Line #1 Music/TonyBanks


1	[[quoteright:350:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/e6da8aafc3ab02ba0faad4a9dbe33883.jpg]]
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3	Anthony George Banks (born 27 March 1950) is a founding member and the keyboardist of the rock band Music/{{Genesis\|Band}}. He is actually the only original member left in the band, with [[Music/MikeAndTheMechanics Mike Rutherford]] having come aboard after Banks and Music/PeterGabriel's founding of the band The Garden Wall. He appears to be responsible in large part for some of their weirder post-Peter Gabriel tunes as well as the more fancy ones.
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5	While he never was the face of the band, he's recognized for having authored many of its more important tunes and being (along with Rutherford) its only constant member. His creative peak could be said to be the albums ''Music/ATrickOfTheTail'' and ''Music/WindAndWuthering'', where he has a majority of the writing credits and contributed large expansive pieces such as "One For The Vine" or "Mad Man Moon". In the Music/PhilCollins era, he was still recognized as a writer for "[[EpicRocking long songs]]", notably "Domino" and "Home by the Sea". While he enjoyed giving a song breathing space and certainly did so when you let him, he did recognize that being able to create a song with a few basic chords and adequate lyrics can often be enough, and contrary to what is often new fans' first instincts didn't consider the pop turn of Genesis as a negative.
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7	The other notable aspect of his career is that he is the only Genesis member to have failed his solo career. Phil Collins became a titan of the 80's, only second to Music/MichaelJackson in sales. Peter Gabriel similarly cast an intimidating shadow. While Mike Rutherford didn't have much success with his first two albums, he did assemble Music/MikeAndTheMechanics and remained a major figure in the 80's, even restarting the machine in the 21st century. Meanwhile, Music/SteveHackett remains a respected figure in the ProgressiveRock community and continues to release albums generating a lot of buzz. Banks, meanwhile, never managed to get off the floor in spite of trying a lot of things, including synthpop. He eventually decided to try his hand at classical music and composed a number of orchestral pieces that were well received.
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9	His main solo albums include:
10	* ''A Curious Feeling'' – 1979
11	* ''The Fugitive'' – 1983
12	* ''Bankstatement'' – 1989
13	* ''Still'' – 1991
14	* ''Strictly Inc.'' – 1995
15	* ''Seven: A Suite for Orchestra'' – 2004
16	* ''Six Pieces for Orchestra'' – 2012
17	* ''5'' - 2018
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19	Other albums include:
20	* ''The Wicked Lady Soundtrack'' – 1983
21	* ''Soundtracks'' – 1986
22	----
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24	!!Tony Banks and his music provide examples of these tropes:
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26	* BoringButPractical: Tony prefers modern keyboards over retro ones like the Mellotron simply because they're much easier to manage.
27	* BornInTheWrongCentury: The protagonist of the song "Throwback" from the album ''Bankstatement'':
28	-->''I walk the backstreets''
29	-->''Of every dirty city, searching for the route''
30	-->''That leads me back to where I belong''
31	-->''I don't know how, but I'm trapped in the wrong time''
32	-->''If you know someplace I can go''
33	-->''Then I ask you, lead me to the door!''
34	%% ConceptAlbum: ''A Curious Feeling''.
35	%% DeadpanSnarker
36	%% GentlemanSnarker
37	%% GoodIsNotNice
38	%% HappilyMarried
39	* IAmTheBand: He never went on record saying this, but other people involved with Genesis were happy to say it on his behalf. Genesis manager Tony Smith always held that everyone in that band was replaceable except for Tony, and Music/PhilCollins has admitted nothing happened in Genesis without Tony's approval. In fact, if Music/PeterGabriel wanted to do something cheeky (like wear a dress and a fox's head, or sing over the solo in Supper's Ready) he had to go behind Tony's back, or Tony would have put a stop to it.
40	* LonelyPianoPiece: "In The Dark" from ''A Curious Feeling''.
41	* LossOfIdentity: This happens to the protagonist of the ConceptAlbum ''A Curious Feeling''.
42	* TheManBehindTheMan: Arguable. Despite the fact that people tend to label the band's eras as the Gabriel and Collins eras and give those two the largest share of the credit, Banks actually had the majority of writing credits in both eras.
43	%% PerpetualFrowner
44	* PopStarComposer: Banks scored the 1978 horror film ''Film/TheShout'', the 1983 Creator/FayeDunaway movie ''The Wicked Lady'' and the 1986 Creator/KevinBacon movie ''Quicksilver'' (no, not ''this'' ''ComicBook/{{Quicksilver}}'', the [[SimilarlyNamedWorks one about the bike messengers]]), among others. May be somewhat subverted, as Banks has not yet achieved the fame that his Music/{{Genesis\|Band}} bandmates and fellow [[PopstarComposer Pop Star Composers]] Music/PeterGabriel and Music/PhilCollins have.
45	* RippedFromTheHeadlines: WordOfGod says that "Strictly Incognito" from the album ''Strictly Inc.'' is loosely based on an actual case Banks read about in the newspaper.
46	* [[SanitySlippageSong Sanity Slippage Album]]: ''A Curious Feeling''.
47	* StepUpToTheMicrophone: For his second record ''The Fugitive''. Also on "Big Man" from ''Bankstatement'' and "Hero for an Hour" from ''Still''. He was also the second lead vocalist on "Shepherd", a rare early (pre-Collins and Hackett) Genesis track that never received an official studio recording (a version from a BBC session has been released on multiple box sets).
48	* TheStoic: Tony is infamously unemotive when on stage, especially when in Genesis. Even during his solo career where he occasionally sang, Tony barely emoted.

Context Music / TonyBanks