Peter Gabriel's post-Genesis Evolution

Gabriel gets up close at Knebworth

When Peter Gabriel re-emerged in 1977 after his shock exit from Genesis, he knew he needed to find his feet as a solo performer.

By the end of the decade, his music had taken on a rockier edge, harnessing the spirit of the new wave. 

His early solo efforts were imbued more with the legacy of his progressive rock past, notably on the first solo album, Peter Gabriel.

For his return to recording after Genesis, Gabriel decided to work with American musicians and producer Bob Ezrin, best known for his work on Alice Cooper's albums such as Billion Dollar Babies, and later, Pink Floyd's The Wall.

PG at home, post-Genesis. Note the old masks

"At the time of the first album, I was nervous recording without the structure of a band and was happy to let Bob take a strong role" Gabriel told biographer Armando Gallo.

The record was much-anticipated by Genesis fans, many of whom were still getting over his leaving the band. The first single, Solsbury Hill, was a hit, rising to number 13 in the UK charts.

His first solo shows at the Roxy, Hollywood, April 1977

The song's lyrics are partly a reference to Gabriel's decision to leave Genesis, just as they appeared to be breaking into the Big Time.

He said Solsbury Hill was about "being prepared to lose what you have for what you might get. It's about letting go."

PG1

A second single, Modern Love, should also have been a hit, but somehow didn't make it onto the charts.

While he was happy with the first album, it was clear to Gabriel that he needed to take more control. Some of the record had been over-produced, in Ezrin's signature bombastic style. The closing track, Here Comes The Flood, for example, was a fan favourite, but Gabriel said he preferred the stripped-down version he recorded with Robert Fripp.

So he went in an entirely different direction, enlisting Fripp to produce the second album, Peter Gabriel. King Crimson were on hiatus at this time and Fripp had recently been working with David Bowie.

The second PG album was well-received and got into the top 10 of the UK album charts. But there was no hit single, despite a couple of strong contenders in On The Air and DIY.

PG2

For his opening live shows in the US, in April 1977, Gabriel used the core of the musicians from the Ezrin sessions. Anyone who saw Genesis touring The Lamb Lies Down On Broadway in 1975 would understandably have expected some elaborate stage costumes, but instead Gabriel chose to dress down. At the Roxy in Los Angeles, he wore a grey track suit.

Here's some original footage from those first shows at the Roxy. Notably, he does covers of Ain't That Peculiar and You Really Got Me, encoring with Back In NYC, from The Lamb.

Gabriel at Knebworth, September 1978

The live band included Fripp and bassist Tony Levin, who would become a Gabriel mainstay and a key part of the reformed King Crimson in 1981. Fripp is said to have performed all the shows from behind a speaker cabinet. He's certainly not visible on the clip linked to here.

Gabriel himself was disappointed with the second record. It wasn't the step forward he had wanted. He said of Fripp, "He's a wonderful player and a great producer with other people, but for me it didn't work out so well.

Climbing into the crowd at Knebworth...

"Bob Ezrin was thinking music-biz but Robert was anti-music biz, so I just went from one side to the other on the first two albums."

During 1978, Gabriel toured in Europe and the US, honing his new cropped-hair look with the high-vis orange vest, becoming a popular live act in the process.

Gabriel was signed up for the Knebworth festival in September 1978, on a bill with Frank Zappa, The Tubes, Boomtown Rats, Rockpile and Wilco Johnson.

...and climbing back up

Knebworth 1978

It was a lovely sunny day in Hertfordshire and Gabriel was clearly among friends. There were several 'Rael' flags in the crowd and one that proclaimed 'The Angel Gabriel'.

He didn't disappoint them, climbing up ladders and scaffolding and out into the crowd at various points, with a toy panda to sing 'Me and My Teddy Bear', as you do...

The set at Knebworth was comprised mostly of songs from the two solo albums, but included a new song, I Don't Remember, which appeared on his third album, Peter Gabriel. They also did a punk rock version of A Whiter Shade of Pale, with Gabriel playing the drums.

