PAUL SIMON POLL RESULTS THREAD AND DISCUSSION

"50 Ways" was my #5, at least half because of Steve Gadd. Love that shuffle so much.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sZZLLYEzKE8

yeah steve gadd absolutely kills that track

i posted this on the other thread so i assume everyone who cares has heard it but i love this edit that removes the goofy chorus and adds a nice bass line

http://soundcloud.com/aordisco/50-ways-to-leave-your-lover-pollyns-re-edit-remix-paul-simon

ha, that's interesting - but I for one welcome the goofy chorus. It's fun!

Lose the chorus and you lose the way he hits "discuuuuuss muuuch," which would make me sad.

Simon mentioned in an interview (Songwriters on Songwriting) that "Mother and Child Reunion" as a title comes from a menu item featuring chicken and scrambled eggs.

...and "Yesterday" was originally called "Scrambled Eggs." The secret history of pop music coming into focus.

http://sp.life123.com/bm.pix/scrambled-eggs1---eggs-on-plate.s600x600.jpg

xpost:

Plus I think the goofy chorus is kind of the point of the song, which is a ribbing of '70s touchy-feeliness and therapy talk.

xpost Few people know that "And I Will Always Love You" was originally titled "And I Will Always Love Juice," until Dolly Parton's conservative Southern management insisted it was too evocative of OJ Simpson and therefore of an interracial relationship.

The more you know

Also, goofy chorus is part of this ongoing thing we see where all this "adult" "grown-up" stuff paired with stuff that any kid is going to love singing along to.

I really like the 50 Ways edit - it's like a completely different song without the chorus.

'Lounge' is the mantra though - I can well imagine lounging, in a lounge, to that cut.

Never seen that whole AOR Disco site before, what riches it promises.

gdamn "50 ways" without the chorus is like christmas without presents or something

xxxxp More eggy Simon weirdness: "I Am The Walrus"' juxtaposition of eggmen/Humpty Dumpty and "coo coo ca-choo" ("Mrs. Robinson")

gdamn "50 ways" without the chorus is like christmas without presents or something

― call all destroyer, Wednesday, March 21, 2012 10:03 AM (7 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

no dog its like christmas without church

Church of the Bus Gus

Pastor Coy Roy officiating.

Don't need to repent, Kent.

no no you guys this one's pretty easy

"I look outside my window and I watch the Cars" - Paul is in London where Roy Thomas Baker is producing their debut, he sees them arriving at the studio daily for tracking
"I fear I'll do some damage one fine day" - he is thinking of covering one of their songs in his own style
"but I would not be found guilty by a jury of my peers" - old hippies will love my Cars cover no matter what it sounds like
"still crazy after all these years" - I am an axe murderer

― pathos of the unwarranted encore (underrated aerosmith bootlegs I have owned), Tuesday, August 30, 2011 12:57 PM (6 months ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

i think of this post every time it's "Paul Simon" time

50 ways chorus prob most epitomizes the aspect of ps that i cant really deal with

xpost Ditto, I have cracked myself up to that whole sequence so many times.

lol yes, that post has given me a deep deep new appreciation of "still crazy."

had no idea everyone hated the 50 ways chorus so much.

50 ways chorus prob most epitomizes the aspect of ps that i cant really deal with

For me it's like the opposite. The aspects I have most reaction against is the po-faced stuff that's most prevalent in S&G but resurfaces here and there through the solo career. Loose, jazzy Paul >>>>>>>> English-major Paul.

i like all the pauls.

lyrics to s&g songs can be really annoying, though, tru

Rubbing those two aspects of Simon up against each other in one song is what makes it classic. It was high on my ballot.

i don't dislike the 50 ways chorus specifically. the whole song just feels very slight and unmemorable to me in ways that seem surprisingly opposite to public opinion of it.

re: 50 ways, that is

btw, I heard it on the radio yesterday and thought "yep, high placement totally justified"

xp to self

I love the chorus of "50 Ways" & agree with tipsy re. the Simons.

50 ways was my #3

this is where i get to play "comedy films poll" by saying i love the 50 ways chorus bcz i loved it when i was 13.

guessing "For Emily Wherever I May Find Her" is not showin up

If that misses the top 10 that's a shame.

