More Than This

More Than This is the second single to taken from Peter Gabriel’s seventh studio album UP and was released on 30 December 2002.

Recorded and mixed at Real World Studios, More Than This was produced by Peter Gabriel, recorded and engineered by Richard Chappell and mixed by Tchad Blake.

The single spent two weeks on the UK singles chart and peaked at 47.

‘More Than This’ came right at the end [of the album recording] and I’d started a thing with guitar samples. I was mucking around with guitars and Daniel Lanois left his beautiful Telecaster here. I can’t play guitar to save my life but I can make noises on it. The samples that we were getting I was then manipulating on the keyboard and the first sound that you hear on this track is that sort of thing and the track was built around that. I’d always liked it and in fact it was actually driving through the Italian Alps, again it is one of these scenic detours, and I found this old cassette which had this stuff on it where I’d been playing around with a different groove and that started all to make sense to me at that point.

The cover image was designed by Marc Bessant. Of the artwork Bessant says;
“Mostly the singles artwork came from the choices already taken to represent the songs on the album. For a couple of months myself and Dilly Gent sourced various material to show Peter based on what we had heard and some lyrics we had. Some choices were more literal than others, whilst some had meaning which we missed and/or was more relevant/personal to Peter.”

More Than This CD single artwork design grid.

The More Than This cover uses an image from NASA. “Around this time, Peter bought me an amazing book called ‘Full Moon’, which contained new scans from some of the 32,000 negatives from the Apollo missions. Suffice to say, they are incredible. I suggested the image of the footprint on the moon simply because, not only is it a recognised picture of human endeavour, but that these great adventures are born from our curiosity and need to seek more. I’m pretty sure its not what Peter intended, but I always imagine a marooned astronaut singing this.”

Performers on More Than This:
Drums: Dominic Greensmith, Ged Lynch
Percussion: Ged Lynch
Guitar: David Rhodes
Bass: Tony Levin
Mandolin, chamberlain: John Brion
Backing vocals: The Blind Boys of Alabama, David Rhodes, Melanie Gabriel
Programming: Richard Chappell
Organ, sampled guitar, piano, wonky Nord, mutator, MPC groove: Peter Gabriel

The single was released on CD, 12″ and DVD single

CD – PGSCD14
More Than This – Radio Edit. Mixed by Tchad Blake
More Than This – Remixed by The Polyphonic Spree. Additional instrumentation by The Polyphonic Spree. Engineered by Chris Bell. Recorded at Luminous Sound, Dallas, Texas.
More Than This – Remixed by Elbow. Additional instrumentation by Elbow. Recorded at the Elbow Rooms

12″ – PGST14
A1. More Than This – Remixed by The Polyphonic Spree. Additional instrumentation by The Polyphonic Spree. Engineered by Chris Bell. Recorded at Luminous Sound, Dallas, Texas.
A2. More Than This – Remixed by Elbow. Additional instrumentation by Elbow. Recorded at the Elbow Rooms
B. My Head Sounds Like That – Remixed by Röyksopp

The promo CD single and the DVD single took a different approach to the cover imagery; “both artworks were made at the same time with Susan Derges and known as Cymatics – the study of patterns created by sound vibrations” says Marc Bessant, “in this case with liquid being distorted by a speaker underneath. The idea being that any of Peter songs on the record would create a unique pattern/photogram.”

DVD – PGSDVD14
More Than This – Album version
Sky Blue – Martyn Bennett Remix
The Barry Williams Show video
Peter Gabriel Photo Gallery, with images from Armando Gallo, Arnold Newman, Graham Wood and York Tillyer.

More Than This promo CD wallet

Unavailable digitally for many years, The Polyphonic Spree Mix, the Elbow Mix, the Röyksopp Remix and the Martyn Bennett Remix of Sky Blue are all available on the digital compilation Flotsam and Jetsam.