Songfacts®:

• "On The Air" is the first song on Peter Gabriel's second solo album, which like his first was titled Peter Gabriel. As lead singer for Genesis, he often wrote story songs built around the kind of characters you might find in fantasy novels. That's what he did here with Mozo, a mercurial stranger who would come and go, changing people's lives. Gabriel planned to develop the story into a stage production or movie, but that never came to fruition. Another song on the album, "Exposure," he also considered part of the Mozo story.
• The song is about Mozo's fantasy world he creates with his shortwave radio. He can be anyone he wants on the air, but lives in a dumpster and is ignored in real life. Gabriel was fascinated by short wave radio and how it gets stronger as night approaches.
• The name Mozo is a distortion of Moses. Other characters in the story are also plays on biblical names.
• Bruce Springsteen's keyboard player, Roy Bittan, played on this one, accompanied by Gabriel's backing band:
  
  Electric Guitar – Sidney McGinnis
  Bass – Tony Levin
  Drums – Jerry Marotta