page_title: The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway
section_title: Writing
hierarchical_section_title: The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway / Production / Writing
caption_attribution_description: Zdjęcia zrobione podczas III Life Festival w Oświęcimiu.
context_page_description: The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway is the sixth studio album by the English progressive rock band Genesis, their last with frontman Peter Gabriel before his departure in 1975. It was released as a double album on 18 November 1974 by Charisma Records. It tells the story of Rael, a Puerto Rican youth from New York City who embarks on a journey of self-discovery, and encounters bizarre incidents and characters along the way. During the writing and recording sessions Gabriel, who insisted on writing all of the lyrics, temporarily left the group in order to work with filmmaker William Friedkin; this put strains on the rest of the band.
  The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway was released to a mixed critical reception, though it afterward received acclaim and has gained a cult following. It peaked at No. 10 on the UK Albums Chart and No. 41 on the US Billboard 200. Two singles were released in the UK, "Counting Out Time" and "The Carpet Crawlers", while the title track was released as a single in the US. Genesis promoted the album with their 1974–1975 tour across North America and Europe, playing the album in its entirety across 102 dates.
context_section_description: Before discussions were held regarding the album's contents, the band decided to record a double album, for the extended format would give them the opportunity to improvise and put down more of their musical ideas. A single album with songs telling "bits" of a story was an option that did not appeal to them. Banks thought Genesis had gained a strong enough following by this point to put out two albums' worth of material that their fans would be willing to listen to. They had wanted to produce a concept album that told a story for some time, and Rutherford pitched an idea based on the fantasy novel The Little Prince by Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, but Gabriel disagreed as he thought it was "too twee" and believed "prancing around in fairyland was rapidly becoming obsolete".
  Gabriel presented the group with a more complicated and surreal story about Rael, a Puerto Rican youth in New York City, and his spiritual journey of self-discovery and identity as he encounters several bizarre incidents and characters along the way. Gabriel had first thought of the story while touring North America in the previous year, and pitched a synopsis to the group "until they agreed to do the whole thing". It was more detailed and obscure in its initial form, until Gabriel refined it and made Rael the central character. Seeking a name that had "no traceable ethnic origins", he chose the name 'Rael', but later realised the Who had previously used that on The Who Sell Out (1967); this annoyed him at first, but he stuck to the choice. As the band searched for a name they realised that "Ra" was common in male names in various nationalities. Gabriel was inspired by a variety of sources for the story, including the novel and musical West Side Story, "a kind of punk" twist to the Christian allegory Pilgrim's Progress (1678), the works of Swiss psychologist Carl Jung, and the surreal Western film El Topo (1971) by Alejandro Jodorowsky. In contrast to Selling England by the Pound, which contained strong English themes, Gabriel made a conscious effort to avoid repetition by portraying American imagery, with references to Caryl Chessman, Lenny Bruce, Groucho Marx, Marshall McLuhan, Howard Hughes, Evel Knievel and the Ku Klux Klan. He also expressed some concern over the album's title, but noted that the lamb itself is purely symbolic and a catalyst for the peculiar events that occur.
  During the writing sessions at Headley Grange, Gabriel found himself separated from the rest of the band, which caused some friction. He insisted that having devised the concept he should write the lyrics, leaving the majority of the music in the charge of his bandmates. This was a departure from the band's usual method of songwriting; lyrical contributions on previous albums had always involved the other members. This situation left Gabriel often secluded in one room writing the lyrics, and the remaining four rehearsing in another. In one instance Gabriel was unable to meet a scheduled deadline to have the lyrics finished, leaving Rutherford and Banks to write words for "The Light Dies Down on Broadway". At other times, Banks and Hackett suggested lyrics they thought would fit their songs better, "The Lamia" and "Here Comes the Supernatural Anaesthetist" respectively, which Gabriel rebuffed.
  Further disagreements arose during the writing period when Gabriel accepted an invitation from film producer William Friedkin to write a screenplay; Friedkin had taken a liking to the surreal story by Gabriel that had been printed on the sleeve of Genesis Live (1973). Collins then pitched the idea of having the new studio album be purely instrumental, thinking it would favour the other members as Gabriel had made some of their earlier songs too lyrically dense, but the idea was rejected by the rest of the group. However, Gabriel's offer from Friedkin soon came to nothing and he resumed working on the album. Matters were complicated further when Gabriel spent additional time away in London when his first wife Jill underwent a risky and difficult birth of their first child in July 1974, leav
caption: The album's concept and story was conceived by the group's original lead singer, Peter Gabriel.
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