So (1986)

So is the fifth studio album by the English singer-songwriter Peter Gabriel, released on 19 May 1986 by Charisma Records, Virgin Records and Geffen Records. After working on the soundtrack to the film Birdy (1984), producer Daniel Lanois was invited to remain at Gabriel's Somerset home during 1985 to work on his next solo project. Initial sessions for So consisted of Gabriel, Lanois and guitarist David Rhodes, although these grew to include a number of percussionists.

Although Gabriel continued to use the pioneering Fairlight CMI digital sampling synthesizer, songs from these sessions were less experimental than his previous material. Nevertheless, Gabriel drew on various musical influences, fusing pop, soul, and art rock with elements of traditional world music, particularly African and Brazilian styles. It is Gabriel's first non-eponymous album, So representing an "anti-title" that resulted from label pressure to "properly" market his music. Gabriel toured So on the This Way Up tour (1986–1987), with some songs performed at human rights and charity concerts during this period.

Often considered his best and most accessible album, So was an immediate commercial success and transformed Gabriel from a cult artist into a mainstream star, becoming his best-selling solo release. It has been certified fivefold platinum by the Recording Industry Association of America and triple platinum by the British Phonographic Industry. The album's lead single, "Sledgehammer", was promoted with an innovative animated music video and achieved particular success, reaching number one on the Billboard Hot 100 and subsequently winning a record of nine MTV Video Music Awards. It was followed by four further singles, "Don't Give Up" (a duet with Kate Bush), "Big Time", "In Your Eyes", and "Red Rain".

The album received positive reviews from most critics, who praised its songwriting, melodies and fusion of genres, although some retrospective reviews have criticised its overt commercialism and 1980s production sounds. So was nominated for the Grammy Award for Album of the Year in 1987 but lost to Paul Simon's Graceland. It has appeared in lists of the best albums of the 1980s, and Rolling Stone included the album in their 2003 and 2020 editions of the 500 Greatest Albums of All Time. In 2000 it was voted number 82 in Colin Larkin's All Time Top 1000 Albums. So was remastered in 2002, partially re-recorded for Gabriel's 2011 orchestral project New Blood and issued as a box set in 2012.

Recording

Since 1978, Gabriel had composed his music at Ashcombe House, including his album Security (1982) and the Birdy soundtrack (1984). He had an inexpensive studio in the adjacent barn consisting of two rooms, one where Gabriel would produce his vocals and work on lyrics, and another where the music would be assembled. Preparing for So, Gabriel considered Bill Laswell and Chic's Nile Rodgers as potential producers. He eventually asked his Birdy collaborator Daniel Lanois to stay at Ashcombe and work with him further.

Work on the album began in earnest in February 1985, with "We Do What We're Told (Milgram's 37)" as the first song; the first six months would be spent on writing and developing song sketches. The songs were usually recorded in the studio with Gabriel, Lanois and guitarist David Rhodes playing together to a drum machine, based on an idea or chord structure Gabriel had. Lanois recalled they had "a nice starting point [as] in that kind of scenario, it's not a good idea to have a lot of people around because you get nervous that you're wasting other people's time". Consequently, there was a relaxed atmosphere surrounding these sessions and the trio would jokingly refer to themselves as the "Three Stooges". This also involved the wearing of construction site hard hats as they had a "turning up for work humour".

Once they had the songs' foundations, bass and drums were overdubbed - primarily with Tony Levin, and Manu Katché, respectively. According to Lanois, he usually liked "to capture as much of the live playing as possible in any session, but these [sessions] were really the reverse... It was like overdubbing the rhythm section on top of a demo. That was the spirit of the record." During the recording, Gabriel would occasionally invite Levin, Rhodes and Katché back to re-do their parts as the songs continued to take shape and evolve.