Peter Gabriel has a new album in hand, ‘O/I’, whose release will again follow the lunar calendar and will be spread over several months, culminating in the full release of the album at the end of 2026. ‘O/I’ is the second part of his 2023 album, ‘I/O’, in which Gabriel explores the duality between light and darkness, exterior and interior. In fact, ‘O/I’ will once again be made up of two versions: one mixed on the “light side” and another on the “dark side.”
“I have been thinking about the future and how we could respond to it,” Gabriel explained about this new work. «We are entering a period of transition, probably triggered in three waves: AI, quantum computing and the brain-computer interface. Artists have the role of looking through the mists and, when they glimpse something, holding a mirror.
‘Been Undone’, the first preview of ‘O/I’, is one of those progressive Peter Gabriel compositions that move between art-rock and pop, without giving up a subtle dose of electronics. Released in its ‘Dark-Side Mix’ version -although not especially somber-, the piece goes through different phases or even reaches almost eight minutes in length, recreating itself in a serene epicity… not exempt from a certain tension, too.
The song conveys a latent anxiety about the modern world, artificial intelligence and immediate access to information. “I need to know this information now, so as not to make mistakes” is a phrase that seems to portray a humanity that is increasingly distanced from itself, determined to reflect an unreal and unattainable perfection. Hence, perhaps, Gabriel lists everything that “undoes” him as a human being in his imperfection, including injustice. This is where possible allusions to the United States come in, such as the image of the “recurring slaves in the home of the brave”, a clear reference to the national anthem.
Mentions of the “Mandelbrot set”, the “Turing machines”, the “mitochondrial cells” or the “Nazarene” point to a universe in which science, mathematics and religion coexist in apparent harmony, although this implies accepting that existence will never be fully understandable by human beings.
Gabriel himself has explained that some of his new material “will be part of the project about the brain that I have been exploring for several years”, while other songs he simply publishes because, in his words, “they make me feel happy.”
