#78 Torino, Stadio Comunale, 8.9.1988

Human Rights Now!
Torino, Stadio Comunale
September 8th 1988

Youssou N'Dour
Tracy Chapman
Claudio Baglioni
Peter Gabriel
Sting
Bruce Springsteen

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It was 25 years ago today. Well.... almost...
It was 25 years ago yesterday ;-)

The 5th show in the series - after London, Paris (2 dates) and Budapest - that brought the Amnesty International message and especially the Universal Declaration Of Human Rights all over the world.

Those early dates were musically not yet as adventurous as the tour would prove at later stages (I would give almost everything to go back in time and see the shows in Africa and India!), but the ones I saw were all solid performances by everybody involved.

I do remember the first Wembley show as the weakest. Gabriel played in the early afternoon, immediately after Youssou and before Tracy Chapman. But though the decision was dictated by the will of letting others go ahead and take the better spot, the choice proved to be wrong and a mistake: most people had not yet even arrived at the stadium and his performance was already over! Not being a fan of Sting and knowing that I had a few more dates ahead to see them all, I left after Tracy's set!

The French audience was great as always, but the thing that struck me the most in Bercy that year was how good it all sounded, proving once again that the advantage of the second night in the same venue is a clear plus! This was particularly significant in PG's set during the opening number: the combination of Shankar's violin and Youssou's voice was superb. It's just a pity that Nusrat didn't get aboard on the tour, so as to replicate daily/nightly the sheer magic that was the Cornwall Coliseum night!!

About Torino, then...
It's funny that in typical Italian style we were the only ones to make a huge fuss about the invited "local" artist. The voices against Baglioni were loud and numerous, but in retrospect they were just silly... In most other places the selected musicians was definitely not the "best" the local scene could offer, but nowhere else - at least that I know of - people booed their own representative.
That, more than any artistic whim or inspiration, is the reason behind Peter appearing on stage in the middle of Baglioni's set to support him during the song "Ninna Nanna"...

PG's set was abruptly interrupted in the midst of Shock The Monkey by a power failure which silenced the whole stadium all of a sudden. But things were quickly fixed and after 10/15 minutes, with a second Monkey take, thing got back to normal.

In the past few months a number of different recordings from that day have been lovingly and carefully recovered, repaired and remastered by a bunch of fans to completely recreate that beautiful day. The full package includes 5 audio cds and 1 dvd which you can download FOR FREE from a torrent site near you (you can choose among Dime, Jungleland and the Genesis Movement one)
 :-)

The video above is the grand finale for the show with everybody onstage doing a fine version of Bob Marley's and Peter Tosh's hymn "Get up! Stand Up!", and it has been reconstructed using audience recorded audio, pro shot extracts from a tv program and some amateur video footage. But the dvd includes more, and I'll let you find it out by yourself.

As always, I hope you'll enjoy it!


Full Setlist

• ALL ARTISTS
Get Up! Stand Up!

• YOUSSOU N'DOUR
Nelson Mandela
Immigrés/Bitim Rew
Bamako
The Truth
Kocc Barma

• CLAUDIO BAGLIONI
Strada Facendo
Via
Amori In Corso
Notte Di Note, Note Di Notte
Ninna Nanna Nanna Ninna (with Peter Gabriel)
Uomini Persi
E Adesso La Pubblicità
La Vita E' Adesso

• TRACY CHAPMAN
Across The Lines
For My Lover
Behind The Wall
Fast Car
Freedom Now
Mountains O'Things
Talkin'bout A Revolution
Why?

