Peter Gabriel’s PASSION

Music Bard here.
Okay so I think I found a new blog post.
Lately I’ve been kind of struggling.
Just been posting monthly playlists and a few TOP FIVE favorites but I decided to move on.
And that’s my prerogative.

But my new post here is actually about Peter Gabriel.
I’m actually maybe kind of annoyed. Not at him but at some NON-fans.
Plus some of these NON-fans are my friends/co-workers so I’ll be nice.
I have nothing against the people as individuals but more of this Blasé / ehh attitude about Mr. Gabriel.
Now I’m not saying every person out there has to be a Peter Gabriel fan by any means.
That’s okay. That’s your prerogative.

But like he was just inducted into the “Rock & Roll Hall of Fame” recently among the likes of KISS and NIRVANA.
So yeah there’s differences in all three of those artists right there but I personally feel like he’s getting over-looked
Not enough credit by the audience out there. Perhaps not being treated fairly.
Some are saying, “He’s old,” “He’s boring” and “I don’t like his stuff.”

Sure some of his songs are overplayed on the radio. Like Salisbury Hill, In Your Eyes and Sledgehammer (to name a few).
But to dig deep into his catalog, particularly when he was the frontman of GENESIS, pretty much everything he touched (until drummer Phil Collins took over) was pure gold in my opinion.
I suppose it requires a patient listener to fully appreciate that experimental sound.
Me? I like avant garde & weird art music.
So he split and did his own thing due to creative differences with his former band by coming out with some great solo material.

In particular; it was his album PASSION, from 1989, that catapulted world music into the popular culture.

Passion was originally Peter Gabriel’s soundtrack to the Martin Scorsese film The Last Temptation of Christ.
And there’s no mistaking this record’s exciting power. I love that it’s essentially all instrumental too.
But he developed this into an actual album rather than just soundtrack.
Like a lot of Gabriel’s solo work, the album is the result of his continuing obsession and devotion with world music.
He uses it here to create an exceptionally beautiful and atmospheric canvas of sound perfectly bringing strong and vivid memories to the mind.
If you saw the above mentioned movie, memories flash of the film’s resonating spiritual drama; inspired by field recordings collected in areas wide spread as Turkey and Egypt.
Passion (the album posted below) achieves a unique effect clearly Middle Eastern in origin.
I seriously consider PASSION as Gabriel’s finest music of any kind. Such an underrated album.

But I digress.
Peter Gabriel has been around for a long time and certainly deserved his accolades.
He certainly writes brilliant music
He was and still is a true artist.

That’s my story and I’m sticking to it!

Later Lou

Lou Reed died on October 27th 2013. I don’t believe rock and roll bands change people’s lives. But when I was 19, in college, one of my roommates was listening to a song by Lou Reed that really resonated with me. Coney Island Baby is the name of it. We were smoking cigarettes and talking. I asked to play the song again. I went back home during winter break. I bought a compilation record called Different Times: Lou Reed in the 70’s. That song was on there as well as many other of his hits. I bought this compact disc at a strip-mall in Aurora, Illinois. Northgate, the neon sign read. The mall isn’t as pretty as it used to be, kind of a dump actually. But I loved it when my discman leaked a tiny reproduction of Reed’s voice into my head all day, every day for most of 1996. I enjoyed listening to him. His music is out there to be experienced any time you want to hear it. He made lots of records.

When you’re a teenager, rock & roll has a gravity that it can never have again. In the summers of my college days, Lou Reed and The Velvet Underground were sort of my emotional life. I have blogged before about his music and I have been still listening to his stuff. When I heard the news, I listened to Coney Island Baby right away. I tried, but could not recapture the intensity of feeling that song had for me in another time. I wouldn’t want to, however. But the spaces in that song are certainly planted in my DNA now. (paraphrased) Man, I’d swear, I’d give the whole thing up for Lou.

later lou

to be misunderstood
is not so bad
brutal honesty in New York City
crossing his legs
holding a guitar
on his lap
writing a sad song
with sunglasses on
(better artistic impressions)
to care
but not regret or change
to transform
but stay the same
a poet
a story teller
a man who will be missed
enjoy the twilight
as its reeling

-Christopher Noe Copyright 2013