Peter Gabriel
New Blood

THE REVIEW

Peter Gabriel is one of the greatest geniuses and innovators of modern music. Vocally endowed with a unique and inimitable voice, capable of delivering stage and theatrical performances that are almost unreachable, if not by a few rare gifted individuals. His creative journey led him to curiously venture into World Music, electronic music, "Springsteen-esque" rock, and even disco music, but his last two albums explore classical music and the interpretative capabilities of the prestigious accompanying orchestra, completely stripped of typical rock instruments. Just as he explored other people's songs in "Scratch my back", in "New Blood" he reanimates the blood of his old compositions, with the help of his daughter Melanie Gabriel, who I don't have an entirely positive opinion about, but I'll explain this in detail later.

The album begins with the majestic and extremely dark "The Rhythm Of The Heat", from the immense "IV", and here presented in a less claustrophobic guise. The first thing one notices is a genuine miracle: Peter's voice only improves with age! Here, it takes on dozens of different nuances, darkens and closes in on itself, launches into incredible climbs, and drowns in the nihilism of the dancing madness of African tribes. Overall, however, I find the original version better rendered.

"Downside Up" is the first song where Melanie Gabriel duets with her dad, and what can I say? Her voice is simply overshadowed by her father's, and that's a fact, but this surprised me negatively: often, she gets lost in unnecessary vocal embellishments and repetitive warbling, too whiny and lacking expressiveness. However, the piece is extremely enjoyable, and much better rendered than the original.

The immense Gabriel masterpiece of all time (in contest with "The Family and The Fishing Net") follows, the caressing, sweet, and extremely determined "San Jacinto." Here is the best gift Peter gives us, managing to make an immense masterpiece even greater. The new orchestral dimension gives the song an airiness and a nearly unique sense of extreme freedom, something the original somewhat neglected in favor of an equally incisive pounding percussive base, less airy and delicate than this, yet extraordinarily integrated among other instruments. The voice reaches the greatest emotional peak ever achieved by PG, especially in the orchestral explosion at 4 minutes. I didn't expect that without electric guitar, the power would remain unchanged, but I had to reconsider after listening to the immensity of Gabriel's singing here; there's little to be done, this man has made his voice his tool.

"Intruder" is the album's first attempt to resurface the old sensation of fear that PG knew well how to convey. Who doesn't remember the original? With those stifled drum skins, that pounding and martial rhythm, that absurd whispered singing that filled with creeping and mean terror. Well, here all that is gone (I was very disappointed by the lack of whispered singing, after what PG was capable of doing with his voice in the previous track, I expected much more) in favor of adding a new instrumental dimension to the song, which features a long orchestral tail, quite unsettling but far from harmonizing with the past. This is a new track, not even considered a cover because it is radically different!

"Wallflower" personally disappointed me, starting from the original they could have done great things like for San Jacinto, but here PG adds absolutely nothing to the initial proposal, there's only a melancholic piano and a rather forgettable performance by Melanie at the end.

"In Your Eyes" proceeds with a lively theme, without excelling, then follows the track that disappointed me most of the entire album along with "Darkness," I'm talking about "Mercy Street," where on earth has the magic of the original gone? Even the voice seems to have worsened! The ambient ending (in my opinion one of the most exciting things ever written by PG) then gets lost as nothing under the weak orchestral base, and the result is a half-disaster with PG's splendid voice in the foreground, not enough to justify any positive judgment.

"Red Rain" significantly raises the quality level, the wonderfully nervous atmosphere is practically unchanged from the original, both the voice and the melody in the chorus are spectacular, making a majestic immense storm appear as the first image in our minds, where a fearless PG sails on a ship (which should have been in Mercy Street, to be clear "Out with the father he's out in the boat, riding the water, riding the waves on the sea" there was a transfiguration) bravely facing his worst nightmares. A new vocal peak, indeed, and a clear improvement over the original.

The following two tracks, while not repulsive, come close to it, on "Don't Give Up" I really only have bad words to say (what is that thing meowing in place of Bush? WHAT THE HELL IS IT?) but for "Darkness" I want to spend a few words. The original is one of my absolute favorite tracks, with those metallic explosions and that unsettling sweetness of the piano in moments of pause, in moments of cosmic void that preludes to a new unstoppable explosion of fury, terror, and pure rage. Well, here there is nothing. Where the voice was simply filtered as through a cellphone, here it is heavily digitally modified, and the result is really clumsily tragicomic. No sense of looming terror, no metallic sound in the background, nothing would give us the impression that madness is at the heart of the song. I only see craftsmanship here, and I don't like that. Immense disappointment!

"Digging In the Dirt" once again raises the album's standard, great vocal performance, beautiful instrumental pauses on the chorus, charged with tension that releases in the subsequent phases. And here Melanie becomes almost pleasant to the ear, as she limits herself to supporting her father, and I must say that her sweet voice well accompanies the rough and sharp one of the father.

The highest moment of the album is, in my opinion, an absolutely ignorable 3-minute instrumental song, "The Nest That Sailed the Sky." Never, and I mean never, has PG managed to move me so much, and with so little. The absolute delicacy, the total expression of freedom and openness to the external world that this track conveys, makes those previous ugliness tolerable, as you know you are in for a long journey in the open and sparkling sky of an unnatural blue, in your warm basket of wicker lined with love by some female relative's hands, or perhaps by your mother. These are the ethereal images that the song evokes for me, and there is no better way to conclude an album.