Peter Gabriel – Scratch My Back, Now Fuck Off!

All hasn’t gone to plan with the rock legend Peter Gabriel’s supposed dual album release as artists aren’t cooperating.

Gabriel’s latest album ‘Scratch My Back’ which was released last month was a series of covers of new and old artists where he presented his own interpretation of the original songs. The initial plan was for Gabriel to release this album of covers and then follow it up with an album consisting of his songs covered by the artists in the first. Instead there has been a problem in that the artists who Gabriel had hoped to participate in the project are either missing deadlines or refusing to take part at all. As such, Gabriel has been forced to release the material as a series of monthly downloads available from iTunes.

In an interview with the New York Times, Gabriel said: “We may not get everybody, but I hope we will.” The first two songs, featuring Paul Simon’s version of Biko, and the Magnetic Fields’ take on Not One of Us, are available now, with others following over the coming months.

According to Pitchfork, Arcade Fire are not covering ‘Games Without Frontiers’ as originally promised. It is unclear whether they are covering another Gabriel song or if they are even participating in the project at all.

The only artist to officially turn Gabriel down was David Bowie. Gabriel covered the track ‘Heroes’on ‘Scratch My Back’. Instead, the song’s co-writer, Brian Eno, is to record something instead.