Peter Gabriel is considering his options for future recording projects, now that he has fulfilled his U.S. contract with Geffen with Tuesday’s release of the retrospective “HIT.” The artist’s deal with EMI for the world outside North America will expire after one more album.
“I think that the way things are going is scaring record companies sh*tless,” Gabriel tells Billboard. “Some people are jumping off the Titanic and trying to find a life raft, while others are busy throwing bits of the ship into the sea, hoping it will float better. I’m not sure that’s the right way to go about it.”
However, there are also people who feel this is a time of flux, with some fantastic opportunities, Gabriel says. “I think that those people, with their optimistic attitude and love of music, will find a way through. But everybody is going to have to change the model. The old model is dead,” he says.
As previously reported, Gabriel is considering recording only in 5.1 Surround Sound in the future. “Working in 5.1, including on film scores, is a new discovery [for me],” he says. “It influences how you can use that capacity to shift sound; you can get bolder moving sounds around the place.”
The artist’s new “Growing Up Live” DVD, also due Tuesday, was conceptualized with a high-fidelity audio experience in mind. “Standing at the console mixing a sound that was going to come out of a tiny TV speaker, you’d be thinking, ‘What’s the point?'” he says. “But now you have the capacity to immerse people in 5.1 sound, which offers tremendous scope for adventurous music.”
