On December 12th, 2002 my girlfriend and I attended the Peter Gabriel concert at America West Arena in Phoenix.
We were very excited about it, as we are admirers of his great music and his work in general. It is a rare opportunity
to see Peter Gabriel live. He had not performed in Phoenix in almost 10 years.
To our amazement AWA which seats approximately 19,000, was perhaps 40% full…7,000 people?
It was an incredible show. A performance by Peter Gabriel is always filled with great props, theatrics and themes
to enhance the wonderful music. While it was all beautiful and powerful, for myself the songs were threaded by a
sense of desperation, almost a pleading for us in the audience to do something, anything to turn around a world
headed in the wrong direction or struggling to find direction.
Though every song was great, as with any show, 4 or 5 stood out. Among those were…the opening song Here Comes
The
Flood, then Downside-up
and ending with Signal to Noise.
Nearing the end of the show all those empty seats seemed sadly appropriate, like another prop for the show, they leant
support to the message I felt in Mr. Gabriel’s presentation. Still it was disappointing to think of all the Arizonans that
had missed out on both the magic and the message.