Getting his kicks behind the drums

The set finished with the uptempo rocker Modern Love and an encore of the Genesis classic, The Lamb Lies Down On Broadway. Here is the band in 1978 playing On The Air
and The Lamb Lies Down On Broadway

Around this time, Gabriel began experimenting with the stage diving that would evolve into the 'Lay your hands on me' track from the fourth album, Peter Gabriel.

An early stage dive

"When I am standing on stage, I can sense how far the performance is reaching the audience. Sometimes the audience appears like a large animal. When I walk off the stage (into the audience) I relate to the people one to one. I am vulnerable...on a good night I can lose myself totally."

On stage with Genesis in 1973

Gabriel finally found his sound on the third album, with the help of young engineers Steve Lillywhite and Hugh Padgham, whose experiments with the available studio technology Gabriel was happy to encourage.

PG3

Of the dry 'gated reverb' sound of the drums (played by Phil Collins) Gabriel said "it was originally Hugh Padgham's set-up and he should get credit for that.

"I remember the moment when I first heard the gated reverb. I stopped the session we were working on and said that I wanted to record that sound immediately for Intruder. I was certain that it was a landmark drum sound."

And so it proved, but not for Peter Gabriel. Instead, his old band mate took the sound for his own solo single, In The Air Tonight.

Gabriel wasn't best pleased, saying "I get angry when people say I have copied Phil's drum sound."

"Phil hadn't met Hugh before that session (on PG3). He then invited him to come and work on all of his records, which went on to become a massive international hit, in the way that 'Intruder' was never going to be."

On PG3, Gabriel worked with younger musicians from the new wave, including Paul Weller, XTC's Dave Gregory and John Ellis of The Vibrators. Gabriel continued to innovate throughout this period. His third and fourth albums are unique and groundbreaking works. He was also asked to create soundscapes and atmospheres for Alan Parker's film Birdy and for Martin Scorsese's The Last Temptation of Christ.

The 12" single release of Biko, from PG3

Gabriel wasn't afraid to use his platform to highlight human rights abuses and wrote 'Biko' in response to the death in South African police custody of the anti-apartheid activist Stephen Biko. The song was often used at the climax of Gabriel's live shows, encouraging the audience to chant in sympathy and comradeship.

He was an early adopter of the emerging digital studio technology, that allowed him to sample found sounds and indulge the fantastical imagery he first explored with Genesis. This edition of the South Bank Show has footage of him working on his fourth album and the primitive computer tech then available. 

Much of the inspiration for the new sounds Gabriel was creating came from African tribal rhythms and melodies. His respect for the unique character of what came to be known as 'World Music' led him to curate the first WOMAD festival in 1982. Many people who attend WOMAD events today around the world probably don't appreciate that it was Peter Gabriel who started it all. 

It is quite an achievement to create new sounds and remain true to your artistic goals, while remaining accessible to a wider audience. Ultimately, it's a testament to the quality of the music. The fourth Peter Gabriel album represents the high water mark for phase one of PG's solo career. He would take it to another level visually and commercial with his next album, So. 

The majority of photos in this piece are from Armando Gallo's book Peter Gabriel, published by Omnibus Press in 1986.

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See also on this blog:
Genesis On Tour in 1975 - Peter Gabriel Quits
https://bangnzdrum.blogspot.com/2012/07/coming-soon-gabriels-cosmic-juice.html 

And here's a broad-ranging long interview with Gabriel that's worth a read.

 

Genesis on tour in 1975 - Peter Gabriel quits

What does a rock singer who has dressed up as a sunflower and a creature with unfeasibly large testicles do for his next trick? If you’re Peter Gabriel, you “walk right out of the machinery” and don’t look back.

The story of Gabriel’s shock departure from Genesis played out during 1975's The Lamb Lies Down On Broadway  tour. Tensions had built up in the band owing to the fact that their singer was undeniably the star of the show and, as a result, got all the credit. Gabriel, with his funny stories and costumes, the English whimsy of his between song flights of fantasy, had gained Genesis recognition in the music press, allowing them to play to bigger audiences.

