Peter Gabriel

Peter Brian Gabriel (born February 13, 1950, in Cobham%2C_Surrey, England) is an England musician. He first came to fame as a member of the progressive rock group Genesis (band), which he founded as a student at Charterhouse School with bandmates Tony Banks (musician), Anthony Phillips, and Mike Rutherford. Genesis quickly became one of the most talked-about bands in the UK, largely due to Gabriel's flamboyant stage presence, which involved numerous bizarre costume changes and comical, dreamlike stories told as the introduction to each song. During "The Knife", a popular live song from the ''Trespass'' album, Gabriel would perform a stunt that, two decades later, became extremely common: stage diving. On one occasion he broke a leg leaping into the crowd, but managed to climb back up onto the stage and finish the performance. On most songs Peter was backed up by drummer Phil Collins, who eventually became the lead singer after Gabriel unexpectedly left the band in 1975. His first solo success came with the single "Solsbury Hill", an autobiographical piece expressing his thoughts on leaving Genesis (band). Although early on he achieved critical success and some commercial success (e.g. "Games Without Frontiers" from his third album and "Shock the Monkey" from his fourth), Gabriel achieved his greatest popularity with songs from the 1986 ''So'' album, most notably "Sledgehammer" and "In Your Eyes." He famously refused to title his first three solo albums, since he wanted them to be considered as issues of a magazine instead of individual works. They are usually differentiated by number in order of release, or sleeve design.Then he released his forth solo studio album known as Security. Gabriel's song "Sledgehammer (disambiguation)" was accompanied by a visually stunning music video, which was a collaboration with director Stephen Johnson, Aardman Animation, and the Brothers Quay. The video won numerous awards at the 1987 MTV VMA, and set a new standard for art in the music video industry. A follow-up video for the song "Big Time" also broke new ground in music video animation and special effects. He has collaborated with singer Kate Bush several times, including an appearance on her television special. Their duet of Roy Harper's "Another Day" was discussed for release as a single, but this never came to pass. Another duet, "Don't Give Up" became a hit, however. He also collaborated with Laurie Anderson on two versions of her composition "Excellent Birds" - one for her album, ''Mister Heartbreak'', and a slightly different version called ''This is the Picture'' which appeared on audio cassette and CD versions of ''So.'' In 1987, when presenting Gabriel with an award for his music videos, Anderson related an occasion in which a recording session had gone late into the night and Gabriel's voice began to sound somewhat strange, almost dreamlike. It was discovered that he had fallen asleep in front of the microphone, but had continued to sing. Gabriel has been interested in world music for many years, with the first musical evidence appearing on his third album. This influence has increased over time, and he is the driving force behind the Womad (World of Music, Arts and Dance) movement. He created the Real World Studios and record label to facilitate the creation and distribution of such music by various artists, and he has worked to educate Western culture about the work of such musicians as Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan and Youssou N'dour. He has also recently been interested in multimedia projects, creating the Xplora and Eve CD-ROMs. He has a long-standing interest in human rights, and launched the Witness program to supply video cameras to human rights activists to expose abuses. Gabriel's song "We Do What We're Told (Milgram's 37)" from ''So'' refers to Milgram's experiment, and in particular the 37 out of 40 subjects who showed complete obedience in one particular experiment. Peter Gabriel has two daughters from his first marriage, Melanie Gabriel and Anna, and a son, Isaac, from his second marriage. Melanie sang on Gabriel's 2003 ''Growing Up'' tour. Peter Gabriel is one of the founders of On Demand Distribution (OD2), an online music enterprise, and additionally is co-founder (with Brian Eno) of a musicians union called Mudda, short for "magnificent union of digitally downloading artists." Recently, Peter Gabriel has been working with video game companies Cyan Worlds and Ubisoft to aid in the sound production of their latest video games. The 2003 videogame Uru: Ages Beyond Myst featured the song "Burn You Up, Burn You