“Growing Cabbages and Making Babies” - The Peter Gabriel Story Part One by Alan Hewitt. Memorabilia: TWR Archive. Photographs by Mike Ellison.

Peter’s departure from Genesis in 1975 was seen by many as the demise of both the band and Peter as a performer on the verge of international recognition. As fans now know, this was to prove to be totally untrue. Peter could not long resist the need to write and perform music, and his story since has been a source of amazement to his fans and one of consternation to critics who find him impossible to pigeonhole!

Peter’s search for a new musical style was to take him into working with Bob Ezrin who had, up to then, produced every album by Alice Cooper as well as Lou Reed’s seminal Berlin and Kiss’ Destroyer albums. The new LP was recorded at the Nimbus Studio in Toronto during the autumn of 1976. In many ways it can be seen as a transitional album in which Peter was searching for an individual style and as such, several of the tracks were a surprise including the delightful barbershop harmonies of Excuse Me and the melodrama of Moribund The Burgermeister.

The album was released in the UK in February 1977 to widespread critical acclaim. A twenty date North American tour was set up to promote the album for March for which the dates were as follows…

Peter Gabriel Gig Guide 1977

Venue
City
Date
Capitol Theatre
Passaic NJ
5.3.77
Masonic Hall
Detroit MI
13.3.77
Music Hall
Cleveland OH
15.3.77
Tower Theatre
Upper Darby PA
18.3.77
Palladium Theatre
New York NY
19.3.77
Maple Leaf Gardens
Toronto ON
24.3.77
City Hall
Quebec QC
26.3.77
Stanley Theatre
Pittsburgh PA
28.3.77
Roxy Theatre
Los Angeles CA
9-10.4.77

Perhaps the most surprising aspect of the tour was Peter’s appearance without any of the usual costumery associated with his time in Genesis. Instead, Peter relied on lighting and the music itself. The set for this first tour ran as follows: Here Comes The Flood/On The Air/Moribund The Burgermeister/Waiting For The Big One/Why Don’t We?/Excuse Me/Humdrum/Solsbury Hill/Ain’t That Peculiar/Indigo/All Day And All Of The Night/Here Comes The Flood/Slowburn/Modern Love/Down The Dolce Vita/Back In NYC

What was surprising for many fans on this tour was the inclusion of a couple of soul classics in the form of Ain’t That Peculiar and All Day And All Of The Night as well as the resurrection of Peter’s alter-ego; Rael for Back In NYC. The shows brought Peter a whole new audience in the US and his first single: Solsbury Hill, was a hit on both sides of the Atlantic. A further surprise came in the performance of two as yet unrecorded songs: On The Air and Indigo which were played under their working titles of Song Without Words and Mickey Mouse.

Peter also played a handful of warm-up dates in the UK in April at the following venues…

Venue
City
Date
Hammersmith Odeon
London
24-26.4.77
Apollo Theatre
Manchester
29.4.77
New Vic Theatre
London
30.4.77

These were a practice for the later European/British tour which took in thirty eight dates in all during September and October. For these shows, as on the US tour, Peter was joined by Tony Levin, Larry Fast and Steve Hunter. Fast and Levin have remained with Peter until recent years

For the late 1977 tour, Peter tried out some more new pieces in front of the crowds and the set for the European tour ran as follows: Here Comes The Flood/Slowburn/Moribund The Burgermeister/Modern Love/Indigo/Humdrum/White Shadow/I Heard It Thru The Grapevine/Excuse Me/Waiting For The Big One/Solsbury Hill/Down The Dolce Vita/On The Air/All Day And All Of The Night/Here Comes The Flood/Back In NYC.

Very occasionally another new song : Animal Magic was played as an extra encore.

Venue
City
Date
?
Courtrai
2.9.77
?
Antwerp
3.9.77
Rijnhal
Nijmegen
4.9.77
?
Rotterdam
7.9.77
?
Brussels
9.9.77
?
Paris
10.9.77
City Hall
Newcastle
13.9.77
Apollo Theatre
Glasgow
15.9.77
City Hall
Sheffield
17.9.77
Victoria Hall
Stoke On Trent
19.9.77
De Montfort Hall
Leicester
21.9.77
Empire Theatre
Liverpool
23.9.77
Odeon Theatre
Birmingham
25.9.77
Apollo Theatre
Manchester
27-28.9.77
Gaumont Theatre
Southampton
30.9.77
St David’s Hall
Cardiff
1.10.77
Colston Hall
Bristol
2.10.77
Olympia Theatre
Paris
4.10.77
?
Lyon
5.10.77
?
Colmar
6.10.77
CCH
Hamburg
8.10.77
?
Stockholm
9.10.77
?
Munster
13.10.77
?
Wiesbaden
14.10.77
?
Berne
15.10.77
?
Strasbourg
16.10.77
?
Cologne
17.10.77
Stadthalle
Offenbach
18.10.77
Philipshalle
Dusseldorf
19.10.77
Deutschlandhalle
Berlin
21.10.77
Zirkus Krone
Munich
22.10.77
?
Dijon
24.10.77
?
Nantes
26.10.77
?
Poitiers
27.10.77
?
Bordeaux
28.10.77
?
Toulouse
29.10.77
?
Bath
1.11.77

The tour was a hit with audiences across the continent although the band were not quite so popular with the Swiss police during the last leg of the tour when they were arrested in St Gallen on their way to a gig in Besancon. The band even failed to convince the police after singing an acapella version of Excuse Me and the band were only finally released after their Swiss promoter verified their story!

Despite a successful tour, album and single, Peter was still £200,000 in debut at the end of 1977 and not satisfied with his efforts so far, he enlisted the help of Robert Fripp whose work with King Crimson had so inspired the early Genesis. With Fripp producing, Peter embarked on work for his second album. Fripp was very reluctant to produce the album and wanted to give Peter the freedom to express himself that was in some ways missing on the first LP.