I didn't vote for it specifically for the slightness issue, but I do love the song. I think if Paul Simon were a one-hit wonder and this was his only thing, it'd do really really well in like the 70s songs poll, you know, this fondly-remembered bit of AM good times. As a "Paul Simon song" it doesn't quite fit somehow.

er, that's in ref to "50 Ways," not "Emily!"

For me it's like the opposite. The aspects I have most reaction against is the po-faced stuff that's most prevalent in S&G but resurfaces here and there through the solo career. Loose, jazzy Paul >>>>>>>> English-major Paul.

― something of an astrological coup (tipsy mothra), Wednesday, March 21, 2012 11:02 AM (17 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

these are i guess the two aspects of ps that i cant really deal with, and its not that hes loose and jazzy its that hes trying to be loose and jazz when its not really in his nature, he is not a chill dude

PS feels like a dude that only really relaxed and came into himself when he had kids

i mean just judging by his songwriting/lyrics and stuff

anyway i voted 50 ways high up even though the chorus is goofy

I know "Mrs. Robinson" belongs to that category of oppressively overplayed radio songs, but the Joe Dimaggio verse will never not amaze me.

yeah I feel the same way. other people have expressed incredulity at my admiration for the Dimaggio verse but it's such a perfect image, the vanished, defeated folk hero. And I don't even like baseball.

I have always thought of solo-era Simon as a pretty chill dude. It's the evolution from earnest nerd to laid-back hipster that I think most separates S&G from the later stuff.

Hard to imagine the Simon of S&G working a line like, "When I think back on all the crap I learned in high school..."

Yeah, and with that going, it seems like Simon really speaks to people like me who WERE earnest nerds and possibly English majors etc., went to a lot of museums, and just get a little further on and go "okay, chilling is cool too."

had no idea everyone hated the 50 ways chorus so much.

― horseshoe, Wednesday, March 21, 2012 8:01 AM (1 hour ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

yeah, a bit shocked by and disappointed in this thread. 50 ways chorus is so wonderful, esp in the way the song suddenly becomes propulsive, suggesting the actual act of leaving, after the static intimacy of the verses, which only contemplate it. and i'm also w horseshoe in liking all the pauls, the laid-back hipster of the 70s no more and no less than the earnest undergrad of the 60s.

"50 Ways" is literally the first pop song I remember listening to and having stuck ion my head, chorus only. The verses in between made it like a peek-a-boo game.

And as I've said elsewhere, the line that I loved most then was "You don't have to be courdoroy."

The thing about the 50 Ways chorus, for the stans who love it and don't get why anyone would hate it...much as I love it and I *did* vote highly for it, the chorus and the verses are almost two separate songs. The chorus is the novelty/corny Simon, where it's so close to an advertising jingle that it could easiily be the only thing a person hears when they think of the song.

If you don't love that song a LOT, you may not even be able to remember the quieter, more pleasant/writerly verses.

And honestly it would be the most boring poll in the world if the results exactly matched your ballot.

The verses in between made it like a peek-a-boo game.

lol, yeah, i remember having something like this sense of the song at first. not as an infant, so probably not as literally, but as a kid who loved the chorus.

And honestly it would be the most boring poll in the world if the results exactly matched your ballot.

oh, of course. i just like to fulminate.

So, the top ten at this point is looking fairly predictable, not that that's a bad thing - it should be pretty much wall to wall classics, although my hopes for "Oh Marion" are dashed and "Papa Hobo" along with them. But for once I have no sense at all of what will swing #1 - seeems like there's a few strong contenders although I expect "Diamonds on the Soles of Her Shoes," "Julio," or "Only Living Boy In New York."

Generally don't have too much to say about this last batch of ten - they're all pretty great and I've posted about them before I'm sure. The only ones I voted for were "Late in the Evening," "Bridge," and "You Can Call Me Al," which I voted #1... though I can't really explain or articulate why. Not in the sense of it being this really strong emotion that resists verbalization...it was more just the ballot-making process, each song I compared it to and went "Do I like this more or less than 'You Can Call Me Al'," and it always won. It's not really the quintessential Simon song but I will never get tired of singing along to it, any place or any time that it comes on.