PETER GABRIEL

This is NOT a Peter Gabriel Album ? but It's Not Bad

BIG BLUE BALL is another of the Peter Gabriel's Real World projects, not a solo album by any means. As most know, Gabriel has been active in promoting world music for nearing 30 years now. In the 80's he coordinated the WOMAD festival, and his work (along with Paul Simon's) were instrumental in the world fusion surge in popularity during the 90's. Gabriel still spends most of his time recording and promoting various world artists, and this disc may have simply been a fundraiser for that effort. BIG BLUE BALL is a record of three collaborative sessions in 1991, 1992, and 1995 at Real World studios covering a huge span of musicians. Strangely, this project was not put in to finished form until 2007 for 2008 release.

There is one good Gabriel song on the album, the opener "Whole Thing." It's fairly typical of the US era, featuring plenty of world percussion along with Gabriel's big studio sound. The melodies are good, and it would have stood up as a nice album track had US had a real follow- up (which many of us would have appreciated in the mid to late 90's).

The rest of the album is a sampler of other bands and Gabriel friends. Karl Wallinger of World Party and the Waterboys actually had a large musical role in the album, and singer Joseph Arthur leads several songs. The variety is quite nice, from African voices and percussion to Middle Eastern tonalities to Celtic flavors. Some of the programming is pretty dated, with the ethno-rap "Jijy" sounding particularly dinosaur-like. Overall, this is a pleasant disc to put in on a drive, seamlessly returning to track one for a continual world beat background music. Unfortunately, none of the songs really blow me away. They are all good, but none are truly excellent aside from the world instrumentation.

It's also very hard to give this much prog cred as it wasn't released until long after these sounds were part of common culture. Even in 1995 when the last session was recorded, listeners already would have been somewhat familiar with these sounds. (Thanks in part to Gabriel's own efforts). I got the disc used and certainly don't feel cheated, but this is a non- essential novelty. 2/5 stars.

I cannot imagine what this album sounds like to someone born after 1990, as so many of Progarchives' users are. Perhaps it smacks a little too much of the early eighties (abundant use of orchestral synths and all) and it does not even have the advantage of sounding "quaint" and "antique", like early Genesis.

But if you can reconcile yourself with its unique idiom, there are a lot of treasures to be found. Generally speaking, Gabriel continues in the (largely) experimental style that characterised his third solo album, but where PG III was dark and ominous, PG IV is life-affirming, predominantly festive, exultant even. I tend to see III as black-and-white, but IV is in vibrant multicolor.

Many of the tunes here are among the best Gabriel has written. In any retrospective box set of his work, I would definitely include "The Rhythm Of The Heat", "San Jacinto", "I Have The Touch" and "Kiss Of Life". Only two tracks turn out to be a disappointment. "The Family And The Fishing Net" purports to deal with Weighty Themes, but as a piece of music it simply doesn't stand up; and "Wallflower" is a rather bland and unconvincing ballad.

By the way, have you noticed how Gabriel keeps returning to that triumphant climax of "Supper's Ready"? We've seen the gorgeously symphonic second half of "Humdrum" on his first solo album, and now he uses a similar effect in "San Jacinto", surely one of his strongest compositions. Once a symphonic progger, always a symphonic progger; in spite of all those fashionable New Wave trappings!

A VERY wonderful album indeed. There is an excellent cover of "Philadelphia" by Neil Young from the "Philadelphia" soundtrack, which Peter contributed to, so if the proposed "response" album, tentatively called "I'll Scratch Yours" does materialize, hopefully Neil will cover "Love Street". I was also happy to see him cover Randy Newman, an artist he has referenced ever since "Waiting For the Big One" on "Car". I would also like to have seen him do justice to "A Whiter Shade of Pale", since he used to cover it when he first went solo, and I also would have liked a version of "I Heard It Through The Grapevine", since he covered that as well. Still, his cover of Radiohead is wonderful (and they may cover "Wallflower" apparently), and Peter doing Elbow????...!!! This one is a keeper.

