0
0
Peter Gabriel played at Climate Pledge Arena on Sunday, Oct 8th. At the age of 73, Peter is just as creative as ever. Peter Gabriel was an original member of the band, Genesis, and is in the rock and roll hall of fame twice, once with Genesis and once as a solo artist. Peter is endlessly artistic and his flair for the theatrical is one of the reasons that he left Genesis in 1975. The rest of the band simply felt that his theatrics overshadowed the music. That could be but all the theatrics make for an interesting and entertaining concert, or show might be a better descriptor.
For starters, most concerts just have some random music playing in the background once the doors open and you just sit there waiting for the show to start. There’s rarely anything going on other than maybe some last minute sound checks. Not Peter Gabriel though. Prominently centered as part of the stage set was a large disc that images and video was projected on. Starting when the doors opened and playing until the concert started was a video that looked completely real of a large clock in which a gentleman behind the clock painted the time and then erased the hands and repainted them every few minutes to reflect the actual time. It’s something that took some imagination to do but that’s what people expect from Peter. It’s hard to explain so here’s a video someone uploaded. It’s a simple thing but was mesmerizing to watch and made the time (no pun intended) pass more quickly as we waited for the show to start.
The whole show displayed this type of inventiveness. Every song showcased an artist’s work, sometimes as a video in the background and other times some imagery. Every song was different and almost without fail Peter would acknowledge the artist. This is another way the concert varied from most. There are musicians who might talk between songs, either about the influences that led to the song’s creation or perhaps just random chatter. Usually they’ll introduce the band at some point in their show but for the most part bands just play the music. Not Peter Gabriel. He introduced every song, talked about the artist who had created the imagery, introduced the member of the band that was being highlighted, and so on. He must have introduced all the members of the band three or four times over the course of the show. In some ways all the talk broke the continuity of the music but it also provided insight into the music and gave additional context to what was happening.
In another little nod to perfectionism and attention to detail all of the crew members doing lights, video, sound, etc… all were wearing matching orange jumpsuits identical to the one worn by the clock guy in the opening video and Peter gave them their own shout-out as the show wound down.
I’ve talked previously about artists like Bruce Springsteen and Sting who, although they’re well into their 70’s, still look more buff than most people in their 20’s. Peter Gabriel isn’t that guy. He looks like your grandfather and walks around with the gait of someone who’s got many aches and pains. That said, he never stopped moving the whole show.
In one particularly innovative segment, translucent panels lowered at the front of the stage and somehow they projected video images onto these panels. At one point the panels looked like windows with rain drops on them and as Peter wandered back and forth across the stage but behind the panels, he waved his arm around it looked like smoke or fog was following his movements. If you have the patience to let the video load (in admittedly not great quality), you can watch some of it here. The whole show had these head scratching “how’d he do that” moments and it was quite the spectacle.
As long as Peter Gabriel has been making music he has quite the catalog to pull from. Most bands that tour with ten or fifteen albums under their belts tend to play the hits with just a song or two from their newer albums but, again, Peter isn’t like most artists. He has a new album he’s in the middle of releasing and he played most (all?) of the songs from the new album, interspersed with some hits. I’d say half the show was either new music or deep cuts from older albums that the casual fan might not know. It was interesting to me that everyone stood for the songs they knew and sat down for the new music they didn’t know. The thing is, the new music is very good and is worth listening to on its own merit and I appreciated the fact that he wasn’t afraid to do his own thing and showcase his new material.
There was no opening act and Peter played for almost three hours with just a short intermission in the middle of the show. The whole thing was amazing and immersive, exactly what you’d expect from someone who got kicked out of his original band for being too theatrical. Look where it got him…
