Mike Rutherford – Bass

Mike Rutherford is a very underrated musician and his bass playing is like the second dog star, you cannot see it because the other star shining in front of it masks the light coming from behind it. As the engine room of Genesis, Rutherford has been the bass behind some legendary musicians including Peter Gabriel, Phil Collins, Tony Banks and Steve Hackett but time spent focussing on the work of the tall gut at the back is time well spent. His work on the Three Sides Live version of The Cage is one of many highlights but there are so many examples of his work that are worthy of note. This probably isn’t one of them. ‘Misunderstanding’ was (and still is) a Phil Collins tune that many saw as the beginning of then end of the best era of Genesis and evidence of Collins’s own pop proclivities. It is, however, a relatively easy read, once you get past the challenges of reading 12:8 (try thinking of it as a triplet feel in 4:4 and that will get you through most of it). Note: this is the ‘Three Sides Live’ version of the tune rather than the one off ‘Duke’ so there is the additional tag ending but, otherwise, there is not much difference.