After the dark claustrophobic mood and rhythm of the preceding releases, Gabriel went into an entirely different direction. The tribal beats are still present but they operate in an entirely different sonic environment. So has a lush resonance, full of rich instrumentation, funky vibes and bright and slick sounds. It's not just a pop album; it's the perfect pop album, one of the best ever.

While it isn't as unique as Security, it has equally amazing songwriting. Regardless whether it concerns melancholic anthems like Red Rain, That Voice Again, In Your Eyes and Mercy Street, or MTV hits such as Sledge Hammer and Big Time, a sentimental duet with Kate Bush or more experimental pieces like We Do What We're Told and This is the Picture; Gabriel pulls if all off with amazing easy, never faltering, never missing a beat.

He must have had one brilliant flash of inspiration after the other during this recording. Not only did he nurture every single idea that crossed his mind with the utmost care, he also managed to keep things to the point and effective. Quite an achievement given the extensive list of guest musicians that helped to flesh out the sound.

This album is a marvel of song arrangement; it's varied and lavish but it stays clear of pretentiousness. Yes it's accessible, commercial and successful. Three words that tend to sit unpleasantly with fans, but let that not scare you; it fully deserves all praise and success it ever got. 4 solid stars

Birdy is an 1983 soundtrack of the movie of the same name. It consists mainly of an instrumental reworking of themes and melodies of the two preceding albums, but there are also some new pieces composed for the occasion.

It's a mesmerizing and ambient album, with sparse instrumentation and lots of new sounds. The opening At Night only has some slow repetitive percussion and some dark dry chords on what sounds like flutes and a mellotron that was smothered under 10 blankets to muffle the sound. Brilliant. Pieces like Quiet and Alone, Slow Water, Slow Marimbas and Sketch Pad maintain a similarly gagging claustrophobic mood.

Most of the remaining tracks are derived from known songs. While they are certainly deserving, they list among the sort of things fans have more need for then anyone else. But when it comes to soundtracks this is up there with the best, Birdy is an amazing album but should be approached with an open mind. 3.5 stars

What got into Peter? Right from the first second this album nails your head to the floor. After two directionless albums, the forceful percussive beat and weird instrumentation of Intruder is the most exciting thing Gabriel had recorded in his entire career. Regardless how good he was with Genesis, this album writes music history, almost for its entire 45 minute length.

The most remarkable innovation is the world music inspired percussion. Jerry Marotta was forbidden to use any cymbals and the resulting effect of the dry and powerful tribal rhythms is crushing. Some uncanny guitar, piano chorus effects and amazing vocals create a stunning masterpiece. Most of the album follows in the same path, combining clever songwriting with African percussion and beats. Highlights are plenty, No Self Control, Games of Frontiers and Biko are well known classics, but also the upbeat I Don't Remember and Not One Of Us never cease to amaze me. The minimalist Lead A Normal Life is very powerful, even if it just has some repetitive piano, vibes and Gabriel's distorted vocals in the background. Actually, only the awkward And Through The Wire reminds us of the albums that preceded.

While not his best in my book, this is easily Gabriel's most defining album, it's a groundbreaking experiment that is blessed with superb compositions, originality and unconventional musicianship. Prog was dead, but music was alive and kicking in 1980.

Gabriel's solo career took an awkward start. I don't know what people expected, but from whatever point of view you look, be it past or present, this debut is an odd album. It was a huge step away from the prog rock of Genesis and compared to his later famous albums it's still a pretty standard art rock affair. In a way that means it's a unique item in Gabriel's career.

The compositions and vocals are adequate but never amazing. Moribund for instance is an adventurous tune, I especially like the creepy I will find out section, but the arrangement of the chorus is a bit overblown, like something Lou Reed would do in an orchestral mood. Apart from Salisbury Hill and Here Comes The Flood the album mainly consists of classic rock styled anthems and ballads that are too unremarkable to grasp my attention.

I've never found much charm in the art-rocking direction Gabriel started his solo career with. It was a field that was already occupied by superior performers such as John Cale and David Bowie. At least, this first one is a sincere and personal start of an exciting solo career and will probably sit well with people who like the 70's classic rock sound more then I do. 2.5 stars

On his second solo album, Gabriel goes all punk. The year was 1978 and the first generation of punk bands had already stormed over the country. Gabriel had his ears open to what was happening around him. Assisted by that other genius, Fripp, he went in a vastly more rough and harsh directions then on the debut.

