Phil Collins didn’t like Emerson, Lake & Palmer

Phil Collins became part of the Genesis in 1970, as a drummer, and five years later, when Peter Gabriel he left, he also became the band’s singer. Before moving towards decidedly pop sounds in the 1980s, the English band was linked to the progressive rock movement.

Among the most celebrated prog rock groups, today as then, are the Emerson, Lake & Palmerbut Phil Collins he’s never been a big fan. And he wasn’t even a big fan of the drummer Carl Palmereven though he was his friend and he really liked him as a person. One of the first times Collins expressed his opinion on ELP was in 1973, in the midst of the prog era. In an interview he was asked what he thought of the Award-winning Forneria Marconia prog band that was also very popular in Great Britain at the time.

Phil Collins he replied very bluntly: “They were good, but now I don’t like them so much anymore. They’ve become too much like ELP for my taste. I don’t like ELP. I don’t like how they are, as people… Emerson is good. I don’t like Carl Palmer’s drumming, I don’t like the music. It’s too neurotic. And it’s too much on one level. For me it’s all like “Karn Evil #9″.”

Phil Collins
he continued, still talking about ELP: “To be honest, I haven’t listened to ELP much. But from what I’ve heard and seen backstage, I don’t like them. I would never doubt that they’re excellent musicians. I don’t like the kind of things ELP have done. But the sound on the record is great. Of all three of them, I like Emerson, mostly because he says nice things about us.”

A long time later,
Phil Collins
he hadn’t changed his mind about
Emerson, Lake & Palmer
. In a 2014 interview, he once again reiterated that it was not a group that was among his favorites. “I used to be a big Yes fan, now less so. Even though I like the guys in the band, I didn’t really identify with their music after the first two or three albums. Jethro Tull, ELP aren’t for me musically. I’ve never been a big Floyd fan. I’ve probably become more of a Floyd fan in the last few years than I was back then, even though I saw them at the Marquee with “Arnold Layne”. I knew what they were doing. But I didn’t I’ve never been a real fan. I was in a band that was always put in the same group as everyone else. But I never had the feeling of really being in the same group. But we probably were.”