Last week’s Start Your Weekend Right featured the Phil Collins incarnation of the band Genesis, which got me thinking of the earlier, Peter Gabriel version of Genesis. Genesis started with Peter Gabriel, keyboardist Tony Banks, bassist and guitar player Mike Rutherford, lead guitarist Anthony Phillips, and drummer Chris Stewart. Generally regarded as a band on the leading edge of “Progressive Rock,” that original lineup sadly didn’t last. Peter Gabriel left in 1975 to pursue a solo career.
My original intent was to feature the first incarnation of Genesis. Pickings are lean for that earlier Genesis, though, while some great Peter Gabriel tunes are going around. So this week, we present two Peter Gabriel-Genesis tunes – boy, did he wear some weird costumes – and four Peter Gabriel tunes from the post-Genesis era.
See Related: Start Your Weekend Right With 6 Great Songs From Phil Collins/Genesis
With Genesis:
The Musical Box (1971): A long tune, with an original in-studio recording time of 10:29, this cut is from Burt Sugarman’s famous TV show, “The Midnight Special.” Probably to fit the show, this performance was cut about two minutes short. It’s still a weird, dark song, presenting an almost fairy-tale story of a girl who murders her male companion, and then is haunted by his ghost, drawn back to the mortal plane by a music box.
Watcher of the Skies (1972): This song takes its title from a John Keats poem, “On First Looking into Chapman’s Homer,” which includes the lines “Then I felt like some watcher of the skies/When a new planet swims into his ken.” It’s a brooding piece – here again is the live performance from “The Midnight Special,” which I prefer to the studio versions. And boy, did Peter Gabriel ever wear some weird getups back in those days.
See Related: Start Your Weekend Right With Five Great Live Performances From 'The Midnight Special'
Solo:
Solsbury Hill (1977): Peter Gabriel’s first single. He wrote it—so the story goes—about a “spiritual experience” he had atop Solsbury Hill in his native Somerset, England. The song's 7/4 time lends a complexity to the piece that, even in the late 1970s, one didn’t often see in a rock song.
Games Without Frontiers (1980): This may be one of the best Cold War rock songs ever. It’s not optimistic; in fact, it’s a pretty damning commentary on the Cold War, on war and diplomacy, and on international relations, that likens those efforts to kids playing with easily-broken toys. Those of us from a certain era will find familiar the clips of the “Duck and Cover” film scattered through the video.
Sledgehammer (1986): This is a little cheerier than most of Gabriel’s work. It’s a hopping, hammering tune, and was Peter Gabriel’s only number one hit on the U.S. Billboard Hot 100. It was also wonderfully lampooned by "Weird" Al Yankovic in one of his “Polka Party” variations, and that’s high praise.
In Your Eyes (1986): This tune may be the most famous for the role it played in the movie “Say Anything,” in which the young John Cusack serenades Ione Skye by standing outside her bedroom window with a boombox over his head, playing this song. The scene was wonderfully lampooned in “South Park,” where the character Stan did likewise for his girlfriend Wendy – only he played Gabriel’s “Shock the Monkey” (1982) which, in all fairness, I have to include in this selection.
Peter Gabriel is still around. He has a big shelf of awards, and apparently, he still does some live shows, which is pretty good for a guy whose musical career started in 1965.
Are there any Peter Gabriel tunes that I’ve overlooked? The comments, as always, are all yours!