Down" in several portions of the game. The song, in a different form, featuring the Blind Boys Of Alabama (who also collaborated with Gabriel on the song "Sky Blue") was on a press release copy of Up but deleted before the album's actual release. The 2004 release of Myst IV: Revelation (developed by Ubisoft Montreal) featured a song called "Curtains", which was originally a B-side from the single to "Big Time" from So. The song is also often called 'Portal to Ages of Myst IV: Revelation#Serenia' or 'Portal to Dreamworld', and Gabriel also perfomed a large voice acting part in the game. ==Discography== === Albums === *1977 ''Peter Gabriel (I)'' (I or ''Car'', wet car cover, ) #7 UK, #38 US *1978 ''Peter Gabriel (II)'' (II or ''Scratch'', scratch cover) #10 UK, #45 US *1980 ''Peter Gabriel (III)'' (III or ''Melt'', melting face cover) #1 UK, #22 US, US Sales: 500,000 *1982 ''Peter Gabriel (IV Security)'' (IV, known as ''Security'' in the USA) #6 UK, #28 US, US Sales: 500,000 *1983 ''Peter Gabriel Plays Live'' (live) #8 UK, #44 US *1985 ''Music by Peter Gabriel from the Film "Birdy (movie)"'' #162 US *1986 ''So (album)'' #1 UK, #2 US, US Sales: 5,000,000 *1989 ''Passion (album)'' #29 UK, #60 US, US Sales: 500,000 *1990 ''Shaking the Tree'' (best of 1976-1990) (compilation) #11 UK, #48 US, US Sales: 2,000,000 *1992 ''Us (Peter Gabriel)'' #2 UK, #2 US, US Sales: 1,000,000 *1992 ''Peter Gabriel Revisited'' (best of 1976-1992) (compilation) *1994 ''Secret World Live'' (live 1993) #10 UK, #23 US, US Sales: 500,000 *2000 ''Ovo (album)'' *2002 ''Long Walk Home: Music from the Rabbit-Proof Fence (movie)'' *2002 ''Up (Peter Gabriel album)'' #11 UK, #9 US *2003 ''Hit (album)'' (compilation) #29 UK, #100 US *2003 ''The Wild Thornberries Movie: Soundtrack ''See also: list of musicians with multiple self-titled albums'' === DVD === *1994 ''Secret World Live'' (concert DVD from the Secret World Tour 1992/93) *2003 ''Growing Up (DVD)'' (concert DVD from the Growing Up Tour 2002/03) *2004 ''Play (DVD)'' (compilation DVD with all of his music videos, including bonus videos and remastered sound). 2004 ''A Family Portrait - A Film By Anna Gabriel'' (Peter Gabriel's daughter directs a film about her father's Growing Up And Still Growing Up tours) === Hit singles === * from "Peter Gabriel (I)" ** 1977 "Solsbury Hill" #13 UK * from "Peter Gabriel (III)" ** 1980 "Games without Frontiers" #4 UK ** 1980 "No Self Control" #33 UK ** 1980 "Biko" #38 UK * from "Peter Gabriel (IV)" ** 1983 "Shock the Monkey" #29 US * from "So" ** 1986 "Sledgehammer" #4 UK, #1 US ** 1986 "Don't Give Up" (with Kate Bush) #9 UK ** 1986 "Big Time" #13 UK, #8 US (1987 release) ** 1986 "In Your Eyes" #26 US * from "Us" ** 1992 "Digging in the Dirt" #24 UK ** 1993 "Steam" #10 UK, #32 US * from "Secret World Live" ** 1994 "SW Live EP" #39 UK ==External Links== *[http://www.petergabriel.com/ Official website] *[http://www.solsburyhill.org Fan site] *[http://rec.horus.at/music/gabriel/ Another fan site] *[http://www.deltaforce.net/~jnu/pg/ And through the wire] fan site *[http://www.realworld.co.uk/ Real World] *[http://www.cometalktome.com/ Fan site ]with forum *[http://www.ingsoc.com/gabriel The Feeling Begins] 1950 births British rock musicians British songwriters Genesis Peter Gabriel british pop singers Male singers

Peter Gabriel

Does this piece need the five external links? And if it does, how about some text explaining what they are? It seems a bit silly - and typical of music entries in here - that people just add links but there's no indication of their content or value. --User:138.37.188.109 11:17, 9 Jun 2004 (UTC) == Bipolar disorder... == Well, as far as I'm aware, this bipolar disorder story was never confirmed... It's just a rumor and, despite some claims, the man never confirmed it. So, I think the sentence "It has been reported that he has bipolar disorder." does not belong in an encyclopedia, which needs to get its facts straight. For instance, the article could mention that he's known to be a vegetarianm although he recently admitted enjoying fish every now and then. Birthday? Martin C. Strong's Great Rock Discography says PG was born May 13th, not Feb. === Vatche Housepian === I removed this section because it is off-topic and nearly unparsable. In nearly any album there are quibbles over credts. Why is this notable? If there is some notable dispute the reason it's meaningful needs to be clear, and I'd suggest it needs to go in the album article rather than here anyway. User:Jgm 15:47, 16 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Peter Gabriel

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