"Here Comes the Flood" is a song by British rock musician Peter Gabriel from 1977. It first appeared on his debut solo album, Peter Gabriel (Car).
| "Here Comes in the Flood" | |
|---|---|
| Song by Peter Gabriel | |
| from the album Peter Gabriel (Car) | |
| Released | 1977 |
| Recorded | 1976 |
| Genre | |
| Length | 5:38 |
| Label | |
| Songwriter(s) | Peter Gabriel |
| Producer(s) | Bob Ezrin |
The song has been played on several Peter Gabriel tours, often forgoing the orchestral arrangement found on his 1977 eponymous release in favor of a more stripped down arrangement. Sparser re-recordings of Here Comes the Flood have been included on Robert Fripp’s 1979 Exposure album and Gabriel’s 1990 compilation album, Shaking the Tree: Sixteen Golden Greats. Gabriel has performed the song in both English and German both live and in the studio. A German recording of Here Comes the Flood was included on the 12" single of "Biko".
Background
editGabriel wrote "Here Comes the Flood" soon after his departure from Genesis in 1975.[1] He recalled that the song was written during a warm summer evening while on the hillside above his cottage. As an experiment, Gabriel made a habit of running down the hillside one hundred paces with his eyes closed. During one of those excursions, Gabriel recalled that he felt "an energy point on the hillside and after a burst of meditation stormed down the hill to write."[2]
The song centered around a fictional character conceived by Gabriel known as Mozo, an individual loosely based on Moses and the alchemical treatise Aurora consurgens. Gabriel dispersed several songs related to Mozo on his albums up through So in 1986, with "Here Comes the Flood" and "Down the Dolce Vita" being the first to reference the character.[1] He considered the idea of using "Here Comes the Flood" in a multi-media rock opera based on the character of Mozo, but the idea never came to fruition.[3]
Gabriel’s interest in shortwave radio served as a catalyst for the creation of "Here Comes the Flood".[4] He observed that radio signals were stronger as daylight faded and believed that this correlated with an increase in psychic energy at night. During one of his dreams, Gabriel envisioned a scenario where the psychic barriers that safeguard one's thoughts would erode and thus manifest in a collective consciousness.[2] In an interview with Sounds magazine, he said that the lyrics pertained to the concept of a mental flood where the collective thoughts of other individuals would be made publicly available and accessible through telepathy. He posited that extroverted people would tolerate the situation but believed that those who wished to conceal their thoughts would be unable to adapt.[4]
Gabriel rehearsed "Here Comes the Flood" on a few occasions with Anthony Phillips, Mike Rutherford, and Phil Collins, all of whom were former bandmates from Genesis.[3] During his first meeting with producer Bob Ezrin, Gabriel presented him with a demo of "Here Comes the Flood" in the producer's living room. Ezrin approved of the song and went to bed singing its melody, later commenting that "there's not many songs I've heard fresh from the artist's mouth that are that great".[5] Rutherford recalled that the version used on Gabriel's first studio album was hardly recognizable from his original sessions with Gabriel.[3]
Other versions
editPrior to its official release, the song appeared on an entertainment show on Thames Television in the summer of 1976.[6]
Gabriel believed that the recording found on his 1977 eponymous release was overproduced and not faithful to his original demo.[2] In March 1978, Gabriel reworked the song with Robert Fripp on his 1979 Exposure album. Unlike the original recording found on Gabriel’s 1977 eponymous release, this version only featured vocals, piano, a synthesiser played by Brian Eno, and Frippertronics, a recording technique developed by Fripp using two reel-to-reel tape machines.[7][3] Gabriel commented that this version adhered more to the arrangement he originally conceived.[2] That same year, Gabriel performed the song on a BBC Two TV special, which was prefaced by a choir trio featuring Kate Bush. A German recording, titled "Jetzt Kommt Die Flut", was included on the 12" single of "Biko".[6] Gabriel performed "Jetzt Kommt Die Flut" during the German and Switzerland shows of his i/o tour.[8]
In 1990, Gabriel re-recorded "Here Comes the Flood" for his 1990 compilation album, Shaking the Tree: Sixteen Golden Greats. Gabriel commented that it gave him "another chance to do another version. We'd done one on the first album, which was a grand thing with an orchestra, which I think had some beautiful textures in the verse that I liked a lot, but the chorus ended up a little too bombastic. I'd done a demo prior to that with Robert Fripp, and he then did a version which was more like the demo. I wanted to take a simpler, more emotional sketch version of it and do it with voice and piano."[6]
