A Brave Man Decided To Try His Own Wings

Peter Gabriel decided to leave Genesis in the 1974, but he was forced to finish The Lamb tour before he was free to go.

That was very hard to time for Peter and luckily he survived it. After Genesis he taked a some break. This self-titled debut album shows Gabriel musical variety maybe better than any other his solo works. There some very good tracks:



1. Down The Dolce Vita 5

- Very dramatic and surprising song.



2. Here Comes The Flood 4½

- Beautiful ballad that shows Gabriel's singing skills well.

Some people have said that this song sounds like Genesis.

In my opinion, Moribund sounds more but maybe this could

have been also Genesis song.



3. Moribund The Burgermeister 4½

- funny, crazy and playful song that reminds me little bit for Genesis(for exemple.Grand Parade Of Lifeless Packaning).

Gabriel uses his bass singing( I will find out ) very well.

This track is one of his most thrilling solo songs.



4. Solsbury Hill 4

- Tells you reasons why Gabriel had to leave Genesis. He wanted express himself fo musically. Very catching quitar riff and couraging lyrics makes me smile.



Why I could not give five stars for this album?

- Waiting For Big One is the main reason because it's boorin and too long jazz ballad.

- There are little too much variety between songs.

- 4½ stars would be right judgement for Gabriel's debut.



If you want listen Gabriel's solo albums then start for So and Hit(greatest hits collection) but dont' forget 3( Smelt) ja 1 ( Car) albums

Great debut by Gabriel.

Peter Gabriel's first album after he left Genesis is largely an exercise in experimentation. Gabriel constructed an that album both looks backwards and shows the way to the future.



The band on this album features Gabriel regulars Tony Levin and Larry Fast (on bass and synthesizers), as well as guitarists Robert Fripp and Steve Hunter. Fripp's presence, in particular, is felt in subtle ways throughout the record, but for an album featuring strong voices, this one is largely a reflection of Gabriel's voice.



The opener, "Moribund the Burgermeister", appears to pick up where Genesis left off-- its a mid '70s prog piece, complete with bizarre lyrics and bizarre rhythms. Also in a more prog rock vein are "Humdrum", which builds from quiet and delicate to hazy and overblown, but never pretentious, and "Down the Dolce Vita", an orchestral rocker, not to my liking-- almost as though Gabriel was pursuing a hard rock version of the Moody Blues.



Gabriel moved in new directions as well, including his first hit, "Solsbury Hill", with great lyrics, a fun rhythm, and a killer distorted guitar riff at the end, a couple of great straightahead rock pieces, "Modern Love" and "Slowburn", that point the way to the next album, and the anthemic, brilliant, swelling ballad, "Here Comes the Flood". Probably the best song on the album, Flood remains in Gabriel's live set to this day (although I prefer the piano+Frippertronics version on Fripp's "Exposure" album). Starting as a simple piano ballad with subtle horns and an impassioned vocal, it builds to an explosive and powerful chorus.



Perhaps more bizarre in terms on experimentation is "Excuse Me", opening with a barbershop quartet and featuring Fripp and Levin on banjo and tuba respectively, and the cocktail jazz of "Waiting for the Big One". Both of these are generally criticized as misfires, but "Excuse Me" in particular is a lot of fun. "Waiting for the Big One" is decent, but its a bit overlong.



Gabriel would go on to bigger and better things on later records, but this is certainly a good start, and definitely a great album.

Just what is Gabriel up to on this one?

At a first listen, it might sound like Peter Gabriel simply took a bunch of different songs he'd had cooking in his head, and decided to release them all on the same album, regardless of whether or not they had anything in common. What other way could there be to explain the musical diversity on this album, both between songs and in the songs themselves? But the second time you listen to this, hopefully you'll realize, as I did, that Gabriel only pretends not to know what he's doing.



As this is Gabriel's first album after leaving Genesis (which had been a genius progressive rock group under his influence), it's as if he decided to take a musical journey, testing the creative waters now that he was a solo artist, and had complete creative control. And he uses that control in some interesting ways. The end result is an album that is more engaging than his second solo album, but less solid and coherent than his third.



There really isn't a song on here that I dislike. Gabriel, through his exploration, runs the gamut from folk (Solsbury Hill), pop rock (Modern Love), cheesy retro barbershop (Excuse Me), epic symphonic hard rock (Down the Dulca Vita), and what could best be described as Broadway showtunes on acid (Slowburn). Some songs work better than others, but the way the album is sequenced (for example, following an edgy rock number like Modern Love with something more silly, like Excuse Me) keeps the listener engaged, and marveling at what Gabriel could possibly be thinking. It's also interesting the way he changes direction within the songs themselves. Humdrum almost seems to go through three phases: we start with only a low-key piano and Gabriel singing, then shift into something that almost sounds like bistro-jazz, then we end with something that sounds more epic, with a sweeping synthesizer overscoring the rest of the music. This song also provides an excellent display of Gabriel's vocal range: he starts soft, then shifts into a higher pitch, then finishes in a lower, almost grumble. For me, though, the stand-out tracks are the following:



-Moribund the Burgermeister. Some might find it bizarre that he starts the album out with such a bizarre number. But those that know Gabriel from his days with Genesis won't find it bizarre at all. Gabriel's penchant for being delightfully weird shines through in the tale he weaves, a tale that is both morose and lighthearted, just what you'd expect from him. Here again, he also displays the diversity of his vocal range, from soaring high notes to a deep, bass rumble.



-Waiting For the Big One. Gabriel's love of shifting direction especially holds true for this one. It's almost as if he was writing two songs in one. We start with a delightful 40s cocktail jazz-rock motif, then the song seems to stop suddenly, and we hear a guitar piece with a bit more edge to it. Then we go back to what we were hearing before. We go back to this guitar number again a few times, and at the climax of the song, it's accompanied by a small choir. It may not seem like it, but this is definitely one of the more accomplished tracks on the album.



-Here Comes the Flood. This is a beautiful closing song, and if one listens to both the musical undertones and the somber tones with which Gabriel sings, it almost serves as a prelude to the music Gabriel would go on to write for much of his solo career.



Overall, we're left with an album that's more disjointed than the rest of Gabriel's solo work, but in the style of the former Genesis frontman, it's magnificently disjointed. Gabriel invites the listener along on a musical exploration, and if one is prepared to listen to the album on those terms, one will see it as brilliant.