earMUSICGizmodrome, the new band Police drummer Stewart Copeland formed with ex-King Crimson guitarist Adrian Belew, Level 42 singer/bassist Mark King and Italian prog-rock keyboardist Vittorio Cosma, releases its self-titled debut album today.
The project grew out of a series of songs Copeland and his frequent collaborator Cosma wrote over the last decade or so. Stewart tells ABC Radio that Belew and King were recruited after he and Vittorio were offered a record deal, and the four musicians soon got down to work in a studio in Milan, Italy.
Copeland says it was in the studio where the band’s sound developed, thanks in large part to the musicianship of Belew and King.
He gives as an example the Gizmodrome song “Amaka Pipa” — whose title is a bastardization of the phrase “American People” — noting that “just out of nowhere, Adrian comes up with…this electric riff that just lights the whole thing up.”
Copeland adds about Belew’s improvisational approach was “what we’re looking for. Not what I told him to play. What I’m looking for is for his juices to start flowing, for his creativity to start flourishing and exploding.”
Gizmodrome’s music is hard to categorize — an amalgam of progressive rock, world music and other diverse sounds topped off with irreverent spoken-sung verses and melodic choruses. One of the most surprising aspects of the band is that Copeland serves as lead vocalist.
“They were Stewart’s songs so only Stewart could sing them in his way,” Belew explains to ABC Radio. “So what we arrived at was that Stewart should sings the [verses], and Mark and I could easily sing the choruses together and harmonize…’cause our voices blend really well.”
Adrian says Gizmodrome hopes to play its first official show in late 2017, “and then fill up next year’s calendar with lots of shows around the world.”
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