Peter Gabriel
Born
13 February 1950, Chobham, Surrey, United Kingdom
Currently
Member of
Artists United Against Apartheid, Big Blue Ball, The Garden Wall, Genesis, Peace Choir, Peace Together
Notes
Founder of Real World Records and Real World Multimedia; married to Jill Gabriel [1971-87]; father of Melanie Gabriel and Anna-Marie Gabriel
Also Known As
Peter Brian Gabriel
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1998 • Akiko Yano + Peter Gabriel + Akira Inoue + David Rhodes
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ChangSauce
"There are so many disputes over what can qualify as 'good music' these days. A song is no longer simply good because it sounds good. Is it thought-provoking? Is it innovative? Is it too derivative? Are 'interesting' and 'good' the same thing? However, like the genius that he is, Peter Gabriel summed it up perfectly: "A good song is something that makes you feel, makes you think, and, if you're really lucky, it makes you move". And, coincidentally enough, a good Peter Gabriel song makes you do all three. His intelligent lyrics spark a curiosity and an interest within your brain, his pounding drums and ominous arrangements strike you with each beat, and his infectious rhythms don't just make you want to dance, they possess you to dance. At times, it feels like no other music is as in touch and in synch with utter emotion as much as Gabriel's is."
RYM Rough Guide for Peter Gabriel
Biography
As an artist, Gabriel has never settled. He has composed albums with elements of Progressive Rock, Punk, proto-Industrial, worldbeat, and Pop. His third eponymous LP, Peter Gabriel (1980), included early and prominent use of the '80s-defining gated reverb drum sound, played by long-time bandmate Phil Collins. Shortly thereafter, Collins used it again on his legendary hit single "In the Air Tonight." That third album was also notable for its use of the Fairlight CMI sampler to sculpt elements of world music, which would define his later recordings and usher in an industry-wide fascination with the sound.
In 1986, Gabriel produced his biggest mainstream hit with the Grammy-nominated and multiplatinum-selling So (1986), which contained the #1 hit "Sledgehammer," a song whose accompanying video, "Sledgehammer," won nine MTV Video Music Awards in 1987. The album itself landed at #187 on Rolling Stone's "500 Greatest Albums of All Time" in 2003. The single " In Your Eyes" helped establish Gabriel as an '80s icon when it was featured prominently in the hit film Say Anything (1989).
After collaborations with the likes of Robbie Robertson and Youssou N'Dour, it took three years before Gabriel came back with the world music album Passion (Music for The Last Temptation of Christ) (1989), which won him his first Grammy Award, for Best New Age Performance.
In 1990, Gabriel launched his own world music–based label, Real World Records, which produced music from Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan, Joseph Arthur, and Afro Celt Sound System, among others. Throughout the '90s, Gabriel remained on the cutting edge of music with several multimedia projects, including the music for England's Millennium Dome, the world's first music-motion ride "Mindblender," contributions to several Film Soundtracks, and two CD-ROM's _Xplora1_ and _Eve_.
Following the release of Us in 1992, Gabriel focused less on standard studio albums, creating a plethora of other projects, including Film Scores, orchestral covers of existing material, and the Grammy-winning Secret World Live (1994). Of the content from these two decades, only 2002's Up was a conventional studio album.
In 2009, Gabriel won his fourth and fifth Grammys and was nominated for an Academy Award for his contribution to Pixar's WALL·E soundtrack. In 2010, he was inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame, along with his original band, Genesis.
That same year, he released the Scratch My Back album, a self-described "song exchange project," in which Gabriel covered songs by other artists who, in turn, covered songs from his own catalog. Artists who returned the favor in the accompanying tribute album, And I'll Scratch Yours (2013), included David Byrne, Bon Iver, Paul Simon, and Lou Reed. This project, along with the 2011 follow-up, New Blood, helped kick off a minor trend among established artists of reimagining Pop Rock classics with full orchestras.
During 2023, on the year's full moons, Gabriel released singles containing "bright side" and "dark side" mixes of tracks featured on i/o, his first studio album in two decades, in anticipation of its release. Despite a general reduction in original content output since 2003, Gabriel admits to having a backlog of Experimental tunes that should fuel several future releases.
During his lengthy breaks in between recording sessions, Gabriel dedicates his time to promoting world music artists and supporting humanitarian causes with Amnesty International and his own organizations, WITNESS and The Elders.
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