Cleveland Ohio 1975: Peter Gabriel announces he will definitely be leaving the group…

It is now hard to realise how this appeared at the time. The group's image was essentially Peter in one costume or another, and the group's obituaries were soon being written. The decision for Phil to take over as singer did not seem obvious to anyone (except perhaps to Phil). Auditioning was tough, perhaps we were trying too hard to find a clone of Peter. We finally decided Phil was really the only man for the job. The album, "A TRICK OF THE TAIL," was so much the most enjoyable to make, up to that point; this, combined with the response to our first few shows in Canada, meant we knew we had a future. 1976 proved to be our most successful year to date, surprising all of us I think.

On stage we added Bill Bruford on drums. After one tour, alternative career options beckoned for Bill, and his place was taken by Chester Thompson. When, during the mixing of the live album, "SECONDS OUT," Steve Hackett left the group, we decided as before not to replace him in the studio; live, however, we added Daryl Stuermer on guitar and bass.

The studio tracks here include virtually all the tracks recorded at the time of the various albums which were not included on those records. With some it was a toss-up whether they were on that album or not; in many cases one group member would have chosen one of these over an included track. Other tracks, however, were never contenders. Over the years these songs have turned up as B-sides or EP tracks, etc. Some are definitely period pieces, but some stand up fine.

The live tracks here have all been selected because they did not appear on any of the live albums. Live records were mainly made up of songs from the most recent tour, so songs from previous tours tended to be overlooked, even some stage favourites.

Also included here are four 12" mixes done at the time of release of some singles from "INVISIBLE TOUCH" and "WE CAN'T DANCE."

The final piece is a recording of "Mama" while we were still writing it. By this stage we had tied down the structure of the verse, but were still searching for

ideas for the middle. There are obviously no lyrics apart from the odd line. The middle and end parts of this are just improvisations from this one day, and although some bits were later incorporated, some promising ideas were never developed…

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