{"id":936,"date":"2017-07-25T15:37:47","date_gmt":"2017-07-25T15:37:47","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/2026.ikon2023.eu\/index.php\/scratching-in-the-dirt-peter-gabriel-s-scratch-my-back\/"},"modified":"2017-07-25T15:37:47","modified_gmt":"2017-07-25T15:37:47","slug":"scratching-in-the-dirt-peter-gabriel-s-scratch-my-back","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/2026.ikon2023.eu\/index.php\/scratching-in-the-dirt-peter-gabriel-s-scratch-my-back\/","title":{"rendered":"Scratching in the Dirt: Peter Gabriel\u2019s Scratch My Back"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Dork Report March 22, 2010<\/span><\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

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As a Peter Gabriel fan for over two decades, it\u2019s difficult to admit that I find myself struggling to appreciate his first new album in years.<\/span><\/p>\n

There have always been three core things to love about Gabriel\u2019s work: his literate songwriting, meticulous soundscapes, and emotionally expressive voice. Behind the creepily organic album art, Scratch My Back is an experiment in subtraction. It finds Gabriel covering other artists\u2019 songs, accompanied only by solo piano or orchestra (the oddly defensive marketing pitch \u201cNo drums, no guitars\u201d says it all). That leaves only the voice. Soulful and gravelly even as a teenage cofounder of Genesis in 1967, Gabriel\u2019s voice should be more than enough to justify anything, so my pat reduction here is not totally fair. Gabriel and John Metcalfe clearly labored over these orchestral arrangements, but I miss the complex sonics of the rock and world music instrumentation that has characterized most of his music for over 40 years.<\/span><\/p>\n

Gabriel did very nearly the opposite a decade ago, when his high-concept millennium project Ovo made a point of casting Paul Buchanan and The Cocteau Twins\u2019 Elizabeth Fraser to sing his songs. The most recent collection of his own songs was 2002\u2019s Up, followed in 2009 by the collaborative project Big Blue Ball. Casual fans of his music might not be aware that Gabriel is an active humanitarian, particularly as cofounder of Witness and The Elders, so the temporal gap between his musical ventures is not entirely explained by chronic procrastination (although he would probably be the first to admit he\u2019s easily distracted). Gabriel has stated that he hopes to work on more song-swap projects in the future, but first plans to work on some of his own songs. How long until he prepares a new album over which he can claim sole authorship?<\/span><\/p>\n

Gabriel told the New York Times:<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cI was trying to make a grown-up record [\u2026] This is treating people as if they can handle difficult music and words. Not that I\u2019ve courted the lowest common denominator before, but there\u2019s a playfulness and childishness in some of my older work that isn\u2019t present on this record.\u201d<\/span>
He is presumably referring to the media satire of \u201cGames Without Frontiers\u201d and \u201cThe Barry Williams Show\u201d, the randy sex romps \u201cSledgehammer\u201d and \u201cKiss That Frog\u201d, and the vaudeville silliness of \u201cExcuse Me\u201d and \u201cBig Time\u201d. Gabriel is one of the few musicians that I first listened to as a teenager, but whose music has aged with me. So I would have expected myself to appreciate an album of him covering many songs that I know and love well (particularly David Bowie, Lou Reed, Elbow, and Talking Heads), but I find that I don\u2019t know what to make of Scratch my Back even after repeated listening.<\/span><\/p>\n

Many songwriters lose their dark edge as they age (case in point: Pink Floyd\u2019s once tortured, prickly Roger Waters is now a big smiley softie), and by all accounts Gabriel should have been following that track too. After leaving Genesis in 1975 to deal with family issues, his first four solo albums were increasingly dark and sinister. But 1986\u2019s So marked a noticeable turnaround in tone and an apparent psychic healing. Now reportedly still pals with his old Genesis cohorts, aging gracefully into a potbelly and gnomish goatee, remarrying, fathering two new sons, and reconciling with his two daughters from a previous marriage, he seemed to be transforming into a cuddly grandfather figure. A trickle of releases over the past decade showed him favoring directly-worded songs for children, including the Oscar-nominated \u201cThat\u2019ll Do\u201d (from the movie Babe), the unsubtle \u201cAnimal Nation\u201d (from The The Wild Thornberrys Movie), and \u201cDown to Earth\u201d (from Wall-E).<\/span><\/p>\n

