Hello, I Must Be Going! (album)

In December 1981, Collins's band Genesis entered an eight-month break in activity after touring their eleventh studio album Abacab (1981). He started work on a follow-up to his first solo studio album, Face Value (1981), which mainly concerned events in his personal life including his divorce from his first wife. Collins was aware that Hello, I Must Be Going! contains even greater amounts of material concerning his private life, and reasoned its concentration down to feeling guilty regarding the divorce and "to be purely sentimental about it". He described the album years later: "If my first album was 'I'm divorced and I'm miserable' ... my next one was 'I'm going to kick this fucker to bits'". However, upon meeting his second wife Jill Tavelman and releasing Hello, I Must Be Going!, Collins noted a change in his songwriting: "[I'm] happier [...] I write happy songs now". Artwork The album's sleeve contains various photographs from Collins's family life, which he had also done for Face Value (1981). He also continued the visual style of Face Value with a facial close-up as the cover image - this time showing Collins' face in profile, with its mirror image on the reverse cover (the original CD release of the album placed this on the insert card instead). The handwritten notes were also a feature carried over from Face Value. Collins wanted both albums to be a "matching set, something that felt like it was from the same bloke". Included is a picture of his young son Simon in a Superman costume, which Collins found humorous to include but later found that some people misinterpreted it as focusing the album too much on his personal life. ==Critical reception==

Hugh Fielder of Sounds praised Hello, I Must Be Going! as "a broader, stronger and better executed follow-up to Face Value", writing, "The original inspiration may be second-hand but the execution and character is entirely his." NME writer Graham K. Smith was less enthused, criticising the lyrics as excessively self-pitying and the music as steeped in "blatant textbook commercialities"; he found that the album "resoundly collapses between the two stools of 'meaningful rock' and disposable pop, wallowing in all the worst aspects of both with none of the saving graces". Retrospectively, AllMusic critic Stephen Thomas Erlewine stated that Collins "began to inject his highly melodic pop songwriting with more soul and R&B influences" on Hello, I Must Be Going!, with mixed results: "While some of the material was successful, much of it showed that he was still coming to grips with how to incorporate R&B techniques into his style." In a later review of the album for AllMusic, Tim Sendra was more favourable, deeming it "a winning follow-up that shows Collins to be in full control of songwriting and production". ==Tour==

Collins supported the album with a concert tour of Europe and North America between November 1982 and February 1983. He performed with a nine-piece band ==Reissue==

The album was re-released using a flat transfer done by Steve Hoffman for the Audio Fidelity label in 2011 on Gold CD. The album was also reissued as part of the Take a Look at Me Now series of Collins studio album remasters during 2016, with a new second disc of bonus songs. ==Track listing==

Musicians Production and artwork • Phil Collins – producer • Hugh Padgham – assistant producer, engineer • Howard Gray – assistant engineer • Martyn Ford – engineer (for orchestral tracks) • Mike Ross – engineer • Ian Cooper – mastering • Trevor Key – cover photography ==Charts==

Weekly charts Year-end charts ==Certifications==