While the move to left is surely worth some praise, the result leaves much to be desired. Clearly this wasn't the kind of stuff he felt really comfortably with, there are a number of pleasant songs such as On The Air and DIY but they don't measure up to the more adventurous and angry stuff Peter Hammill released in the same year. Mother of Violence is like a lost song from Nursery Crime. It fits awkwardly after the vehemence that preceded but it's a nice tender song.

It's quite hard to make out what the purpose was behind of the remainder of the tracks, most of them sound like weak filler tracks and leftovers. Only the more experimental tracks like White Shadow and Exposure (which also features on Fripp's solo album of that title) are interesting but hardly a compelling listen.

I can not imagine how this album was received back in '78. Maybe the only purpose was to release something that was as remote from prog as possible, something that nobody would have minded had it been good. But really, it's hard to see this as more then a collection of uninspired song writing. 2.5 stars

Review 2 in a while, Peter Gabriel II

Peter Gabriel II is a spectacular effort to alienate listeners old and new. The series of problems that are the production (Fripp's rather idiosyncratic approach to the material here doesn't really do a good job of emphasising strengths and leaves the busier songs feeling messy), the vocals (Gabriel's voice is always under the same effect in this one, which makes it rather difficult for him to actually express most of the songs very well), the lyrics (now, Gabriel's lyrics past and future were excellent. Here he seems to be on the verge of moving to the more direct approach he'd adopt in the future but with neither the interest nor the powerful central images he so excels with) are mildly redeemed by the quality of a few of the album's better numbers and the sort of cumulative power that all these idiosyncrasies build over a listen. Worth picking up if you're a serious Gabriel fan and have the acknowledged classics; it has grown on me, given time, but in a sort of sideways direction that baffles and bemuses as much as it entertains.

On The Air is one of the album's little highlights, introducing Fripp's production by a little sensitive needling with the synthesiser breaking under the hard guitar/bass riff (some great little embellishments by Levin here). Gabriel's vocals add little more than a general angry buzzing interchanged with some slightly contorted theatricals, thankfully obscuring the rather misfired lyrics. Fripp's solo is rather neat (if a bit undermixed). On the other hand, DIY, the album's second hard rock number is equally dim but not quite so winning... there's an oddly decent version on Plays Live... here only Levin's bass really comes across very strongly and the vocals sound like they've been sung from inside a well-padded box.

Thankfully, that's really the only song that's a bit bland to sit through, and compensated for by the gorgeous Mother Of Violence (an icy little duet between acoustic guitar and piano... something I'm usually not a fan of, but it works here... and Fripp adds his yearning electrics over the top and a couple of interesting insect humming bookends), probably the only song on this one that a Gabriel fan really needs to hear and arguably his most winning acoustic piece.

Thereupon, the album's on its up... possibly the most satisfying section with the quirky bass-driven pop song Wonderful Way In A One-Way World and the thumping orientally-flavoured rocker White Shadow (with some truly superb multi-part riffs, one hell of a Fripp solo and a bit of an unhelpful synth-based introduction). Indigo opens the shorter still side two... a rather inoffensive little piano number seemingly adding a slightly more personal touch to the album's rather thin commentary on commercialism that clumps into a clunky chorus/break then suddenly explodes back in with an unanticipated emotional grip ('All right, I'm giving up the fight/I didn't know when I'd be a stranger again in my own land'). Eventually, it works out as a relatively satisfying piece with some cool side-melodies (listen out for the background guitar and synths... they're not exactly pointed out by the production. Animal Magic is possibly the closest to conventionally catchy the album gets... a slightly odd rock-and-roll inspired piece with Levin in the foreground and some snarly Gabriel vocals, great aggressive guitar, a comparatively convincing lyric. A highlight.

