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Peter Gabriel is quite an amazing showman. We saw his concert at Starplex on Wednesday night. (Aside: Yes, it is called Smirnoff Family Entertainment Center now, or somesuch horrid corporate sponsored name, but I refuse to refer to it that way. Actually, I think that it also used to be called Coca Cola Starplex, but I digress.)
It was a very good concert. The weather was a bit too hot, and we were sweating like pigs underneath the canopy. I think it was probably cooler out on the lawn. About fifteen minutes before the show ended, a storm blew in. It went from no breeze at all and stifling humidity to gale force winds, and not two minutes later, the temperature dropped probably 15 degrees.
He looks really incredible. He’s totally bald, maybe with some grey fuzz, and he’s got a short grey beard. He toned back the stark white six-inch Imperial that we’d seen him in last year. Dressed all in black, all that. So the whole Grammy thing (come on, you remember — “That’ll Do, Pig” as sung by Uncle Fester) was just an unfortunate choice of costumes and lighting. I’m relieved. Oh — quite funny: At one point he said something about pulling another song about animals out of the closet. Someone in the audience screamed out, “THAT’LL DO, PIG!” And he laughed and said very nicely, “No, not THAT closet.”
Here is the set list (not in order): Red Rain, Darkness, Growing Up, Signal to Noise, More Than This, Secret World, Digging in the Dirt, Come Talk to Me, Mercy Street, In Your Eyes, Don’t Give Up, Shock the Monkey, Games Without Frontiers, Solsbury Hill, The Tower That Ate People. He also did a piano-only song that he’d written for his father as his final encore. I don’t think I forgot anything, but there is always that possibility.
It was very nice to hear the new stuff live. Terrific props — a giant squishy hamster ball that he climbed into and rolled around on stage and bounced choreographically with his band. The phone booth from the Secret World tour. Also, two Segways. He’s always loved the props. I found myself hoping against hope that he’d pull out the flower costume or something… wishful thinking, I know.
Normally, I am not a big fan of concert lighting. I find it distracting — colored spots flinging themselves everywhere, changing colors all the time, etc. But the guy (or gal) who did the lighting for this show is fuckin’ incredible. It was really really good.
As far as other songs, he didn’t go any farther back than “Games Without Frontiers,” and really all he did were singles for the most part. But then again, I’m the type of fan who adores his older and more obscure stuff (e.g. “Grand Parade of Lifeless Packaging,” “White Shadow,” and “Here Comes the Flood,” to name a few), so I didn’t really expect him to throw me any gems. I guess that I was just remembering two other concerts I’ve been to where the bands played, against all odds, things that I never thought I’d hear live. (Genesis in 1993 played a medley of their ’70s stuff, and even though it was Phil Collins it was amazing to hear that live, and I will never forget it; and then Elvis Costello in 2001 sang “Alison,” which I’d read that he never ever does on stage, ever).
Doc made an interesting observation: he never ever plays or refers to any of his Genesis stuff. It’s like that part of his career never existed. I know that he left the band on not-so-great terms, and then Phil took the band in a COMPLETELY different direction (thanks a lot, Phil… well, there were about six good years in there where Phil was still doing a Peter imitation), but Peter made some amazing music with Genesis.
My favorite parts: “Mercy Street.” This is one of my favorite songs, anyway. According to what he said on stage, members of Anne Sexton’s family were in the audience. I wonder who they were. At the very beginning he gathered all his band and backup singers to the center of the stage, and bathed in a single blue spotlight, they sang a capella, “Dreaming of Mercy Street / Wear your inside out / Dreaming of mercy / In your daddy’s arms again / Dreaming of Mercy Street / Swear they moved that sign / Looking for mercy / In your daddy’s arms.” In full, eight-part beautiful harmony. Wow. Then they went into the rest of the song. I adore this song AND Anne Sexton’s poem by the same name — so much so that in my grad poetry class when I was a freshman in college, I wrote a term paper comparing the two.
“Games Without Frontiers.” No Kate Bush to sing backup, but still. They had to start over, twice. I’m not sure why other than that Peter seemed to have missed his cue. He was trying to come out on stage on a Segway. He and a backup singer were on the Segways, and they were choreographed to some extent. What I found really cool was that the sideways-swaying movements they were making on the Segways, at least initially, mirrored the movements of the miniature wind-up babies in the video for this song. I wonder if anyone else noticed this.
“Signal to Noise.” It got so crazy loud and throbbing towards the end, but it totally sucked me in. I liked this song before, but now I think I really like it.
I noticed that his main backup singer seemed to sing in a somewhat emotionless and flat manner, and then on “Don’t Give Up,” her timing was completely off on the Kate Bush part. Way way off, every time. I felt very embarrassed for her. And she messed up some of the lyrics. I said to Doc, “She is soooo fired!” Halfway through the show, he introduced his band, and that backup singer turned out to be his daughter. So, I guess that Dad’s not going to fire her, after all! Actually I think it’s kind of sweet for him to have her out there on stage with him. Hell, if my dad was Peter Gabriel, I would do anything it took to be a part of it — even singing lessons!!!