Peter Gabriel's Covers Project Comes Unstuck

Posted on Mar 3rd 2010 9:19AM by Barnaby Smith
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The premise of Peter Gabriel's new album of covers, 'Scratch My Back,' was that each artist whose song the former Genesis man would rework would in turn cover their favourite Peter Gabriel song. It has emerged, however, that the project has been compromised due to the artists in question either missing deadlines or turning Gabriel down flat.

'Scratch My Back' features orchestral interpretations of songs by Paul Simon, Neil Young, Randy Newman, David Bowie, Arcade Fire, Bon Iver and others. The accompanying album, inevitably, was given the title of 'I'll Scratch Yours.'

Paul Simon's cover of Gabriel's 'Biko' and Magnetic Fields rendering of 'Not One of Us' are currently available as digital downloads, with Gabriel releasing other covers in pairs every month.

"We may not get everybody, but I hope we will," Gabriel told the New York Times.

David Bowie, whose 'Heroes' is covered by Gabriel on 'Scratch My Back' rejected the opportunity to cover a Gabriel track, so Brian Eno, who co-wrote 'Heroes', is recording something instead. It was also reported that Arcade Fire will not be covering 'Games Without Frontiers' as initially planned. It is not certain if they will be covering a different Gabriel song or dropping out of the project altogether.