Listen to New Peter Gabriel Song, ‘Playing for Time’
Peter Gabriel has released another song from his upcoming album, i/o. You can hear "Playing for Time" below. "'Playing for Time' is a song that I have been working on for a long time and have performed live, without lyrics, so some people may be familiar with it," Gabriel said in a press release.
"It's been an important song for me. It's about time, mortality and memories, and the idea that each of us has a planet full of memories which get stashed inside the brain.
"It is more of a personal song about how you assemble memories and whether we are prisoners of time or whether that is something that can actually free us. I do think it's good to push yourself towards more bold or interesting experiences because then you will have richer memories to feed you when you get to my age. You also get taught by every meaningful experience that you go through."
"Playing for Time" follows two other songs Gabriel has released from i/o, "The Court" and "Panopticom." Gabriel plans to release a new song every full moon, with each track featuring two different mixes from engineers Tchad Blake and Mark “Spike” Stent. (Stent's mixes are labeled as "Bright-Side"; Blake's are "Dark-Side.") The below version of "Playing for Time" is the Dark-Side mix.
The former Genesis singer said he was also inspired by an organization called the Long Now Foundation, a nonprofit whose mission centers on "long-term thinking." "I'm sure that if we have a chance of surviving the existential problems that we now face, we have to start thinking much bigger and longer to make some real headway," Gabriel noted.
Gabriel is scheduled to launch a European tour in May.