Peter Gabriel - Passion
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Free Music Notes for Passion
Free Music Review: Want to be Passionate about Music?
Hit: 5 Stars
People writing these reviews for Peter Gabriel's "Passion" are not just jumping on the bandwagon because there is real credibility to saying that this music is profound, at the apex of creativity, and any other hyperbolic statements you can think of (its not hyperbole though if its true...you be the judge of that though when you listen to Gabriel's Passion).I'm not an expert at the world music genre, but Gabriel does take his musical influences and performers the world over and fuses them into an ambient spiritual vision. I say vision because this music has an optical quality that speaks of scenes and events. It is powerful enough to allow you to close your eyes and see scenes playing on the back of your eyelids. We played this CD while driving through Yosemite and experienced serious sensory overload staring at 5,000 vertical feet of granite while this powerful hymns brought us into the church of the world. Here is what I see to a few of the tracks (once you get this CD you'll see things too...no mind altering substances needed):
Track 1 (The Feeling Begins): Sunrise in the desert on a day of great expectations. Moving through traffic with caffeine surging through the system. Suddenly things are not as they were before. On this day things are different. Things are going to change.
Track 3 (Of These, Hope): The opening hails a great meeting. I think of the League of Nations or the Modern Day UN. This time the organization is effective. This time they have teeth. Through the song they have laid out and debated a plan to resolve the Palestinian-Israeli conflict. At the end they are ready to put it into action. A guitar wails hope and cries out the days last light.
Track 10 (Open): A blind man sees for the first time and not just any old hospital room. Somebody has placed him in front of the Pyramids of Ghiza or the Eiger/Munch/Jungfrau valley or maybe the Sawtooths of Idaho.
Track 15 (Passion): People have realized they are worshipping the same God and can stop killing each other over belief. They have just built the largest cathedral claiming an interfaith universal religion. Think the Koln cathedral, the Taj Mahal, and the Mecca Mosque all thrown into one. An Imam starts it off with chanted prayer (ala Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan's Qwualli from Pakistan). A Hindu cleric joins in (ala voiced by Youssou N'Dour from Senegal). An English choir boy (Julian Wilkins) with pure voice raises eyes and ears to the rafters as sunlight streams through great 10 story tall arched windows. This track is pretty phenomenal and worth the price of admission alone.
Track 21 (Bread and Wine): It's a beautiful moonlit night in an Alaskan bay as glacier's reach fingers into the water. Somewhere a herd of humpback's loll through the water calling songs to each other. The world is at peace.
Get this CD. You'll be seeing things too. Let me know when you do.
Free Music Review: Sonic poetry.. majesty.. beauty.
Hit: 5 Stars
A stellar musical achievement.. a masterpiece.. an engrossing musical journey through mideastern deserts and windswept plains. When I first read the Amazon reviews before buying my first copy, I wondered just what was so special about this one album to garner such universal praise. Now, after over four years and hundreds of listens, I still wonder. It's not the wondering of a skeptic who doesn't understand the fuss; it's the wondering of someone who's been touched in and out by the sheer beauty, ambience and.. well, passion of this work and still has trouble putting it into words.For those still curious, a description of mere words will have to suffice; this is instrumental electro-African world-beat music. Simple guitars, synths and drum loops are seamlessly married to violins, doudouks, tablas and all manner of flutes and whistles - and those are just the ones I can pronounce. It's exotic, it's immediate, it's full of variety and rhythm and mystery and of course, passion. Only two members of the usual Gabriel band appear (minimally) on the recording. The entire cast of players reaches from American and Europe to Egypt, India, Pakistan, New Guinea and more other places than I have space to name here. Yossou N'Dour (that same voice that appeared at the end of "In Your Eyes," in case you're wondering) and Shankar appear from other Gabriel recordings. Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan's phenomenal qawwali voice takes the title track into another world. There are no English lyrics to get in the way. The singing throughout is sometimes in languages I don't recognize, but more often without words at all, which is exactly how it should be. If that choir sang real words through "With This Love," for example, or if lyrics were scattered through the chants of "A Different Drum," it would only seem a hindrance. I can't pick any other standout tracks, but I will mention that the closing "Bread and Wine" is possibly the closest thing to pure heavenly sound I've heard on record.
I've probably said enough. I'll just wrap this up by saying that this album has been my single favorite recording for the last four years, and the new remastered edition sounds even richer and fuller than ever. It's well worth the few hard-earned dollars that little piece of plastic costs if you're looking for a meaningful, touching work of art. You can't put a price on something this enriching. Those who already like it should also look into Peter's latest soundtrack, Long Walk Home.
