Art-rock overlord Peter Gabriel has had a seismic effect on a lot of genres of music over the decades. But up until now, Gabriel has mostly interacted with rap music in the most indirect ways, like the "Sledgehammer" sample on 3rd Bass' "Pop Goes The Weasel." So it's fun to be able to say that the 76-year-old Gabriel sings the hook on a new collaboration with Maryland rapper IDK.
Peter Gabriel and IDK did not independently come up with the idea to collaborate. Instead, the new single "Beyond The Brilliant Haze" is the latest release from Everything Is Recorded, the genre-blurred alter-ego of XL Recordings boss Richard Russell. Everything Is Recorded tracks typically feature lots of guests from across the spectrum; his last single, 2025's "Wear And Tear," featured Sampha, Florence Welch, Danielle Ponder, and Jah Wobble.
Right now, Gabriel is in the middle of releasing o/i, the new album where he's putting out a new track every full moon this year; the most recent track in that effort was "A Hard Lesson." Gabriel previously worked with Russell on "Four Kinds Of Horses," a song from his last album, 2023's i/o. IDK, meanwhile, collaborated with people like Pusha T, the RZA, and the late MF DOOM on e.t.d.s., an impressive mixtape that he released earlier this year. "Beyond The Brilliant Haze" has a mixing job from super-producer and Dr. Dre collaborator Mike Elizondo, and it's not a nice, unforced sense of contemplative sweep. It's an unlikely combination of names, but it works.
Obviously, we are going to need to quote all the principal figures involved in this collab. Here's what Gabriel says:
Following the writing sessions I did with Richard for his Everything Is Recorded project, there were some ideas that didn’t make it that we both thought were still worth exploring. Richard sent me some stuff he had worked on, and I re-wrote the section I had originally come up with for the melodic part of the song. I always like it when people fuse disparate elements together, which Richard has been doing a lot in his own work, and bringing IDK in on this was an inspired choice and provided some strong musical contrasts for the song. I’m happy to see this work finally heading out into the world.
Here's IDK:
Working with Peter and Richard was a complete honor. I was honored to hear back from Richard, and even more surprised when the record he sent involved Peter. But I've been working long enough at what I do to know that, even though it was a surprise, I was prepared to bring the best parts of myself to it. The result feels like a beautiful mess of juxtaposition.
And here's Richard Russell:
I grew up listening to Peter and was honored to work with him on i/o and my own music and after I’d immersed myself in making Temporary still had some ideas for us that I was keen to pursue. Jason brought an incredible energy to the whole thing. Everything, including Peter’s suggestion to have Mike mix it, just fell into place at the right time.
Check out "Beyond The Brilliant Haze" below.
And while we're on the subject of rap songs with hooks from Genesis frontmen, this is a good time to remember the legendary Bone Thugs-N-Harmony/Phil Collins link-up of 2002.