And yes, Exposure is the Gabriel/Fripp collaboration at its most extreme. A hypnotic rhythm, typically entrancing Frippertronics (i.e. a series of guitar loops designed to kill airplay), the first really effective use of Marotta's thick drum style and Gabriel just drawing out every possible idea, syllable and quality of the word 'exposure' before freaking out at the end. It's really something to observe. Levin's bass is also a blast. I'm sure many, many people will be rightly concerned by this; I think it's fantastic.

Flotsam And Jetsam continues in the slightly more experimental vein with a neat vocal yawning and some Marotta/Levin intensity. Almost a shame that Gabriel's boxed-in vocal and the rather persistent but superfluous piano cut away any power I think the song could have achieved. As it is, only the cutesy solo at the end really touches.

Perspective; the padded box is back in vogue for another piano rock song. Don't really feel there's much content in the basic song, though the sax, guitar and so forth are fun and it gives an opportunity for the band's musicianship to blow away suitably. Passable for what it is but really not doing anything interesting. And if you're sort of entertained enough by this point, Home Sweet Home sort of unifies the whole thing in a typically odd and fascinatin' moral 'dilemma' (dilemma isn't the word...let's try quandary?). It's a sort of piano ballad with half a million ambient touches (organ, harmonies, guitar, little rhythm section additions) fluctuating in the background.

Peter Gabriel II is not the finest 42.3 minutes of a very fine musician (and backed by a number of very fine musicians) but, at the same time is mostly enjoyable, has a couple of standouts and a couple of flumps. A fans mostly rating... 2 stars

Rating: Two stars, 9/15 (I have an odd scale, to be honest... 14/15 will usually be a 5, 12/13 will earn a 4. Thereafter it all gets a bit abstract... Favourite track: Mother Of Violence

Review #1 in a while, So, Peter Gabriel

So what? It's always slightly annoying when the closest thing to a cheap pun doesn't really fit your opinions (the other one I've always wanted to use was PG tips... I blame a childhood deprived of the fourth series of Blackadder for this terrible sense of humour)... this then makes you write things like reviews. Still, Peter Gabriel's fifth 'real' studio album was his first real mainstream hit, and understandably so: it's a great album, has half a dozen songs that could reasonably have been hit singles (and four of which were, I think) and yet has enough odd and atmospheric stuff, innovation and idiosyncrasy to appeal to long-time fans and smug critics. And it's pretty much flawlessly produced (frankly, I'm amazed that Gabriel's production with Daniel Lanois managed to actually improve on this for Us)... every sound has effect, without ever seeming to crowd the songs.

I suppose there is some 'dumbing down' from the startling structures and raw atmosphere of PG IV (we don't hit anything quite as daring as Lay Your Hands On Me or Rhythm Of The Heat) and the lyrics have also lost some of their mystical grip... I guess Gabriel's new directness leans on his voice the central idea generally being strong enough to sort of spread its mood to the fairly haphazard phrases supporting it and on So, that's not always the case. However, there's also a lot of bigging up on So... the ambience is far more consistent and less naked than on IV, which makes for a more satisfying unity: the 'pop' sensibilities feels linked to the experimental sensibilities. And, most of all, Gabriel's confidence and the tightness of the band(s) is phenomenal... there's really no sense that Gabriel is ever holding back here, which makes even the songs which don't really have much to say oddly moving and the ones which do devastating.

From the opening of Red Rain we are hit by this confidence: it's big, bombastic, catchy, interesting and, most of all, punchy music. The inversion of the grandiose crushing waves of drumming (Stewart Copeland adds some fantastic hi-hat work to Jerry Marotta's clattering drums) and searing vocals descending to the sad showers of piano over a lonely voice at the end. Perhaps could have been cut down, but I can't really think of any moments which don't have something I'd miss. The quality of the synths and treated percussion is only improved from IV and it's overall a superb opener, though I'm not perhaps as keen on it as others here. The confidence hits even harder in the slowly building Sledgehammer, which you've probably heard... a rolling funky song with a seriously awesome bit funky bass/guitar riff, blaring horns and a lead vocal and lyric so infectiously fun that it maybe clouds just how good the music behind it is... the flawless incorporation of the bizarre flute intro into the main song, the little organ melody rolling in at the end, the cool overdub harmony on sledge. While this is an undeniably 'pop' song and probably Gabriel's most notorious hit, I still don't think I've heard anything quite like it.

