I Know What I Like (In Your Wardrobe)
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| "I Know What I Like (In Your Wardrobe)" | ||
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| Single by Genesis | ||
| from the album Selling England by the Pound | ||
| B-side(s) | Twilight Alehouse | |
| Released | August 3, 1973 | |
| Format | vinyl | |
| Genre | Progressive rock | |
| Length | 11:52 | |
| Label | Charisma Records | |
| Writer(s) | Genesis | |
| Producer(s) | John Burns & Genesis | |
| Chart positions | ||
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| Genesis singles chronology | ||
| Happy The Man / Seven Stones (1972) |
I Know What I Like (In Your Wardrobe) / Twilight Alehouse (1974) |
Counting Out Time / Riding The Scree (1974) |
"I Know What I Like (In Your Wardrobe)" was the first charting single by the rock band Genesis. Its original b-side was the non-album track, "Twilight Alehouse." The single was first released in the UK in August of 1973.
"I Know What I Like" was also the second track on the Selling England by the Pound album. The song is more lighthearted and rather a moment of relief after the opening number, "Dancing With The Moonlit Knight". The Selling England album cover, which was famous in its own right, provided inspiration for the song.
Like much of Peter Gabriel's lyricism, the song tells a story. It portrays a young man, who pushes a lawn mower for a living, ("I'm just a lawn mower, you can tell me by the way I walk,") and shares his philosophies on life that he does not want to grow up and do great things, and he is perfectly happy where he is. It can be argued that the song takes some inspiration from the themes of the 1967 classic The Graduate, such as the lines "Monday morning Mr. Farmer called, said listen son, you're wasting time! There's a future for you in the fire escape trade, come up to town!" (similar to that of the infamous "plastics" line).
One of the main features of this songs is the bass, highly prominent in the mix, specially at the chorus. Guitarist Steve Hackett also uses a very unique effect at the intro and outro to the song that imitates the sound of a lawn mower. The music in general, is upbeat and pop-ish, with prominent organ tones, and similar in sound to the pieces from their previous two albums Foxtrot and Nursery Cryme, while standing out from the overall classical and acoustic sounds of the rest of the album's pieces.
This was the band's biggest pop hit for many years, and was the first tentative step towards bringing Genesis into the mainstream. Its success would not be topped until And Then There Were Three's "Follow You Follow Me," some five years later, and was (and still is) the band's biggest hit without Phil Collins as frontman.
