- One of the most legendary and soulful house tracks of the '90s defined garage and split up a friendship. Matt McDermott explores the contested history behind the one-of-a-kind anthem.
- This article is part of Elijah's guest-edited month of March.
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"Sometimes you don't know what's going to happen with a song. Until it hits the floor and gets some reaction." When I catch Chicago house legend Roy Davis, Jr. on the phone, he's fiddling with a 909 by the pool at his home in South Florida. Davis hasn't been out on the road since the pandemic due to his multiple sclerosis diagnosis, but he's been productive and sounds serene and rested as we discuss the runaway hit he made with Peven Everett in the mid-'90s, "Gabriel."
"In America, not too many people played the record," Davis tells me. The "Live Garage" mix, which strayed from the four-on-the-floor vibe heard across the rest of the 12-inch, spread like wildfire via UK pirate radio and would go on to be licensed by XL Records, changing the course of English dance music in the process.
"I think it was the bassline in that record that kind of made it for [the UK]," Davis says. "I had no idea about what they would call ‘speed garage’ at the time. It was just a soul record to me." Indeed, the octave-jumping syncopated bass line and swung drums of the "Live Garage" mix presaged thousands of tracks that followed. "I called it the live garage mix, but that was because my studio was next to my garage," Davis laughs. "I'd have bands playing in the garage so the live-feeling mix just reminded me of that, hence the name."
Of course, the angelic voice we hear on the record is the singer and multi-instrumentalist Peven Everett, who may be the closest thing house music has to sui generis, musically-ambidextrous legends like Prince or Stevie Wonder. Everett, who has penned long screeds on social media expressing his issues with "Gabriel" being credited solely to Davis on the first pressing, turned down multiple requests for interviews with RA.
"The record wouldn't be here if it wasn't for Peven being a great vocalist and a great writer," Davis says. "That helped us create something timeless. A lot of people don't give him the credit he deserves, but I like to do that every chance I can get."
According to Davis, Everett initially asked to be credited as a featured artist due to an exclusive publishing deal with another label. "We went back and changed the label to make sure everything was perfect for him. Nobody knew what it would do, you know?"
Obviously, Everett's unwillingness to speak about the record puts us at a disadvantage here. The crux of Everett's argument seems to be that he should be solely credited with the record. "After 20 years ["Gabriel" is] still a banger. Notice the label change," Everett wrote on Facebook back in 2015. "Millions have egg on their faces and are now realizing that I was telling the 1000 percent truth. Expect more changes. That label changed because it was wrong in the first place and it had to be changed or else. It will change again and there will be no other name on that record but the name Peven Everett because the truth does set you free."
In a way, the murky origin story adds to the track's legend, the rare underground "club track" that persists into the present. The horn line on "Gabriel" rivals that on Outkast's "SpottieOttieDopaliscious," in terms of its iconic, instantaneous recognizability. The painfully hip London skateboard brand Palace recently used "Gabriel" in their Palasonic video series. Sampha's recent stripped-down piano version illustrated the song's inherent power, even without the killer bassline and 2-step drums.
So what makes "Gabriel" so unique? Well, to start, it's Peven. Everett is behind some of the greatest vocal house tracks of all time. Beyond "Gabriel," there's "Feelin You In And Out" and "Put Your Back Into It," among others. Everett sings like an archangel. Vocally, he has something in common with the late, great Romanthony, but he also plays 11 other instruments.
After hearing about Peven via a Foot Locker employee on a pre-tour visit to the mall with Felix da Housecat, Davis linked Everett with his friend DJ Duke for "Blow." Davis and Everett would eventually join forces in the studio when Everett, who was living in New York at the time, visited Chicago. "I didn't know he played different instruments," Davis recalls. "I only knew he played trumpet. One day I walked out of the room and when I came back, he was messing around on the Rhodes. I was like, 'Oh man, you play keys too?' He was like, 'Oh yeah, I play a little bit.' It turned out to be more than a little bit."
"Gabriel" would come out in 1996 on the Chicago label Large Records, solely attributed to Davis. The "Live Garage" mix was the inside cut, on the B2. Following the UK's embrace of the live garage mix, an XL re-release foregrounded that mix on a 12-inch that came backed with remixes by Basement Jaxx, among others. It would hit number 22 on the UK Singles chart. When I ask Davis how many copies sold he tells me he's lost track, but that it's in the hundreds of thousands. Even still, a mix of structural and personal problems prevented a proper follow-up from the duo.
"It was a rough road going to perform," Davis recalls. "You have artists who are never happy with the promoters, wanting more money than was already agreed on." Davis was a producing member of Phuture at the time and had a raft of classic solo records for labels like Strictly Rhythm. "I couldn't, you know, burn bridges." But artists are historically mercurial. Davis points towards some larger issues with labels and Black artists when I ask him why they didn't sign an album deal with XL following a lucrative EP.
"It was just options for singles," he says on the deal. "It wasn't an album. And it was a tough time for me because all my friends like Thomas Bangalter, and everyone else, they were getting album deals, and here we are getting single deals, you know? So it was kind of tough to not have the opportunity as a Black man from Chicago and you're seeing white guys from Europe actually learning their sound and techniques from most of us in Chicago. And then everybody's getting all these offers for deals, but a lot of the guys like me, Paul Johnson—rest in peace—and others, like Felix [Da Housecat], weren't getting major deals at that time. We would get major remixes, but we weren't getting the deals we felt like we deserved as being originators and pioneers for starting a whole culture."
Davis keeps up a prolific pace in the studio. He recently collaborated with Steve Arrington and also has a drum & bass track on the way. But he also has sidelines in real estate and other extra-musical ventures. Davis and Everett, perhaps unsurprisingly due to the massive success and arguments over the origins of "Gabriel," fell out years ago. "People ask us today, 'Man, why don't you guys do more records?' I still have unreleased records we made that would probably do good and maybe be classics if I put them out, like on our old eight-tracks, but it was such an up and down relationship that I'd rather just not bother."
Despite the tension and acrimony following the release, Davis comes across as grateful for the track, for the opportunity to be part of something timeless. He tells me the original inspiration for the swung, stuttering beat on the "Live Garage" mix was Wood, Brass & Steel's "Funkanova," a cut that served as direct inspiration for a grip of massive house tracks. I ask him what he thinks makes "Gabriel" so timeless.
"I think God put two gentlemen together for that moment in time to create something beautiful. Hopefully, people will take heed of the words that are spoken and sung on the record. Today we need it more than anything, with stuff going on in the Ukraine and America going through all this racial tension. All of this despair. I think we all need to get lifted, to have some sympathy in our hearts, to start looking at each other and start looking at ourselves in the mirror."
He was an archangel of love
He had good news, good news, good news
For those dedicating' their lives
To the spirit, spirit, spirit
One love was the focus of
The true message, message, message...
Dancing' soon became a way
To communicate, 'municate, 'municate, 'municate
Feel the music deep in your soul
Gabriel playing', playing'
Hold on, hold on
Gabriel play
Gabriel play, play
Gabriel play, mmm mmm...