Contrasting to these two is the lush atmospherically underlined duet Don't Give Up. The matching of Gabriel's increasingly searching and strained vocals meeting Kate Bush's astoundingly sweet and soft replies is just perfect and the idea of the lyrics is here really moving. Credit for the piece's effect goes also to Richard Tee's crisp piano, Levin's smooth, funky, vaguely tragic stick-work and Manu Katche's immensely tasteful percussion. Just incredible.

That Voice Again is the one piece of the album that stands out as not really being particularly great. It's not especially bad, but the melodies just don't strike through, and the contrast of the moments of general shiny threat and the bright shiny chorus feels rather too clunky. And the lyrics just aren't very effective for me. There are a few features I really like... Levin's basswork (and I find it hard to criticise the drumming either), the incredible 'listen to the wind' vocal answer, the rather dark conclusion, but as a whole piece it just doesn't really satisfy.

In Your Eyes simply blows away any doubts left over from the previous piece... I have to admit I probably made myself like the first chorus by sheer force of will... not that I ever particularly disliked it, but I felt that it didn't really match up to the heartbreaking opening. There are very few openings that compare to the way Gabriel introduces 'Love... I get so lost... some-times...' over the rising piano and percussion pairing... and then the way it comes back later is even more powerful. And the chorus keeps building power, too... if I find it a little too light initially, when Levin's bass, Youssou N'dour's backing vocals, the extra drums and the synths come in it moves from heart-wrenching to heavenly.

And Mercy Street: understated and mired in sadness. The cold, lost lead vocals contrast with soft, strange harmonies (my favourite vocals by Gabriel, ever). The percussion is as unobtrusive as any continual rhythm could be, blending in with a whistling sound and the bass (Larry Klein's) has a power over the heart here that I've never really associated with that instrument. And the 'solos' (synthesiser and treated sax) are matchingly soft, sad and unobtrusive. Words really fail to describe this piece (while we're on it, the words of the piece are very striking, 'nowhere in the corridors of pale green and grey/nowhere in the suburbs in the cold light of day/there in the midst of it so alive and so alone/words support like bone').

Big Time flows astonishingly well from this utter immersion, snapping straight out with its awesome basslines (I mean, Levin is usually awesome but here he's just on fire... I guess that's the collaboration with Jerry Marotta on the 'drumstick bass' sound), thunking percussion and Gabriel's deliciously ironic 'HI THERE'. A sharp narcissistic mockery of narcissism, with some hilarious lyrics, the snappy Big Time is really not all that much like Sledgehammer if you actually listen to it rather than assuming that any song with occasional gospel backing and some horns will be the same. Loadsa fun. We Do What We're Told is barest piece on the album with freakily singular vocals, and a virtually purely atmospheric backing with the melody stuck more into the percussion than anything else. Hits a distinctly creepy mood.

This Is The Picture, a duet with Laurie Anderson is something completely different again, catchy as any of the more overtly 'accessible' songs and with a delicious sort of interplay between the two singers' slightly gravellier voices and (again, Gabriel's vocals are incredible) their more soulful seconds. As the lyrics go, it's excellent nonsense that really gives an opportunity for the vocals to move around into a lot of different oddity. And the little synth melody and cool bass part are just perfect. Great way to end an album (or at least the remaster?).

So, four stars. I love everything except That Voice Again, though I guess I'm slightly colder to the still superb Red Rain than the remainder of the material. There's a lot to commend So for, and I think it's comfortably Gabriel's most unified effort to that point, even if it's not my favourite. As for the whole pop/prog/SELLLLOUT debate... I really think the possibilities of (very commercially successful) pop music are much wider than people sometimes think, and here Gabriel has demonstrated that with an album of music that can't really be categorised single-mindedly as pop, prog, rock or world. So is an album you should probably have, if only to bear witness to that.

Rating: Four Stars... virtually essential but not quite perfect. Favourite Track: Mercy Street