Selling England by the Pound is the fifth studio album by the English progressive rock band Genesis, released on 28 September 1973, by Charisma Records.

The group set aside a short period of time to write new material, which covered a number of themes, including the loss of English folk culture and an increased American influence, which was reflected in the title.

[9][11] Early into the sessions Collins formed a pick-up band with former Yes guitarist Peter Banks for a few gigs, and Rutherford revealed in an interview to Sounds in 1976 that "there had been worries that Phil might want to leave the group".

[14] Collins had been listening to the jazz fusion group Mahavishnu Orchestra, which influenced him to play more complicated time signatures on the drums for "Dancing With the Moonlit Knight" and other parts on the album.

[21] Hackett had not contributed a great deal of material to the group during this time, since he found it hard to write due to the breakdown of his first marriage.

The band repeatedly performed these three pieces daily for a short while which Banks thought resulted in "The Battle of Epping Forest" being too overworked.

This included his suggestion of the album's title,[25] itself a slogan adopted by the Labour Party manifesto, to ensure that the British press would not accuse the band of "selling out" to America.

[12] Burns' technical skills resulted in a good recorded sound and environment, and this motivated the group to play better and tackle more complex arrangements.

[31] "Dancing with the Moonlit Knight" evolved from a number of short piano pieces composed by Gabriel, which was combined with some of Hackett's guitar figures.

[34] Gabriel added English-themed lyrics to counter the impression from the music press that Genesis were trying too hard to appeal to the American audience, including references to Green Shield Stamps.

[35] The track was originally supposed to segue into "The Cinema Show" to make a piece around 20 minutes in length, but this idea was dropped as the result was too comparable to the 23-minute "Supper's Ready" on Foxtrot.

[34] Rutherford thought the song's opening provided a good start to the album, but felt less enthusiastic towards it overall, calling it "a bit busy".

[39] Gilbert described an early listening of the song as "Hints of quaint English romanticism" that, according to Gabriel, was initially intended to have more of a folk-oriented melody.

[46] It is performed on the album by just the song's two writers, Rutherford playing 12-string acoustic guitar with reverb effect applied and Collins singing, frequently in falsetto range.

[20][46] Upon hearing a rehearsal take of the song in July 1973, reporter Chris Welch wrote: "'The 'Battle' has a catchy march theme with typical Genesis drum and bass lines, clean and precise".

[20] As with "Get 'Em Out by Friday", Genesis wrote and recorded the entire musical composition as an instrumental before starting on the lyrics, and found that the song seemed overstuffed once the vocals were added.

[28] Though Genesis fans have suggested with varying degrees of seriousness that "After the Ordeal" was titled to reflect its placement after the interminably long and wordy "The Battle of Epping Forest", according to Hackett the title was assigned well before the band decided where to place the song on the album, and was meant to reflect its role as a simple piece which would dispel the tension from the more complex works on the album.

[16] Banks later said the compromise led to the album overrunning its desirable length on vinyl, resulting in a sound quality he thought came out as "pretty rough".

[46] Writing for The Village Voice in June 1974, Robert Christgau assessed the record as "down-to-earth progressive, which means that it indulges in snooty satire about the vulgar futility of working class youth.

[79] It was also included in IGN's list "10 Classic Prog Rock Albums" in 2008, which praised its "subtle elegance, sublime textures, and lyrical splendor".

[80] Rock author Edward Macan had mixed feelings towards the album, praising "Firth of Fifth" ("one of the finest nine and half minutes of music that Genesis ever put down") and "The Cinema Show" but questioning some of the other material.

[81] Motoring journalist and broadcaster Jeremy Clarkson is a fan of the album and wrote sleeve notes for it when it was included in the box set Genesis 1970–1975.

[63] Band friend and former roadie Richard Macphail thought the power of Genesis live had not been captured on record properly until Burns started to work with them and that by the time of Selling England, the group had acquired better equipment.

[89] In an interview, Robert Pollard of Guided by Voices said that "Selling England by the Pound is one of my top 10 records of all time" and that "Genesis with Peter Gabriel might be my biggest influence.

Initially they were to perform with a stage set that included inflatable objects that had images projected onto them, but a change in fire regulations following the Summerland disaster in August 1973 led to the idea being scrapped.

[91] Gabriel devised new stories before songs, and wore a full costume with a helmet and shield representing the Britannia character for "Dancing With the Moonlit Knight" and sang "The Battle of Epping Forest" with a stocking over his head.

This was the first major Genesis tour in which their perennial show closer "The Knife" was not a regular part of the set, though it was on rare occasions used as an encore.

[96] Instead, the band performed a five-song set in front of an invited audience at Shepperton Studios that was filmed and broadcast as Tony Stratton Smith Presents Genesis in Concert.

[99] January 1974 saw the band perform five nights at Theatre Royal, Drury Lane which saw Gabriel lifted in the air by steel wires during "Supper's Ready".

[99] Following a two-week break, Genesis spent all of March and April touring the United States and Canada, including relatively remote areas like Iowa and Minnesota.