Peter Gabriel

Since his departure from prog-rock progenitor Genesis, Peter Gabriel has focused his solo career even more on the cerebral than commercial, incorporating elements of electronic, avant-garde, and world music into his work. After his prolific string of albums that culminated in 1986’s multi-platinum So, Gabriel directed his attention to other brainy projects, ranging from founding one of the first legal online music download sites to jamming with keyboard-wielding apes for a Georgia State University experiment. Gabriel hasn't been terribly prolific in the 2000s, and his latest project is a covers album called Scratch My Back, featuring songs of his contemporaries (Bowie, Neil Young, David Byrne) and successors (Radiohead, Arcade Fire, Bon Iver). Many have agreed to collectively return the favor on the aptly titled I’ll Scratch Yours.

Updated 06/01/2011