Graceland by Paul Simon - Music Review
07/22/2009 02:29 ПП | Articles
After buying Paul Simon’s last album “Surprise”, I realized that I had forgotten how much I loved his music and decided I had to update my old vinyl collection on CD. We stated out with “Still Crazy After All These Years”, which was my husband’s first choice. But I’m so glad I insisted on buying “Graceland” next, and here’s why.
First of all, “Graceland” marked a special turn in Simon’s musical style, by bringing African sounds into his music. While this may sound strange for little Jewish guy who started out singing folk music and dabbled in classic American rock with a touch of pop on the side. However, the combination is beautifully incorporated, and in several different ways. First of all, he includes some ethnic singers to round out his own vocals. This brings a dimension to his own sound that we never heard before. This isn’t to say that Simon sounded flat previous to this album, but rather that these new types of vocals added extra depth, sometimes with shriller female voices that shock the senses, and in others with deep, earthy bass sounds that make your heart vibrate. In addition, instrumentally, this album took full advantage of the African rhythms with many songs including drums of all sorts to punctuate this collection. Add that to a good measure of jazz bass guitar, a country-western sounding accordion or a penny whistle solo and there’s nothing in this album you could call boring.
On the other hand, what is totally typical of Simon in this album is his lyrics, and nothing here compromises his story-telling abilities and unexpected turns of phrase. For instance, in the opening song “Boy in the Bubble” I love the contrast visual of his lyric “this is the age of miracle and wonder, this is a long distance call”, which takes simple language and juxtaposes what he’s saying to make one need to think twice about what he’s saying. Think also about what you feel when you hear the opening of the song “Graceland” where he says “The Mississippi delta was shining like a national guitar” or later with “losing love is like a window in your heart”. And these are just two small examples in only one of the songs here. I can assure you that each and every piece here does more of the same, including an Africa song “Homeless” whose original dialect lyrics also includes the translation “We’re homeless, homeless. We’re moonlight sleeping on a midnight lake”. How glorious is that?
Of course, I have to mention that this album also contains one of my all-time favorite Paul Simon songs, “You Can Call Me Al”. Aside from the humor in this song - which can make me smile even more when I recall the video (see link below in Technical Stuff) of it staring the comedic master, Chevy Chase - both musically and lyrically this song just bounces you in your seat from beginning to end. The song is totally fun and I’ve been known to put it on a loop while driving in my car for whole journeys of over 40 minutes - and for a song that is about 4½ minutes long, that’s listening to it about 10 times over and over again, without ever getting tired of it. In fact, I’ve got this going on in the background while I’m typing this up! What I love most about this song isn’t just the comedy here, but the combination of all the different types of genres of music from this whole album which comes together here. There’s the story-telling lyrics with fascinating subject matter, there’s the weaving of different instruments from big band sounding sax, a mixture of different types of drums, a bass guitar solo to die for, to that penny whistle piece I noted above. This, together with some of the African harmonies behind it, a rock beat that hops you up and a tune that you won’t mind getting stuck in your head for hours just tops it all off. Would I label this as a Paul Simon Masterpiece? Yes, I would say so, especially since its over 20 years old, and still as enjoyable today as it was back then (and no surprise that it’s featured on his own official website together with two songs from his latest album and his other great song “Me & Julio”).
Okay, so I’m crazy about that song, but you don’t buy a whole album just to get one song (well, most people don’t, anyway). The thing is, while I adore one song here, I cannot say that there is any song on this album I wouldn’t listen to over and over again. In fact, I have to say that this whole collection holds together just marvelously from beginning to end. There’s the thread of the African music running throughout but used differently from track to track, enlivening and refreshing this theme in each and every song. Plus, the overall sound is still definitively Paul Simon and undeniably both fun and easy to listen to, even on the sadder songs. Simon’s usual ability to tell a story through rich and evocative, yet deceptively simple lyrics comes through perfectly and vocally, he’s at the top of his form here. Therefore, I can only recommend this as highly as possible and give it a full five stars (despite it being worthy of ten). Give it a listen, because to paraphrase Simon himself, “who are you to blow against the wind”!