• PETER GABRIEL
Of These, Hope
Games Without Frontiers
Family Snapshot
Shock The Monkey (stopped for blackout)
Shock The Monkey
No Self Control
Don't Give Up
Sledgehammer
In Your Eyes
Biko


• STING
01 King Of Pain (3LP bootleg)
02 If You Love Somebody, Set Them Free (SM tape)
03 One World (Not Three) (LDB master series)
04 Fragilidad (LDB master series)
05 They Dance Alone (LDB master series)
06 Fortress Around Your Heart (LDB master series)
07 Bring On The Night (LDB master series)
08 When The World Is Running Down (LDB master series)
09 Don't Stand So Close To Me (LDB master series)

• BRUCE SPRINGSTEEN & THE E STREET BAND
Born In The U.S.A.
The Promised Land
Cover me
Working On The Highway
The River (with Sting)
Cadillac Ranch
War
My Hometown
Thunder Road
Beacuse The Night
Glory Days
Born To Run
Raise Your Hand

• ALL ARTISTS
Chimes Of Freedom
Get Up! Stand Up!

International Day Of Peace 1986

The United Nations' International Day of Peace is a global observance and not a public holiday. It is a day when nations around the world are invited to honor a cessation of hostilities during the day.
A UN resolution established the International Day of Peace in 1981 to coincide with the opening of the UN General Assembly. The first Peace Day was celebrated in 1982 and was held on the third Tuesday of September each year until 2002, when September 21 became the permanent date for the International Day of Peace. The assembly decided in 2001 that the International Day of Peace should be annually observed on September 21 starting from 2002. By setting a fixed date for the International Day of Peace, the assembly declared that the day should be observed as a day of global ceasefire and non-violence.
By creating the International Day of Peace, the UN devoted itself to worldwide peace and encouraged people to work in cooperation for this goal. Since its inception, Peace Day has marked personal and planetary progress toward peace. It has grown to include millions of people worldwide and many events are organized each year to commemorate and celebrate this day.
(For further information: http://www.un.org/en/events/peaceday/)

VIDEO BACKGROUND
This came to me through a great friend, Marco L., whom I haven't seen for a long long time (except for a very brief meet up at the last PG show in Verona, in 2010). We probably first met in the late 80's, when we were both active fanzine makers (he with Wonderous Stories, I with Paperlate), but we did get on even more friendly terms in the summer of 1995, when Secret World, the band he was playing keyboards in (which as the name implies was a Gabriel cover band), played in Bologna for a PG Tribute event I was asked to organize and which turned out to be a great success for all involved with about 800 people showing up in the middle of a July week…

We met a few times afterwards: on one occasion, when I was in Rome for something else, we did go for a pizza one night and he handed me 2 VHS tapes telling me - but here my memory could be mistaken - he had come across the guy who filmed the stuff by absolute chance...
For a few years I did not know what exactly to do with them: they were NTSC and the cost of professionally transferring them would have been too steep; also, the only thing I knew was that they were filmed during the 1986 UN show, of which I already had a PAL transfer. I must say I thought it was strange that these were 2 tapes, when one would have sufficed for the barely 30 minutes set, but I simply guessed the rest would be fillers from US Tv or things like that.

I only managed to finally see and transfer the tapes to a S•VHS PAL copy around the year 2000, and boy was I surprised!! Not only the footage from the day of show was far better than the amateur shoot, it was also done from on stage rather than from the audience point of view, and it included all sorts of interesting and amusing bits and pieces from the day (check out the nutter chapter or the dove incident…).
Then, obviously, there are the rehearsals, of which the above is an extract…
While there is in fact nothing really "new" or "unexpected" in this footage, nonetheless I believe that having a chance to "sneak in" on a such an occasion, even if just for one hour, is something quite unique. As unique is the band gathered for the occasion (as you cn see from the musicians listed below). It appears from some of the musicians' different clothes that the rehearsals happened over a couple of days, so the date is actually just a guesstimate on my side.
Finally, this seems to fit in quite well with the theme of the (belated) 25th SO anniversary celebrations…

So: here's to you, Marco! With many thanks to your friendship and kindness in letting me have this all those years ago. I hope to get in touch again and share a few memories & beers whenever the chance arises!



the intruder (2012)


- - - - - - -


Peter Gabriel - International Day Of Peace 1986 (rehearsals & show)
14th/15th September, New York, Unknown studio
16th September, UN Building

