Peter Gabriel - Peter Gabriel (1980)

To the uninitiated, Peter Gabriel was the singer of the band Genesis in the early 70s.  He left the band to pursue a solo career in 1975 after touring their last album together, "The Lamb That Lies On Broadway".  His first two albums showed a somewhat renewed style of songwriting, such as paying attention on atmospherics and granting opportunities for session players to "strut their stuff".

For his third album, Peter invited musicians from all sorts of genres - there is his ex-bandmate Phil Collins on drums, Morris Pert - Phil's colleague from another band Brand-X, Paul Weller from The Jam, and John Giblin on bass (who later played with Simple Minds).  Robert Fripp, leader of the prog-rock group King Crimson (and also producer on his last PG album) was invited to play the guitar , and top session player Tony Levin (who played on John Lennon's "Double Fantasy")on bass, to name a few.  The album was released in the summer of 1980, with "Games Without Frontiers" being taken from it to promote as a single.  It became fairly popular via moderation of radio air-play, and people like me began paying attention to him. 

I think the whole reason behind the success of this album was that Peter was ready to try anything new.  Even though he came from a progressive rock background, he wasn't scared about hiring Paul Weller to play on his album.  Every one was encouraged to experiment on the tracks that he played.

Great songs abound on the album - "Intruder" is the first track; with Peter singing to you in front of an icy cold metallic musical backdrop.  Then came "No Self Control" - the song started out pastiching theme music of 1940's radio/tv film-noir, then morphed into something else as soon as Peter opened his pipes.  "Start" is a melange of synth and saxophone before it quickly launches into "I Don't Remember", with Peter portraying the character of a paranoid suffering from drugs and delusion.  "Family Snapshot" tells the story of Lee Harvey Oswald attempting to share the limelight with JFK.  It's a song combined with fantastic lyrics and arrangements, with the music building up layers of tension as Peter charges the lyrics forward.  "Games Without Frontiers" has a big hook you can hum to coupled with wonderful lyrics - how would the world be like if kids were given the opportunity to rule the world.

It was a great album - from start to finish.  The performance by musicians was stellar. Peter had some grand ideas and visions, and the production team was able to sculpt them into what they deservedly become.   PG3 stands the test of time.