Stuff coming out, stuff going in - I'm just a part of everything

Continuing my trip forward in time through the album charts

08/12/23 : i/o - Peter Gabriel

This is an interesting one because I've kinda heard the album when I saw him live earlier in the year but, at the same time, seeing someone play the tracks live isn't anything like listening to the album so I'll be interested to see how it compares (and how much I remember what I heard).

Actually, I was surprised how much I did remember - particularly "Panoptican" and "i/o" which I specifically mentioned last time as stand-out tracks from the new album.  But even the stuff I didn't remember, I enjoyed - I think this is a very decent album indeed.  It's not So, but it's not trying to be So - the man is 37 years older and definitely more world-weary (aren't we all, dahling?!?).  But he's used those years wisely and he's thought about all that's happened - both to him and to others.  I do think it wouldn't have hurt for him to try to include a "Sledgehammer" in there, but having seen him "dance" earlier in the year, maybe he's just not feeling like an upped tempo (and I know that feeling, Pete).

I'm really pleased to say we're at #1 with a new entry in the chart this week - I'm somewhat surprsied to see it's his third #1 album,  Obviously So made it there, but Melt also got there in '80 - but when you look at the quality of tracks on that album ("Games Without Frontiers", "No Self Control", "Biko" and "I Don't Remember") maybe it's not such a surprise.  You might be surprised to hear that both So and Melt spent two weeks at #1 - I suspect this one ain't gonna make it, but let's see, shall we?  The rest of the top five are Ateez (another new entry - I'm sure I won't like it but I might well give it a listen to), Bublé, Tay-Tay and The Rolling Stones (I'm amazed they're still hanging around).

And, the rest of the chart is a very, very bizarre Xmas-but-not-kinda-thang - buckle up, people!  The next highest "new" entry is Soft Cell's Non-Stop Erotic Cabaret, which obviously isn't a new entry but the chart counts it as one (don't ask me!) and the only other ones are the slightly odd combination of Kate Rusby (#76) and Trevor Horn (#81).  But if you think that's weird, let's look at some of the high climbers and new entries - Cher's Christmas (#8 - up from #91), P!nk's Trustfall (#15, a re-entry), The Corrs best-of (#61, a re-entry) and, sadly less surprising, The Pogues Rum Sodomy & The Lash (#79 - and if you've not seen this bit of the coverage of Shane's funeral, it's absolutely gorgeous).

Last week I said that Take That would drop to #5 or #6 and I plumped for #5, so it's absolutely no surprise to see it at #6 - but I'll take that as a win!  I reckon Pete will hang in there surprisingly well, but probably not as well as Take That - I'm going for #12 next week.  And this week's Taylor stats are two in the top ten, five in the top twenty and ten in the entire chart - her signs of world domination show no signs of abating.

Wikipedia has loads more than you'd expect (196 milliPeppers) - it never occurred to me this was his first album of new songs in 21 (TWENTY ONE!) years.  Apparently he had approximately 150 songs in the works in 2005 with the expectation an album would appear any time soon, but things didn't work out that way.  He got there in the end though, with all tracks available in three forms - a "Bright-Side" mix (by Mark Stent), a "Dark-Side" mix (by Tchad Blake) and an "In-Side" mix (by Hans-Martin Buff).  The critics were very complimentary about it all and it's done well commercially, getting to #2 in Germany and Belgium as well as hitting the top here.

"Customers also listened to" Genesis, Steven Wilson, Roger Waters and Yes - I don't think there are any huge surprises there!  I really liked this album - it feels both immediate and one that would warrant several relistens, so I will make an effort to do so (although it might have to wait until the new year, because I seem to be somewhat snowed under with albums at the minute!).

01/12/23 - My favourites!
15/12/23 - Better than I was expecting