Suddenly, he appears to have reversed back into depressive territory. Nearly every song chosen for Scratch My Back has been transformed into a mournful dirge. Especially when listened to in one sitting, I find many of the interpretations to be too depressing, and I actually like depressing music. My favorite examples along these lines are Michael Andrews and Gary Jules\u2019 cry-your-guts-out cover of Tears for Fears\u2019 \u201cMad World\u201d (from the movie Donnie Darko), and Elbow\u2019s agonizingly heartrending version of U2\u2019s \u201cRunning to Stand Still\u201d (from the War Child benefit album Heroes).<\/span><\/p>\n

Gabriel\u2019s version of The Magnetic Fields\u2019 \u201cBook of Love\u201d has apparently become something of a sensation on YouTube, licensed in television shows, and played at celebrity weddings. Perhaps I\u2019m coldhearted, but it does absolutely nothing for me. Songwriter Stephin Merritt says his version was sarcastic, while Gabriel\u2019s is deadly serious:<\/span><\/p>\n

At first I thought, How hilarious, he\u2019s got a completely different take on the song. But after a few listens I find it quite sweet. My version of the song focuses on the humor, and his focuses on the pathos. Of course, if I could sing like him I wouldn\u2019t have to be a humorist.<\/span>
Did Gabriel just plain miss Merritt\u2019s point, or did he intentionally transform it into something sentimental, singing the same words but altering the instrumentation and delivery? All that said, something to cherish in Gabriel\u2019s cover is the presence of his daughter Melanie on backing vocals.<\/span><\/p>\n

Elbow\u2019s \u201cMirrorball\u201d is one of the most ravishing love songs I\u2019ve heard. Elbow remixed Gabriel\u2019s \u201cMore Than This\u201d in 2002, providing a more organic rock structure to Gabriel\u2019s perhaps over-processed studio original. But Gabriel does not return the favor here, turning their gorgeous love song into a depressive bummer.<\/span><\/p>\n

The once case where Gabriel\u2019s bummer-o-vision may have actually been appropriate is with Paul Simon\u2019s \u201cBoy in the Bubble\u201d, which actually does have very dark lyrics.<\/span><\/p>\n

The original recording of David Bowie\u2019s \u201cHeroes\u201d boasts an unforgettable lead guitar line from Robert Fripp, which by his own rules Gabriel must subtract. He sings Bowie\u2019s Berlin-inspired lyrics in cracked, anguished tones, not an emotion I associate with the song.<\/span><\/p>\n

The one song I liked immediately was \u201cListening Wind\u201d. The original is one of the odder tracks on Talking Heads\u2019 Remain in Light, and Gabriel rather amazingly draws out a catchy melody embedded in the experimental song.<\/span><\/p>\n

The Special Edition includes a second cd with four bonus tracks: a cover of The Kinks\u2019 \u201cWaterloo Sunset\u201d and alternate versions of \u201cThe Book of Love\u201d, \u201cMy Body is a Cage\u201d, and \u201cHeroes\u201d. It might have been interesting to also include some of Gabriel\u2019s past covers, including The Beatles\u2019 \u201cStrawberry Fields\u201d, Leonard Cohen\u2019s \u201cSuzanne\u201d, and Joseph Arthur\u2019s \u201cIn the Sun\u201d. I would have also very much liked to hear instrumental mixes of some of Metcalfe\u2019s orchestral arrangements.<\/span><\/p>\n

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Go Back<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Dork Report March 22, 2010 As a Peter Gabriel fan for over two decades, it\u2019s difficult to admit that I find myself struggling to appreciate his first new album in years. There have always been three core things to love about Gabriel\u2019s work: his literate songwriting, meticulous soundscapes, and emotionally expressive voice. Behind the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":935,"parent":0,"menu_order":3,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-936","page","type-page","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/2026.ikon2023.eu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/936","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/2026.ikon2023.eu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/2026.ikon2023.eu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/2026.ikon2023.eu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/2026.ikon2023.eu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=936"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/2026.ikon2023.eu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/936\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/2026.ikon2023.eu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/935"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/2026.ikon2023.eu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=936"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}