Simon & Garfunkel - Classic or Dud?

Paul Simon solo: even better.

Art Garfunkel solo: about the same as bathing in honey I suppose - but if listened to at the right time (very happy sunny day), simply sweet.

S&G are fantastic, without reservation. "America" is one of the few songs that makes me cry with unbridled joy - I would say that there's a handful, and America is one of them. "Counting the cars on the New Jersey turnpike/ They've all come to look for America" - genius!

Bookends is a great album, as is Bridge over Troubled Water. The title track of BOTW is a bit OTT, but the rest of the album is great. "Only Living Boy In New York", "The Boxer", "Song for the Asking" - just too good.

The Box Set is first rate, and everyone with a passing interest in tunes will adore it.

Classic to the power to n.

"Kathy," I said as we boarded a Greyhound in Pittsburgh
"Michigan seems like a dream to me now"
It took me four days to hitchhike from Saginaw
I've gone to look for America

Laughing on the bus
Playing games with the faces
She said the man in the gabardine suit was a spy
I said "Be careful his bowtie is really a camera"

"Toss me a cigarette, I think there's one in my raincoat"
"We smoked the last one an hour ago"
So I looked at the scenery, she read her magazine
And the moon rose over an open field

"Kathy, I'm lost," I said, though I knew she was sleeping
I'm empty and aching and I don't know why
Counting the cars on the New Jersey Turnpike
They've all gone to look for America
All gone to look for America

WhA?????

I've always wondered: Did Paul Simon steal that "Coo coo ca-choo" from John Lennon or vice versa?

Several S&G songs are as classic as can be: "The Boxer," "Only Living Boy in New York," "America," "April Come She Will," "Mrs. Robinson."

But they also made some truly troublingly bad things. The swallowed-a-thesaurus 11th-grade-level poetry of "The Dangling Conversation," for example. Or

Pressed in organdy
Clothed in crinoline
Of smoky burgundy

...it just smacks of Trying Too Hard.

And if I never hear "Feelin' Groovy" again, I will die a happy man.

Frankly, I've never really gotten the sense that Garfunkel added a lot. He sings pretty. He sings high. So the fuck what. The songs are where it's at--delete Art from most S&G tracks and you still have good songs.

So semiclassic, with reservations.

Couple in the next room
Bound to win a prize
Theyve been going at it all night long
Well, Im trying to get some sleep
But these motel walls are cheap
Lincoln Duncan is my name
And heres my song, heres my song.

Right up there with "Motel Blues" in the Best Motel Song category.

The snare drum part on the intro of "50 Ways to Leave Your Lover" is easily one of the three or four best drum performances ever recorded. I am a drummer and I am telling you that it is utterly, indisputably perfect. But would you call the group that recorded that song "Simon & Gadd"? No.

Simon solo piques me more.

I love those lyrics!

POX (off the top of my head)

America
For Emily, Whenever I May Find Her
Hazy Shade Of Winter
Patterns
Scarborough Fair/Canticle
Faking It
Mrs Robinson
Seven O'Clock News (Silent Night)
The Dangling Conversation

Albums

1. Parsley, Sage Rosemary and Thyme*
2. Bookends
3. Sounds of Silence
4. Bridge Over Troubled Water
5. Wednesday Morning, 3AM
6. The Graduate OST

*Wins over Bookends because of the hilariously over-earnest sleevenotes.

i think his first solo record is the best, most coherent/satisfying thing he's done (though there are some songs on the second solo album that are incredible). but there sure are some awesome s&g songs, even if they all have a few lyrics and/or clipped diction that make me cringe. ("seeking out the poor-er quarters..." egads).

Also, why was S&G never mentioned as a massive "influence" on Belle and Sebastian?? It seems so glaringly obvious.

Classic.

Simple desultory phillipic too, as noted

I loved "The Big Bright Green Pleasure Machine" as a kid so can't fairly judge it.

The stupid sub-Dylan "A Simple Desultory Philippic (or How I Was Robert McNamara'd into Submission)" is horrid except for that organ bass line or whatever it is that anchors it. Great music, shit lyrics. I feel the same way about "Patterns".

Best unreleased tune is "Groundhog":

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CaKCN44w-T0

The stupid sub-Dylan "A Simple Desultory Philippic (or How I Was Robert McNamara'd into Submission)" is horrid

Yep, I'd agree with this... I've never been fond of it!

the rest of the lyrics of The Boxer aren't quite as bad, but they still have kind of a hackneyed, kid in creative writing class writing about "The Poor" quality.

Philippic: YA CAN UNNERSTAN DA WOIDS

Mrs. Robinson is a pretty mediocre song.

line about Dimaggio gets me every time and I don't even like baseball

well i mean imagine a whole nation's worth of eyes

'Mrs. Robinson' isn't a favourite of mine, but I don't mind it. 'The Only Living Boy In New York', though... ALL TIME.

'Mrs. Robinson' was an unfinished song they had lying around til Mike Nichols needed a song called Mrs Robinson

well i mean imagine a whole nation's worth of eyes

$50 for a lawn seat at my local summer outdoor venue on his summer tour. Feels like a lot to pay to sit on the grass (straining our nation's worth of eyes)

got in the car this morning, turned on the radio and... this came on

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vOGqZJC0_Xs

i don't mean to get all alex in nyc on y'all, but there oughta be a law

It took some time for the YouTube embed to load, all the while I was assuming it'd be this:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u9Dg-g7t2l4

"I Am A Rock" is the first song I have exercised my veto over in my dad cover band. It's a bridge to far, which, incidentally, sounds like it would be the name of a Simon and Garfunkel album.

so I found something rather interesting on wikipedia

In 2015, someone edited the Wikipedia page for "The Sound of Silence," claiming the original first lyric was "Aloha darkness, my old friend." It is still there. https://t.co/uB7mBnA1sQ pic.twitter.com/1EFP7uEXsj

— katherine morayati (@morayati) March 9, 2018

So, I'm listening to Parsley, Sage, Rosemary & Thyme for the first time in ages tonight and I've pretty much reminded myself why this is the last Simon & Garfunkel album I tend to reach for. Such a frustrating mix of high quality classics ('Scarborough Fair', 'Patterns', 'Cloudy', 'The 59th Street Bridge Song') and supreme duds ('A Simple Desultory Philippic') ... Sounds of Silence was a relative rush job, but I much prefer it.

i've lost my harmonica, albert

I'd never seen this before. Really enjoyed it--don't know if Simon's a little stoned, or if he's always like that.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sDqIsuIpVy4

Who actually played on "I Am a Rock," I wonder.

I *think* I can piece it together but there is conflicting info out there

That album it is on was recorded and overdubbed in several different places, New York, Nashville and Los Angeles it seems.

So first song on it was notably overdubbed in New York and the last one seems to have been done in Los Angeles.

Some things say Carol Kaye is playing bass on that song, but it could also very well have been Joe Osborn.