Trespass

After several months of gigs, Genesis had enough material written and, in July 1970, retreated to Trident Studios in London to record a new album. They were joined by producer and recording engineer John Anthony. Rutherford said that Trespass was the only Genesis album where each track was contributed to by each band member equally; every other album contained songs that were written by one or two individuals, with only minor contributions from the remaining members.

The album cover was painted by Paul Whitehead, who also did the covers for the band’s next two albums. Whitehead had finished the cover and then the band added ‘The Knife’ to the running order. Feeling that the cover no longer fitted the mood of the album, they asked Whitehead to redo it. When Whitehead was reluctant to do so, the band members inspired him to slash the canvas with an actual knife. The whole thing was then photographed, but came out blue when reproduced due to lighting in the room.