This was not without its drawbacks, and what in Peter’s and Kate Bush’s cases was later called “The Tortoise Syndrome” was beginning to creep in. For the LP Gabriel also enlisted the help of Bruce Springsteen’s keyboard player: Roy Bittan along with Tony Levin and Larry Fast and extra help on guitar from Sid McGinnis and Timmy Cappello on sax.

A single was released in advance of the LP which contained two tracks from it: DIY/Perspective but this was to prove unsuccessful. Later in the year, the single was remixed and the B side changed to include Mother of Violence and Me & My Teddy Bear. The album itself was released in June 1978 with far less acclaim than Peter’s previous effort and this led to his record label: Atlantic, dropping him from their roster before the release of his third album in 1980.

The new album was a very dark one to listen to, especially the lyrics to Home Sweet Home and in it, Peter certainly challenged many taboo areas in song writing which was a million miles away from his mythological lyrics with Genesis.

Once again Peter undertook European and US tours in support of the album and these were a dramatic demonstration of how good a communicator Peter is. Once again he relied on the music rather than special effects to bring the music’s message across. Improvising played a large part in the shows too, with new songs being aired, often without proper lyrics. A typical set for this tour ran as follows: On The Air/Moribund The Burgermeister/Animal Magic/Flotsam & Jetsam/White Shadow/Have A Wonderful Day (In A One Way World)/Humdrum/I Don’t Remember/Home Sweet Home/DIY/A Whiter Shade Of Pale/Here Comes The Flood/Slowburn/Modern Love/Perspective/The Lamb Lies Down On Broadway/Down The Dolce Vita.

Peter Gabriel Gig Guide 1978

Venue
City
Date
New Theatre
Oxford
23.8.78
University
Lancaster
25.8.78
Chateau Neuf
Oslo
31.8.78
The Globe
Stockholm
1.9.78
Stadthalle
Bremen
4.9.78
Festival
Knebworth
9.9.78
Grugahalle
Essen
15.9.78
Battersea Park Festival
London
16.9.78
Roxy Club
Los Angeles CA
30.9 -1.10.78
Bottom Line Club
New York NY
4.10.78
Grand Theatre
Quebec QC
13.10.78
University
Montreal QC
15.10.78
University
Stoneybrook NY
21.10.78
Capitol Theatre
Passaic NJ
29.10.78
Paradise Club
Boston MA
31.10.78
Palladium
New York NY
4.11.78
Irvine Crawford Hall
?
18.11.78
Ackerman Union UCLA
Los Angeles CA
21.11.78
Terrace Theatre
Long Beach CA
22.11.78
J Eden Hall
Amsterdam
30.11.78
Palais Des Sports
Lyon
5.12.78
Magne Pavilion Baltard
Nogent
9-10.12.78
RTL TV Studios
Paris
10.12.78
Philipshalle
Dusseldorf
12.11.78
Congresshalle
Basle
16.12.78
Ice Stadium
Geneva
17.12.78
Hammersmith Odeon
London
20-24.12.78


Not only was Peter’s appearance radically different but this tour also saw the appearance of something that has since become a regular feature of his shows: the performance of one or more songs in the language of the country in which he is performing. First recipient of this treatment was Me & My Teddy Bear which was variously performed as Ich Und Mein Teddy Bear or Moi Et Mon Teddy Bear. Peter still acknowledged his days in Genesis with a crisp new version of The Lamb… as an encore.

Peter’s appearance at the Battersea and Knebworth Park Festivals in September threw a good many of the critics into confusion. With his shaven head and punk teddy bear, he was already far removed from the caped crusader of Genesis. One critic- he presumably was a Punk fan, had the following to say… “Peter Gabriel was the first of the day to get the audience off its collective ass, but his recent surge to credibility is perplexing; to me he is as anonymous today as he ever was with Genesis. But the rest of the audience endorsed Gabriel’s oddly-arranged music and went quite wild over his punk parody of Whiter Shade Of Pale which I found both unfunny and unspectacular…”

Not all of the critics found Peter’s second album quite as daunting or confusing a prospect as the article from New Musical Express reproduced here, shows. In fact, the album although not as widely praised by the critics as his first, still brought Peter wider recognition and the fans remained as loyal as ever.

The December show at Hammersmith Odeon on 24th December was a special charity event for which Peter was joined by Tom Robinson as a result of promoter Harvey Goldsmith’s double booking of the venue. The show was billed as “Rob & Gab Christmas ‘78” and for it a special set was rehearsed : Ding Dong/DIY/Don’t Take No For An Answer/Humdrum/Red Cortina/Here Comes The Flood/Truce/Hold Out/Solsbury Hill/I Don’t Remember/Bully For You/Doo-Wah-Diddy/Jumping Jack Flash/You Gotta Go/.Saturday Night’s Alright (For Fighting)/2,4,6,8 Motorway.

Instead of doing separate sets, the above represented a pooled effort for which Tom and Peter were joined by Elton John, Paul Jones, Phil Collins and Andy Mackay for what turned out to be a rock ‘n’ roll party. Once again, Peter took the bold step of playing a new piece from the as yet unrecorded third album: I Don’t Remember which was still mainly without lyrics.

Peter’s only UK appearances in 1979 were at the Glastonbury and Reading Festivals over the August Bank Holiday weekend for which he once again premiered several pieces from the forthcoming third album which was still almost a year away. The new compositions were: No Self Control/I Don’t Remember and Biko. Fans received these very well and this was a good augury for the third album which Peter was to continue working on well into 1980 but more about that next time.

(These gig guides are those that appeared in #17. For further information refer to: Genesis Revisited)

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