Mercy Street

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"Mercy Street"
Song by Peter Gabriel
from the album So
ReleasedOctober 1986
Genre
Length6:22
Label Geffen
Songwriter(s) Peter Gabriel
Producer(s)
So track listing
9 tracks

Side one

  1. "Red Rain"
  2. "Sledgehammer"
  3. "Don't Give Up"
  4. "That Voice Again"

Side two

  1. "In Your Eyes"
  2. "Mercy Street"
  3. "Big Time"
  4. "We Do What We're Told"
  5. "This Is the Picture (Excellent Birds)"

"Mercy Street" is a song written by the English rock musician Peter Gabriel from his fifth studio album So (1986). Development on the song began a few years prior to the recording sessions for So and began with some percussion tracks recorded by Djalma Corrêa in Brazil. Lyrically, the song is based on the literary works of Anne Sexton. A music video was created for "Mercy Street", which was directed by Matt Mahurin and shot in black-and-white.

Contents

Background and recording

The song was inspired by the personal and confessional works of the American poet Anne Sexton, who wrote a play titled Mercy Street and a poem titled "45 Mercy Street". [1] : 40:20  Gabriel had acquired a collection of Sexton's work titled To Bedlam and Part Way Back at a bookshop in New York City. [2]

Gabriel had qualified for the Gold Pan Am Travel Anywhere Card due to the miles he accumulated on tour while flying on Pan Am, which enabled him to travel for free to any Pam Am Destination of his choosing. [2] Gabriel selected Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, as one of his destinations to explore different rhythms and meet with different percussionists. While in Rio in the summer of 1984, he met with Djalma Corrêa, who recorded a series of percussion tracks around the forró rhythm. [2] [3] [4] "Forró" was also the song's working title. [1] : 38:10–38:23 

Gabriel used the forró on an alternate incarnation of the song, titled "Don't Break This Rhythm". He experimented with a triangle track that Corrêa had recorded, but he was not fully satisfied with the song. He then reworked the verses, changed the song to include an English folk melody and strapped on lyrics based on Sexton's work. [3] [5] Gabriel determined that there were enough differences to warrant the release of "Don't Break This Rhythm" and "Mercy Street" as two separate songs; "Don't Break This Rhythm" became the B-side to "Sledgehammer" and "Mercy Street" appeared on So. [6]

After Gabriel incorporated Corrêa's percussion into "Mercy Street", Richard Tee overdubbed some piano. Gabriel later removed these additions as he believed that they made the arrangement "too complex". Gabriel later worked out some ideas on the Fairlight CMI at his home studio, opting to play the parts manually to achieve some of inconsistencies and inaccuracies that the instrument's Page R feature was unable to provide. [3] Tony Levin played bass on the majority of So, but Larry Klein recorded the bass part on "Mercy Street" instead. Gabriel explained that he was "obsessive with getting the right feel and performance" and said that there were certain instances where Levin was unable to provide a bass part that "fit the picture". Klein had been recording at The Wool Hall in Beckington when he was contacted by Gabriel to work on "Mercy Street". Similar to Gabriel, Klein was also fond of Sexton's poetry, having first read her work when he was a teenager. Upon listening to "Mercy Street", he identified that it had been inspired by Sexton's poetry and found the song "incredibly moving. On the recording, Klein played both a fretted and fretless bass; he focused on playing the tenth scale degree on the fretless bass. [1] : 35:19–38:09 

During one of the recording sessions for "Mercy Street", the Brazilian rhythm was accidentally played back ten percent slower, giving it a grainy quality. [7] For the verses, Gabriel double tracked his vocals by recording one of his parts an octave below the main vocal. Gabriel initially struggled to record the lower vocal part, so audio engineer Kevin Killen suggested that Gabriel stay overnight at the recording studio and attempt a new vocal take the following morning around 7:00 a.m. before his voice perked up. This proved to be successful, and Gabriel attained a satisfactory vocal take within an hour. [1] : 40:13–42:09 

Critical reception

Both contemporary and retrospective reviewers noted Gabriel's use of Sexton's poetry in the lyrics to "Mercy Street". Jon Pareles of The New York Times highlighted some of the instrumentation, including the triangle and the flute-like textures. [8] Writing for Rolling Stone , Tim Holmes thought that "Mercy Street" was a "wistful and melanchol[ic]" dedication to Sexton. [9]

Eric Harvey of Pitchfork noted the song's "misty synths" and Correa's "ululating percussion" and thought that the song offered an interpretation of Sexton's poetry that "expands her narrative universe, ending with the poet peacefully sailing on the ocean with her father." [10] PopMatters commended Gabriel's use of Sexton's material to create "something haunting and beautiful from an idea so dark and lonely." [11] NME listed the song as one of the "10 Most Depressing Songs Ever", describing it as a "beautifully produced number" featuring Gabriel's "usual sensitivity". They concluded that "it isn't until you're a few listens in that you understand how devastating the whole thing is." [12]