But that recognition for Gabriel created resentment among the band, who felt their contribution was being overlooked. Keyboard player Tony Banks explained it this way: “After a while the make-up and props became a blessing and a curse. There can be some bad feeling when the lead singer hogs all the attention. It can be quite hard to take for the rest of the group.”

The problem for Genesis was that they were musically ambitious and competitive but they were a publicist's nightmare; the most demonstrably un-rockstar like group you could imagine. Guitarist Steve Hackett was still sitting down on stage at this point.  

The NME's Max Bell joined the group on the European tour. He wrote that, in person Gabriel was shy and stumbled over his words. But on stage: “he strides the boards like Sir Henry Irving, an acting colossus with the audience in the palm of his hand. Ironically, he unwinds only in performance, bolting straight out of that shell.”   

In Europe, their box-office success was up there with The Stones and Led Zeppelin. But commercially Genesis were still in the second division. By this stage in their career, onto their sixth album, a double, replete with expensive cover art by Hipgnosis and a fantasy narrative penned by Gabriel, they might have expected to break out of their cult status and become a mega prog act like Pink Floyd and Yes. But they remained under appreciated at home and only truly massive in certain parts of Europe. The more this went on, the more their frustration spilled over.  Hackett told Max Bell, “We’ve played to half a million people on this European tour and we’re still bloody making it”.

‘The Lamb Lies Down On Broadway’ is the story of a New York street punk named Rael and his fantastic journey of discovery. Gabriel described it as “A series of events that could happen to somebody who doesn’t even know his sub-conscious exists”. Tony Banks had apparently come up with an alternative concept that was closer to the style of their previous albums. The decision to go with Gabriel’s idea was the beginning of the end in many ways. Gabriel said, “I felt Genesis were becoming stuck in a formula and needed to come right down to earth. When the band had accepted the idea of a single story album, we went through the routine of voting on each proposal. This was bullshit on my part, as I had already decided there was only one story I was going to develop.”

Genesis at the Shrine Auditorium, Los Angeles, January 1975

In spite of their not having achieved the same degree of success as their prog peers, Genesis had great belief in themselves. They didn’t consider it a risk to play a complete double album of unfamiliar material in their live show. 

Their confidence was justified because, especially on the west coast of America and in Europe, Genesis already had a loyal following. If you listen to the live version of ‘The Lamb’ recorded at the Shrine Auditorium in LA, there is a strong sense that Genesis were among friends. But it was Gabriel the fans had come to see. 

The story of The Lamb, such as it is, is not that easy to follow. During the live shows, Gabriel would provide the audience with short descriptions of how the story would unfold.  Musically, the Lamb is probably the band’s most diverse work, and Phil Collins is on record as saying it was the most fun to play, because of its complexity. The record also contains, especially on the first two sides, some great songs. Like most double albums there are indulgent passages but overall, if you can buy into the concept, the record is absorbing and well produced.

Melody Maker said of The Lamb: “For some fans it was a disappointment; more calculating in its surrealism and lacking the stealth and subtlety of earlier works. The music took on greater effect in their live appearances, but the show became more and more difficult to bring off to full effect. Nevertheless they performed the work brilliantly in Paris in March and not quite so well in London a few weeks later.”

The NME's Max Bell on the road with Genesis, March 1975

Max Bell’s NME article from March 1975 offers some insight to the troubled minds of the members of Genesis at this time. In their interview, Gabriel defended Genesis against what he perceived as a prejudice by rock journalists, particularly the NME.

He agreed with Bell’s suggestion that the more popular a band becomes, the more likely the press are to pull them down: “I’m surprised to hear anyone from the NME say that because it’s definitely true; The NME is the only place where we didn’t get good reviews last time. It’s obvious to me there is a lot more to music criticism than criticising music. The elevation of rock journalists to superstars proves that.”

Haven’t Genesis always laid themselves open to allegations of pretension, asked Bell. “We’re easy to put down," replied Gabriel. “You can say the characters are far-fetched, the music is over-ornate and that we’re riding on my costume success. There, I’ve done it for you.”