STARRING
Peter Gabriel - voice, keyboards
Little Steven - guitar, voice

SPECIAL GUEST
Youssou N'Dour - voice

FEATURING
Darryl Jones - bass
Omar Hakim - drums
David Sancious - keyboards
L.Shankar - voice, violin
David Beal - percussion

ALSO APPEARING
Barry Roberts (University For Peace, Costa Rica)
Dave Stallbaumer (PG technician & stage manager)
Assorted politicians, authorities, personalities and international musicians

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

DISC 1 - STUDIO REHEARSALS
Chapter 1 - Talking before the start (PG, BR, LS & DS)
Chapter 2 - In Your Eyes (Take I - PG on keyb)
Chapter 3 - In Your Eyes (Take II - PG on keyb)
Chapter 4 - In Your Eyes (Chorus rehearsal)
Chapter 5 - waiting and listening to a tape
Chapter 6 - In Your Eyes (Take III - PG standing)
Chapter 7 - In Your Eyes (Take IV - final part only)
Chapter 8 - In Your Eyes (Take V - PG standing)
Chapter 9 - Biko (cut)
Chapter 10 - Barry Roberts speech rehearsal & debate
Chapter 11 - Sun City

DISC 2 - INTERNATIONAL DAY OF PEACE CONCERT
Chapter 1 - Crowd, stage and Barry Roberts declaration
Chapter 2 - A lady's speech and the "Dove Mishap"
Chapter 3 - Musicians interviews
Chapter 4 - International musicians performances (I)
Chapter 5 - International musicians performances (II)
Chapter 6 - "Nutter alert" (a Genesis fan) and backstage shots
Chapter 7 - PG gets on stage and speaks of the day
Chapter 8 - Red Rain
Chapter 9 - In Your Eyes
Chapter 10 - Biko
Chapter 11 - Sun City

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

FULL LINEAGE
Unknown format master (I suspect U-matic) --> VHS (NTSC) --> S•VHS (PAL) --> Panasonic NV-HS1000 --> Canopus ADVC-100 --> iMac (iMovie/Compressor/Toast) --> dvd files (torrent)

If the YouTube sample above as whetted your appetite, head on to the Genesis Movement Torrent website to download the full 2 hours video in dvd format...

WowTube!

Haven't had time for any new posts or videos recently, but I just want to express how freaked out I am that the In Your Eyes clip as gone over the 100-bleeding-000 views wall on YouTube.

I'm not on Facebook and I haven't done anything to push it or promote it, so I honestly would have never expected it to get that far.

The release of New Blood has obviously sparked a lot of interest, and besides pg.com and Facebook, the link to my clip has appeared all over the place.
So thanks to all the viewers and to the nearly 500 who 'liked' it.

Like the man himself said (after the amazing impromptu performance of Daara J on Lay Your Hand On me at Womad 2007): "Now follow that!!"

Don't know if I'll make it, but I'll try to put down a few of my thoughts on the Scratch My Back/New Blood albums and tours soon(ish)...

In Your Eyes@Hammersmith (multicam edit)

At last, here's the first in my intended series of edits form the New Blood shows I attended. To experiment, I chose the last song from the second night at Hammersmith, earlier this year, which features (as always) arranger extraordinaire John Metcalfe conducting the New Blood Orchestra, and an inspired performance from Sevara.

Sound comes from the soon to be legendary Digital Brothers tape from the night of the 24th (freely available on the genesis movement torrentsite).

Footage comes from 4 different video sources: YouTube users' goldmosh (from the 24th) and alistairburns (from the 23rd), and my own shots from both the 23rd and 24th.

Thanks to the click giving all musicians on stage their cues, syncing audio and video from different nights wasn't really hard at all... Continuity, on the other hand, sometimes is obviously far from perfect.

Finally, the title sequence has been done using YouTube user funkymanT's animation sequence.

Hope you'll enjoy it, but please do let me know what you think anyway...