Music video

Matt Mahurin directed a black-and-white music video for "Mercy Street" that was shot in Nicaragua on a relatively low budget. [11] [13] Upon his arrival to Nicaragua, Gabriel gave Mahurin complete control over the creative direction of the song's music video after Mahurin informed him of some conceptual ideas that he had in mind. Gabriel said that the music video for "Mercy Street" was the only one in his discography that lacked any collaboration or creative input from him. [13] Mahurin shot scenes of a man rowing in the middle of lake and a woman carrying out Catholic rituals. [11] In a 2007 interview with Record Collector , Gabriel identified the music video for "Mercy Street" as "very beautiful" and cited it as one of his favorites along with "Sledgehammer", "Big Time", and "Zaar". [13]

Personnel

Release details and cover versions

"Mercy Street" was released (remixed by William Orbit) on Gabriel's 1992 CD-single "Blood of Eden" and a live version from the 1993 Secret World Tour was released on Gabriel's live album's Secret World Live 's companion EP, SW Live EP (1994). [14] It was also reinterpreted by Gabriel on his 2011 orchestral album New Blood . [15]

Fever Ray released this song as a single August 2010. [16] Elbow have also released a version of the song on the album And I'll Scratch Yours . The studio album features Peter Gabriel songs from artists he covered on the companion album Scratch My Back . [17]

Pianist Herbie Hancock included an interpretation of "Mercy Street" on The New Standard , a 1996 collection of pop songs treated as though they were jazz standards. [18]

References

  1. 1 2 3 4 Gabriel, Peter (22 October 2012). Classic Albums: So (Television production). Classic Albums. United Kingdom; Eagle Rock Entertainment: Peter Gabriel Records Ltd. Event occurs at 40:20. ASIN   B0085J1EBM . Retrieved 26 October 2019.
  2. 1 2 3 So (CD liner notes). Peter Gabriel. United Kingdom: Real World. 2012. PGCD 5.{{cite AV media notes}}: CS1 maint: others in cite AV media (notes) (link)
  3. 1 2 3 Hutchinson, John (July 1986). "Peter Gabriel: From Brideshead to Sunken Heads". Musician. Retrieved 7 May 2023– via rocksbackpages.com.(subscription required)
  4. ↑ "Genesis information – Issue 32". Genesis Magazine. 30 July 1984. Retrieved 18 March 2025– via The Genesis Archive.
  5. ↑ Hutchinson, John (20 December 1986). "My Brilliant Career". Sounds. p. 22. Retrieved 10 July 2024– via The Genesis Archive.
  6. ↑ Goldstein, Dan. "Technology's Champion (EMM Jun 1986)". Electronics & Music Maker (Jun 1986): 52–57.
  7. ↑ Scarfe, Graeme (2021). Peter Gabriel: Every Album, Every Song. United Kingdom: SonicBond. p. 51. ISBN   978-1-78952-138-2.
  8. ↑ Pareles, Jon (15 June 1986). "Peter Gabriel Sings of Lost Egos". The New York Times . Archived from the original on 14 August 2014. Retrieved 10 July 2024.
  9. ↑ Holmes, Tim (14 August 1986). "So". Rolling Stone . Archived from the original on 15 August 2014. Retrieved 28 July 2014.
  10. ↑ Harvey, Eric (5 January 2020). "Peter Gabriel: So". Pitchfork . Archived from the original on 5 January 2020. Retrieved 18 March 2025.
  11. 1 2 3 Stephens, Christopher John (19 February 2018). "Anne Sexton, Peter Gabriel, and the Dark Lure of 'Mercy Street'". PopMatters. Retrieved 10 July 2024.
  12. ↑ Elan, Priya (25 April 2012). "10 Most Depressing Songs Ever". NME. London. Retrieved 8 April 2016.
  13. 1 2 3 McIver, Joel (22 October 2007). "Angelic Gabriel". Record Collector . Retrieved 26 March 2025.
  14. ↑ "Peter Gabriel SW Live EP". 1994. 7243 8 92582 2 6.
  15. ↑ Andy Gill (7 October 2011). "Album: Peter Gabriel, New Blood (Realworld) - Reviews - Music". The Independent. London. Retrieved 16 April 2012.
  16. ↑ "Fever Ray Covers Peter Gabriel's "Mercy Street" on New Single". Pitchfork. 16 August 2010. Retrieved 8 August 2019.
  17. ↑ Rogers, Jude (2 June 2010). "Peter Gabriel: 'It doesn't have anything to do with witchcraft!'". The Guardian. London. Retrieved 8 April 2016.
  18. ↑ Yanow, Scott. "The New Standard - Herbie Hancock". AllMusic. Retrieved 10 July 2024.
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