I even had to "act" as a journalist for a big German TV-station (ZDF), which broadcasted the interview with PG an hour ago on their prime-time-show "Leute heute". They wanted to show that journalists were lining up to interview Peter an thus had me and a colleague knock at Peter's hotel room and greet him as if we never met before. That was rather ridiculous and the idea was greeted with great laughter by Peter and myself. But anyway, it was fun and we went ahead.

But, the interview itself was very interesting. This is what he had to say:

The tour next year will be called..."Growing Up"! [recently confirmed as "Still Growing Up"] Because they worked hard on conceiving it and Peter thinks that not enough people saw it. There were obviously a lot of requests for more concerts in certain territories and these will be organised next year. He will definitely play in Germany and will add a few more songs, but generally the show will be the same. Previously I had been informed that it was originally going to be a 'Hits' Tour in which elements from the previous tours would have appeared again, such as the telephone box seen in "Come Talk To Me" from "Secret World Live". But that idea has obviously died.

On why a "Hits" CD at this point in time and how it will appear to the fans: "I don't think "Hits" is so much for the fans as for people who just bought "Sledgehammer" or haven't bought any of my stuff". But in a way "Hit" is contractual fulfillment. "It will certainly help in that way because I haven't felt supported from an American label for some time. I offered them "Son of Ovo" and "Hit" and they did choose "Hit". I wonder why...(laughing)."

On "Odds & Sods": "That is more for the fans. Well, I really want to do that at some point. Maybe next year I am going to do the 'Odds and Sods'".

On "Son of Ovo": "I don't think it will be out in February of next year. And I am not sure now...I mean I was thinking of trying to do that because we had requests from people who wanted to hear me sing my songs as a sort of songwriters version of 'Ovo'. I had sung some of the songs...I mean I had sang them all on the demo versions, but I had re-sung some of them and Stephen Hague had been helping me with that project. I'd like to finish it, but it's not done as yet. I am not sure whether it's really an album worth of stuff. I may take some of these songs and use them in some other material. But I don't know yet."

On another project called the "Big Blue Ball". Rumours about this project were spread years ago and Simon Emmerson and a few others from the Afro Celts were reported to have participated in this: "In fact 'Burn you up' came from that project. I had Karl Wallinger upstairs [that must be the Working Room in Real World] working with me on a lot of it and David Bottrill. Stephen Hague is looking after that and trying to make some sense of what was to be a big mess, but featured some really good ideas. And that is getting near completion. So, hopefully that is coming out next year."

On the upcoming work on a new studio album: "I will get back into the studio soon to see if I still like the material that I had left unfinished the last time. Some of them are just bits of ideas, some are songs, but very few of them are finished."

German readers may also like to pick up the German Newspaper 'Aachener Zeitung', this upcoming Monday Nov. 10. It features a whole page on Peter Gabriel.

© Michael Loesl. Written for exclusive use on www.genesis-movement.org. This review may not be reproduced in whole or in part elsewhere without the written consent of the writer.