Free Music Review: Audacious Spirit closer to Kazantzakis than Scorsese
Hit: 5 Stars
Audacious may not be the first word that comes to mind when trying to describe Nikos Kazantzakis, the author of "The Last Temptation of Christ", "The Odyssey: A Modern Sequel", and "Zorba the Greek", but how else can you describe an author who could provoke both Catholicism AND Orthodoxy, who dared to write a sequel to the greatest epic poem ever, and whose tombstone reads "Den elpizo tipota; den fovumai tipota; eimai eleftheros"(I hope for nothing, I fear nothing, I am free!)? The same word also could be used to describe Peter Gabriel's fantastic score to Martin Scorsese's wretched film version of "The Last Temptation of Christ"(remember how bad Harvey Keitel was as Judas?). At the height of his popularity, Peter Gabriel abandons all of his pop sensibilities & attempts a fusion of African, Middle Eastern, Eastern European, & Byzantine Christian music traditions. Sound impossible? You bet it does, but somehow, as if the ghost of Kazantzakis himself were playing along to the music, it not only works, it transcends.
Although there are moments in the cd where you can't help but hear trademark 80's production values, especially with the heavy reverb-laden drums & slightly discernable synths, all in all the cd still sounds simultaneously ahead of its time & entrenched in tradition. The opening sounds of the first track "The Feeling Begins" could be modern Jerusalem as Christians gather for prayer in the Armenian Quarter; track 12 "With This Love" with elegant strains of oboe is reminiscent of Eastern Europe; while track 16 goes back further in time to Byzantine & Catholic choir traditions.
This is a rare recording that works perfectly because of the sheer audacity of its basic premise: link music & the world, impossibly fragmented by differences in geography, culture, race, & theology, with a slender thread of very basic, shared beliefs. I wager Kazantzakis would've loved it.
Free Music Review: My Favorite Album
Hit: 5 Stars
I was first introduced to this album by my uncle as we travelled a few hundred miles to a distant relative's wedding. Being only 12 I had no idea exactly what he was handing me but he did so with the caveat that this quite possibly could change my life. I laughed this off as so much pretention on his part. Slipping the cassette into my walkman I sat back in the seat as we drove to some unknown destination. And change my life this did. Expressive, chaotic, beautiful, inspired. A thousand adjectives could not overstate this amazing piece of work. PG is beyond his top form and he has created something otherworldly, timeless. So timeless in fact that I've, since owning the cassette (which quickly became worn out) have been the proud owner of 3 cd's of this dynamic work (I actually wore our my first so I bought a second and then when the remastered addition came out I bought that). The remastered addition is worth having as some of the lower register elements are much brighter and clearer. The remastering is most noticeable on "It is accomplished" in which Tony Levin's bass guitar was hardly noticeable in the original recording.
There have been a few reviews earlier on that have given this work 1 or 2 stars. I'm really not entirely sure what to say to this. What were you expecting? Some strange repeat of So or Security bended to fit a story about Christ? Oh well, to each their own.
There was also mention that PG seems to have "stolen" the Armenian duduk as his own as well as some ancient Armenian songs. To those people I say, please read the liner notes of the CD. PG properly credits each instrument and player as well as, where required, he sites inspirational uses or straight recordings of ancient loops for each and every song.
If you know a 12 year old, introduce them to this music. I know I can never thank my uncle enough for doing so.
Free Music Review: Passion According To St. Peter
Hit: 5 Stars
"Passion" is Peter Gabriel's landmark 1989 soundtrack album to the controversial film, "The Last Temptation Of Christ," directed by Martin Scorsese. It is also one of Gabriel's finest works ever. The album is ocean-deep in sounds, moods & rhythms, as Gabriel is augmented by singers & musicians from around the world, such as Shankar, Hossam Ramzy, Yousou N'dour, Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan, Baba Maal, and many others. It's a sensational, breathtaking pallette of music, quite possibly THE best world music album ever recorded. And you don't have to listen to it within the context of the film, either, as the album totally opens up the listener's imagination, with such tracks as "The Feeling Begins," with it's driving rhythms, "Of These, Hope," with it's chugging bass lines suggesting the movement of a caravan, "A Different Drum," with it's beautiful chanting (featuring Gabriel) and slamming percussion, "Zaar," with it's sensation of being in a thunder & rain storm, "Before Night Falls," featuring beautiful finger cymbals that sparkle on your stereo speakers, the lovely "With This Love," the haunting "Passion," with vocals by Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan that will send shivers down your spine, and the glorious, triumphant "It Is Accomplished." But every single track here is simply stunning. And the new remastering treatment on the album makes it sound even crisper & sharper than ever before. "Passion" may not be a "proper" Peter Gabriel album, but nonetheless, Gabriel totally outdid himself with this one. The fact that he wasn't even nominated for an Academy Award for this exquisite film score is a total mockery of justice. Peter Gabriel's "Passion" is a musical triumph. It's music will haunt you & stimulate your senses. A true classic. :-)