POP BEAT
GABRIEL EXPLORES URBAN TENSION

Soon after I admitted almost dozing off during Genesis' recent Long Beach concert, phone calls and letters poured in from the British rock band's fans. The message was the same: "Stay away from Peter Gabriel." The implication was that if I didn't like Genesis, I wouldn't appreciate Gabriel, and these fans didn't want to see another of their favorites knocked. Gabriel, who headlined Thursday night at the Greek Theater, was a co-founder of Genesis and its lead singer until he left the group in the mid-1970s for a solo career. The audience at Thursday's sold-out performance reminded you at every turn of the Genesis/Gabriel connection. Dozens of fans wore Genesis T-shirts and one unfurled a banner which read, "Genesis is Great but Gabriel is God."

Whatever their past association, however, Gabriel and Genesis are today poles apart musically. Where Genesis is mired in conservative, middle-of-the-road pop-rock, Gabriel has emerged as one of rock's most challenging figures.

Besides, I have a good ally in the argument with fans who complained about the harshness of the Genesis review. Gabriel obviously doesn't care much for the group any more himself. That's why he left it. If Genesis has lost much of its ambition since Gabriel took off, Gabriel has become a more consistent and convincing writer. His lyrics are more concrete and his themes are better defined. But enough of the Genesis/Gabriel connection.

A better reference point for the new Gabriel, if one must be made, is David Bowie. Like Talking Heads' David Byrne, Gabriel is exploring the urban tensions that Bowie flirted with in his best 1970s albums. Gabriel isn't likely to achieve Bowie's mass popularity. He lacks that British singer's charisma and he demands too much of himself to lean, like Bowie, on proven musical strains (a bit of the Stones here, a dash of disco there). As a result, Gabriel's elegantly designed, synthesizer-assisted music is less accessible generally than Bowie's.

But Gabriel's songs, which share Bowie's penchant for sci-fi shadings, are far more probing looks at the pressures of an increasingly impersonal society than anything Bowie has given us in some time. Sometimes in Gabriel's tunes the individual is excluded by the group ("Not One of Us"), while at other times the exclusion is self-imposed (the assassin's outcry of "Family Snapshot," the social retreat of "I Don't Recall"). In the ironically titled "Lead a Normal Life," the individual is broken down completely.

These aren't comforting themes, but Gabriel is telling us that these aren't comforting times. That's why the evening's highlight came when he ended with "Biko," a powerful account of the alleged murder in 1977 of a civil rights leader by South African police. In the song, Gabriel moved from the fictional aura of his other works to the reality of actual social extermination.

Gabriel's mistake was in not leaving the audience on that note. The subsequent encore numbers were anticlimatic. In fact, much of the show's pacing Thursday was disjointed, making the evening, for all its values, seem more like a series of sketches than a unified presentation.

Gabriel, who has always exhibited a fondness for rock theatrics, has spoken of weaving his character pieces into a concept work at some point. If he does, it could be a high point for rock in the 1980s. Despite their oppressive undercurrents, Gabriel's songs challenge with the idealism of the best rock. One thing is certain: Gabriel is asking too much in his highly imaginative music for anyone ever to doze off.

Transcribed for The Path by Joe Harden

Joe's story:

Peter Gabriel 1980

About a month after the Genesis concert, Phil again went willingly with me to another concert. This time it was Peter Gabriel's 1980 concert at the Greek Theater. There were no close encounters of the Gabriel kind at this show but it was still a very entertaining and inspiring performance. The setting, an open-air amphitheater in a woodsy setting, was similar to the first place that I had seen Genesis (the Starlight Amphitheater). With the warm night air gently blowing through the surrounding tall pine trees, the perfect ambiance was created for listening to some of Peter's quieter, more thoughtful tunes like "Lead a Normal Life" and "Family Snapshot." Unfortunately, one of the quieter moments also provided the low point of the evening. As "Here Comes the Flood" came to a close, an obviously uninhibited male fan exclaimed loudly for all to hear, "I love you Peter Gabriel!" This was immediately followed by an even louder, huskier male voice retorting, "FAGGOT!" That brought widespread laughter. Phil and I exchanged uncomfortable looks. Any connection that I had felt with the rest of the audience vanished. Who the hell were these people, I mused. Later, all I could figure was that the idealism Peter had expressed so well in songs like "Not One of Us" and "Biko" had fallen on deaf ears.

Joe Harden

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