Personnel
edit- Peter Gabriel – lead vocals, keyboards
- Robert Fripp – electric and classical guitar
- Dick Wagner – electric guitar
- Tony Levin – bass guitar
- Jozef Chirowski – keyboards
- Larry Fast – synthesizers
- Allan Schwartzberg – drums
- Jimmy Maelen – percussion
- London Symphony Orchestra – strings
- Michael Gibbs – conductor
Critical reception
editClassic Rock Review complimented the instrumentation and lyrics of "Here Comes the Flood" and said that Dick Wagner’s lead guitar work cemented the song as an effective album closer.[9] Stewart Mason of AllMusic wrote that the song's lyrics "are the most depressing and paranoid ones on this relatively upbeat album, foreshadowing the increasing darkness of the next two albums. This is also the only song on the album that explicitly sounds like Genesis, right down to Steve Hunter's Steve Hackett-like guitar solos and the orchestral arrangement."[10] NME remarked that the song "ended the album in triumphant style", and further noted the song's "doomy strings" and "searing guitars" that bolstered Gabriel's vocals.[11]
Alan Jones of Melody Maker thought that the acoustic guitars and orchestration aptly underpinned the conviction in Gabriel's vocal delivery, adding that the lyrics were articulate enough to convey a sense of hope in enduring an apocalyptic future.[12] They further stated that the lyrics surrounding apocalypticism were unpretentious and demonstrated admirable restraint.[13] Winnipeg Free Press identified "Here Comes the Flood" as "one of several splendid songs with hit-single possibilities."[14] Uncut believed that "Here Comes the Flood" sounded "a little overcooked" in its studio form, but said that Gabriel would later effectively incorporate the song into his live performances.[15]
References
edit- ^ a b Bright, Spencer (1988). Peter Gabriel: An Authorized Biography. London, UK: Sidgwick & Jackson. pp. 6, 126–127. ISBN 0-283-99498-3.
- ^ a b c d Gallo, Armando (1986). Peter Gabriel. United Kingdom: SonicBond. pp. 16–17. ISBN 0-7119-0783-8.
- ^ a b c d Easlea, Daryl (2014). Without Frontiers: The Life and Music of Peter Gabriel. London, UK: Omnibus Press. pp. 154–155, 157–158, 186. ISBN 978-1-4683-0964-5.
- ^ a b Barton, Geoff (19 February 1977). "Geoff Baron Interviews Peter Gabriel". Sounds. p. 22. Archived from the original on 31 March 2024. Retrieved 19 April 2024 – via The Genesis Archive.
{{cite news}}: CS1 maint: unfit URL (link) - ^ Charone, Barbara (2 October 1976). "Peter Gabriel: Toronto Tales of the Overkill Kid". Sounds. p. 24. Archived from the original on 8 October 2023. Retrieved 19 April 2024 – via The Genesis Archive.
{{cite news}}: CS1 maint: unfit URL (link) - ^ a b c Scarfe, Graeme (2021). Peter Gabriel: Every Album, Every Song. United Kingdom: SonicBond. pp. 14, 122, 132. ISBN 978-1-78952-138-2.
- ^ Kopp, Bill (21 June 2019). "The Drive to 1981 Begins: Robert Fripp's Masterful 'Exposure' at 40". Rock and Roll Globe. Retrieved 30 March 2024.
- ^ "Genesis News Com [it]: Peter Gabriel - i/o The Tour: Europe and North America 2023 - tour review". www.genesis-news.com. Retrieved 31 March 2024.
- ^ "Peter Gabriel 1977 debut album – Classic Rock Review". 26 February 2017. Retrieved 29 March 2024.
- ^ Mason, Stewart. "Here Comes the Flood by Peter Gabriel". AllMusic. Retrieved 29 March 2024.
- ^ Humpries, Patrick (26 February 1977). "Master Gabriel and the Priestly Egg". NME. Archived from the original on 27 October 2021. Retrieved 19 April 2024 – via Genesis Archive.
{{cite news}}: CS1 maint: unfit URL (link) - ^ Jones, Allan (26 February 1979). "Gabriel: On the Sides of the Angels". Melody Maker. Archived from the original on 31 March 2024. Retrieved 19 April 2024 – via The Genesis Archive.
{{cite news}}: CS1 maint: unfit URL (link) - ^ Jones, Allan (12 February 1979). "Gabriel: How I Escaped the Success Trap". Melody Maker. p. 30. Archived from the original on 31 March 2024. Retrieved 19 April 2024 – via The Genesis Archive.
{{cite news}}: CS1 maint: unfit URL (link) - ^ Mellen, Andy (2 April 1977). "Genesis Started His Rise But Gabriel Keeps it Up". Winnipeg Free Press. p. 2. Archived from the original on 8 October 2021. Retrieved 14 April 2024 – via The Genesis Archive.
{{cite news}}: CS1 maint: unfit URL (link) - ^ Thomson, Graeme (30 October 2015). "Peter Gabriel - the first four solo albums remastered". UNCUT. Retrieved 29 March 2024.