But Bell gave the band credit for delivering a powerful show: “Anyone who still holds the precious opinion that Genesis ain’t a rock band has their head well buried.”  He observed, though, that “the rest of the group have grown increasingly pissed off at Peter getting the lion’s share of the publicity. But while they grumble in private, they’re too reserved to force the issue.” Steve Hackett told Bell: “It annoys me when people think Peter did everything. On the last album he wrote less of the music than us.”

Gabriel as the Slipperman. Phil Collins provides vocal support

This unhappy situation in the band was compounded by the technical problems they encountered putting on The Lamb show. It was an elaborate production with three large projection screens and several costume changes for Gabriel, some of which prevented him from singing clearly. 

Banks said, “Frankly speaking, it was a bit of a disaster. The album wasn’t a big seller and the tour was dogged by equipment problems. We were trying to put on an amazing show on a tiny budget and there were many, many nights when things went wrong.”  

Budgets were clearly very tight because although Genesis toured The Lamb in the US, Europe and the UK, not one of the shows was filmed. That hasn't stopped some tech-savvy fans from piecing together the various amateur video clips and synching them with the original audio from the Shrine Auditorium show. It's quite impressive actually, click here.

 

And check out this live recording from the Liverpool Empire gig on 19th April, 1975. The version of 'The Waiting Room' is fantastic.

Max Bell concluded his NME piece by suggesting that Genesis will not compromise their art. “For a brief moment Gabriel-as-Rael and Rael-as-Gabriel coalesce into one person speaking with a common voice: “I’ll tell you something. We’re not going to be a band to sit still. We’ll self-destruct before we stop running.”

We now know that much of the behind the scenes unrest stemmed from Gabriel’s desire to pursue projects outside the band. He had been approached by William Friedkin, director of 'The Exorcist' and 'The French Connection', after Friedkin had read the sleevenotes to the Genesis Live  album. 

The two agreed to try working on some scripts. The band saw this as a lack of commitment from Gabriel and were adamant that if he wanted to go and work with Friedkin, that he should leave the band. Gabriel, for his part, as the only member of the band who was married at that time, also wanted to spend more time with his family.

The Melody Maker front page, August 16th 1975

The rift never healed and in August 1975, rumours circulated that Gabriel had quit Genesis. The MM ran a front page headline, and a few days later it was confirmed. 

In the following week’s MM Phil Collins said, “We were not stunned by Pete’s departure, because we had known about it for quite a while. We are going to carry on and we’ve been rehearsing for three weeks for the new album. It was Peter’s decision and I can only emphasise that we are carrying on as if nothing happened.”

Later on Collins would say their initial reaction was to rubbish Gabriel’s contribution to the band. They were stung into action by his leaving and were clearly determined to show the world that Genesis was more than just their singer. 

From Gabriel’s point of view, it must have been chastening to see how, almost immediately, his former bandmates produced a commercially successful album, A Trick of the Tail, and by focusing on the music, showed that there was indeed more to Genesis than funny costumes and weird stories.

For his part, Gabriel took time out before carefully re-emerging with the first of four albums called Peter Gabriel. The music was distinctly different from Genesis; edgier and, especially on albums 3 and 4, more experimental. His only nod to his old band was the lyric for Solsbury Hill (see below) his first solo single in 1977.  Playing his first shows in the US with the new band in April 1977, Gabriel wore a grey track suit.

To keep in silence I resigned
My friends would think I was a nut
Turning water into wine
Open doors would soon be shut
So I went from day to day
Tho' my life was in a rut
Til I thought of what I'd say
Which connection I should cut
I was feeling part of the scenery
I walked right out of the machinery
My heart going boom boom boom
"Hey" he said "Grab your things
I've come to take you home."

- Solsbury Hill

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Also on this blog:

Peter Gabriel at Knebworth, 1978

The Yes Album - Over 50 Years Old and Still Sounding Great

Pink Floyd's Wish You Were Here - A Flawed Diamond

Pink Floyd On Tour in 1974 and 1977