When it comes to collecting Genesis it’s hard to find stuff from before 1970. There’s nothing I can find throughout the regular channels and when I do find something it costs a fortune. Therefore, I asked my friend to dig out his stuff and he came up with something extremely wonderful: Genesis first ever poster! The poster was designed by a guy named Tim Stafell who was the bass player and singer in a band called Smile, the predecessor to Queen. Smile was formed by Brian May in 1968 and was reinforced by Roger Taylor later on. These are Stafell’s recollections of designing the Genesis poster:
Brian May’s connections at Imperial (college) ensured a steady supply of gigs for Smile (…) The band also signed to the Rondo promotions agency. “We dealt with a guy who was really plummy,” recalls Tim. “Rondo was in the same building in Kensington Church Court as Juliana’s Discotheques, which was a real up-market, toff’s disco for debts’ coming-out parties. It’s probably an oil company now. Rondo was more involved with Genesis than they were with us, in fact I once designed a poster for Genesis: a really big illustration, printed on lime-green fluorescent paper with ‘rock’-style writing.” – Record Collector, Januari ’96 (brianmay.com)
You might have guessed I do not possess this poster, but I did get to borrow this nice looking image of it – so glad I am.