Available From 1974 "The Midnight Special"

Peter Gabriel-led prog legends actually appeared on "safe," mass-appeal concert show. Now, we finally have the official, high-quality video from the source! The congregation may rise...often.

Peter Gabriel and his reverse mohawk circa 1972. His make-up, masks, and outrageous costumes for the early-70s Genesis helped gain the band front page coverage in UK rock tabloids (NME, Sounds, Melody Maker). Their decidedly far-from-the-mainstream, sophisticated sound was otherwise being roundly ignored until Gabriel discovered stage makeup, a gifted designer, and his wife’s red dress.

This Just In…

Word has just come down from on high (or at least from LouderSound.com) that “Genesis are the latest act to be uploaded to The Midnight Special’s ever-growing online archive—classic footage of ‘The Musical Box’ and ‘Watcher Of The Skies’ are now online,” and right here, now.

Previously, only poor-quality VHS rips or the like had been available. Now, we have original source material…in hand.

In the Beginning…

The Midnight Special was a late-Friday-night NBC-TV (U.S.) taped-live concert show (no lip-synching here…that was American Bandstand and Soul Train territory) that began its regular series run on February 2, 1973 (following its premiere as a Special in mid-August 1972). It went off the air over eight years later, on May 1, 1981, exactly 3 months before MTV kicked off its landscape-altering visual stampede.

Hosted by longtime radio personality, Wolfman Jack (above), the show began its early ‘73 run of 90-minute episodes featuring mostly “safe,” middle-of-the-road, milquetoast artists…think Mac Davis, Helen Reddy, John Denver, Three Dog Night, and the like.

Related: In August 1974, Wolfman Jack saw Elvis Presley in his heralded concert at the Las Vegas Hilton. He also went up to meet Elvis after the show. Joining Wolfman at the show, in the elevator, and in Elvis’s penthouse to meet The King, was FR&B’s key contributor, Elvis’s RCA Records label-mate, Stephen Michael Schwartz. Stephen tells the story of that memorable night here, in his own words:

Schwartz Stories #1: Viva Hilton! Stephen Michael Schwartz Meets RCA Label-Mate Elvis Presley, Las Vegas 1974-EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW

It’s Doubtful Frank Zappa Ever Got a Call; The Fugs and GTO’s? Nah.

The target audience for The Midnight Special, quite apparently, was middle America housewives (with hit radio playing while they vacuumed), and the AM-radio office commuters. Hit radio played these artists, of course, who then got free “plugs” with their Midnight Special appearances, thereby boosting retail sales even further. MS talent procurers need not go searching for the odd, peculiar, bizarre, or experimental musical act. So, they didn’t.

Until they did.

Raising his eyes, beholds a planet unknown

My lead guitarist, David, was the first to turn me on to Genesis. I was lead singer/flutist of Brimstone, a 6-piece rock band based at Houston’s Bellaire High from 1971 through May 1973 (the complete Brimstone story comes to FR&B paid subscribers this summer).

David was always playing his latest album finds for me, and they all seemed to be the droning, noodling and experimental “progressive” rock that seemed to be all the rage in the early ‘70s (think Gong, Nektar, Camel, King Crimson, Van der Graaf Generator). Generally, I couldn’t be bothered with most of those bands’ shapeless and self-indulgent musical meanderings.

In late fall 1972, just after the release of the fourth album by Genesis, Foxtrot (Charisma Records, U.S. and UK), David invited me over to hear his new haul, Foxtrot among them. He dropped the needle on Track 1, and similar to my watching The Beatles on Ed Sullivan in February 1964 (when I was 8, eight years previous), everything changed, and I had to hear…and own…more:

On January 25, 1974 (about 14 months after my Genesis introduction, and more than enough time to become a rabid zealot of Peter Gabriel, Phil Collins, Steve Hackett, Tony Banks, and Mike Rutherford), the second season of The Midnight Special was well underway.

Genesis’s Midnight Special taping had taken place just before Christmas 1973, in the wake of a six-show, three day residency at the Roxy Theater on Sunset Blvd in Los Angeles. It was toward the end of the first North American leg of the band’s Selling England By The Pound tour. Selling England had been released in late September 1973, and by the show’s January airing, I had it more than well-memorized!

Curiously, the two songs Genesis performed for the show were from two other albums: “Watcher of the Skies” from Foxtrot, and “The Musical Box” from 1971’s Nursery Cryme album.

The show, on that night, was hosted by Capitol Records blues rocker, Steve Miller, now 79. Joining him were the following, each more “normal,” corporate, and un-costumed than the one before: Michigan rockers Brownsville Station – who performed their hit, Smokin’ In The Boys Room (which I sang many times with Brimstone) – plus Tim Buckley, the James Cotton Blues Band…and, suddenly, with nothing even close to fair warning, this:

…and shortly thereafter, this:

Less than two months after seeing this eye-popping performance on a small screen, I not only saw it live and up-close…literally…maybe 20 feet away(?), I met and chatted briefly with the man with the bat wings and rainbow cape, and even got his autograph:

Many thanks to Mark Chance, A&R for Jack White’s Third Man Records, for the original LouderSound article that inspired this article!

More Gabriel? Write Hear:

Must Listen Review: Peter Gabriel in 2023