Come Talk to Me

Given veteran art-rocker Peter Gabriel’s enduring propensity to mount elaborately themed concert shows (an obvious holdover from his nascent days with legendary progressive-rockers Genesis), it came as no surprise that his extensive ‘Secret World’ tour of 1994, in support of then-current album ‘Us’, boasted rather ornate onstage trappings. Working from a dual-stage concept (the ‘Male’ and ‘Female’ platforms), Gabriel put on invariably aesthetically pleasing performances that drew consistent kudos from press reviewers and diehard aficionados alike. Check out a brilliantly executed rendition of the widescreen ‘Come Talk to Me’, whereby Gabriel initially began singing in a mock classic telephone booth, then slowly emerged from it, being tethered by the receiver cord, and then pulled back into the cubicle again at the end of the rendition, thus giving a slyly literal meaning to the song’s central message of communication breakdown.