From Peter‘s official newsletter:
Welcome to our latest lunar update…
It’s been a busy old month, but one full of excitement, as the i/o tour rolled through Europe, then into the UK and finally came to an end with a lovely gig in Dublin, Ireland. Thanks to everyone who came out to see the show.
“It’s funny, you think you’ve just got it all working properly and it’s time to finish, that’s how most tours that I do go. The idea of trying to integrate the art with the music has worked well, I think people are feeling it. That was my dream, to get more intensity to the experience and in the same way that we work hard creating moods and atmospheres and trying to say something with the music, obviously these artists are very accomplished at doing that in the visual world.“
The first leg of the tour is now complete and though Peter played many of the songs from i/o during the tour this month’s release, “So Much,” only had a few outings. Maybe you were lucky enough to catch it?
Written and produced by Peter, “So Much” is ‘a simple song’, that features a string arrangement from John Metcalfe and contributions from Tony Levin on bass, David Rhodes on guitar and backing vocals from Peter’s daughter Melanie Gabriel. The song was recorded at Real World Studios, Bath, The Beehive and British Grove, London. This month, the first version you get to hear is the Dark-Side Mix, by Tchad Blake.
“I was trying purposefully not to be clever with this. I wanted to get a very simple chorus but one which still had some substance to the harmony and melody. Something that was easy to digest but still had a bit of character to it.
So Much is about mortality, getting old, all the bright, cheerful subjects, but I think when you get to my sort of age you either run away from mortality or you jump into it and try and live life to the full and that always seems to make a lot more sense to me. The countries that seem most alive are those that have death as part of their culture.“
Stream the track through the YouTube player below:
Purchase and Stream the track here: https://lnk.to/PG21
As Peter goes on to explain, there’s a duality to the meaning of So Much, which is just as much about revelling in all the experiences and joyous distractions still to be had right now as it is about contemplating the future; “The reason I chose So Much as a title is because I’m addicted to new ideas and all sorts of projects. I get excited by things and want to jump around and do different things. I love being in a mess of so much! And yet it also means there’s just so much time, or whatever it is, available. Balancing them both is what the song is about.“
This month’s release comes with artwork from the artist Henry Hudson and his work ‘Somewhere Over Mercia’.
“I started looking at Henry’s work and thought it was great. He’s done some dense and intricate work with plasticine, but then he also has this other more expressionist, horizon work with different colours and they’re very simple and pure. I connected quite strongly with him.
The works where Henry’s got horizons are minimalist in a way. They are quite layered and there’s a physicality or three-dimensional element to the way he puts the work together. The idea of cutting the horizon in a different colour, in this case he wanted it to be yellow, and then effectively letting it bleed onto the painting I thought was beautiful and powerful. In the one sense, the horizon is the infinite but it’s also the limit. It had some good symbolism. I think it’s a great piece of work.“
“There’s a universalness about the song,“ says Hudson. “I think the relationship between that song and my horizon lines are quite poignant – dealing with our understanding of what time is, dealing with voids or horizons or places that can appear to be closer or further away.“
Thank you for all the enquiries about the tour programme and merchandise. The programme was not available at all the shows and we know there are many of you, who saw the concerts in Europe, that would like to own a copy.
We will have copies of the programme and some tour merchandise to make available in the Real World Store very soon, we are just awaiting details on stock inventory and delivery from our tour merchandisers. More on this soon!
Purchase tickets here: https://petergabriel.com/live/
Hey! Thanks for sticking with us right to the end. Loving your work, ‘bottom of the mailer people’. Full respect due!
Hope you really enjoy the Dark-Side of So Much and see you later in the month for the new moon releases.
