Simon and Garfunkel

It has been my pleasure of late to re-enjoy one of the favorite acts of my youth. It kind of kicked off when a friend gave me a book of Paul Simon lyrics that they got on sale at a local Borders store. This got me digging around my CDs and cassettes, and I’m enjoying the heck out of it. Looking back, they had an amazing career and a substantial influence.

You must remember that we’re talking about an act that only put out five albums, and one of them never sold in significant numbers. They were signed by Columbia during what James Taylor refers to as the “Great Folk Scare.” This is the same folk movement, inspired by Woody Guthrie and Pete Seeger, that gave us Bob Dylan, Joan Baez, Judy Collins, and like most movements a thousand pretenders that sank without a trace. Do a google search for Inman And Ira and see what I mean.

Anyway, Paul Simon and Arthur Garfunkel had a hit single back in high school, performing as Tom And Jerry. Simon went on to do a stint at the fabled Brill Building, along with people like Carole King. When folk music started showing up on television shows like Hootenanny and the folk-protest movement looked like it was going to displace rock ‘n’ roll, Paul got together with his old classmate in 1963 and recorded Wednesday Morning 3 AM.

But this proved not to be the path to stardom after all. Simon continued on performing and writing, but Garfunkel returned to suburban New York and got on with his life. Paul eventually pulled up stakes and moved to England where he tried to get his music career jump-started.

Fast forward to ’65 or ’66, where some enterprising Columbia A&R man took a track off the pair’s album and overdubbed a small rock band. The song was called Sounds Of Silence. Record company execs liked what they heard and released it as a single. Next thing they knew, an act they had released two years previously suddenly had the number one single in the land.

While the company was cobbling together an album from various Simon demos and bits of Wednesday Morning 3 AM, they talked the duo into coming back together and giving it another go. The Sounds Of Silence album ended up being one of the biggest records of Beatles-dominated 1966, and a pair of stars were born.

Part of the appeal of Simon and Garfunkel was that they embodied the intellectual, poetic vibe that made Bob Dylan so popular, but with a lot more musicality and considerably more mainstream attitude. They were the safe Dylan, so to speak. It was music aimed at a specific demographic; college students from New York City. This turned out to be something a lot of middle class kids aspired to in the mid 60’s.

The next album, Parsley Sage Rosemary and Thyme, brought this to the fore. It was the first opportunity since Wednesday Morning for Paul and Artie to craft some new music, and now they had a mandate and some money to work with. Enter producer Roy Halee, and the unit was complete. Listening back to it now, the album had some remarkable arrangements. Now in 2010 it’s hard to imagine a time when bass and drums were not obvious choices, but you won’t hear much of them on S&G albums.

Lyrically, Paul’s songs from this period come off as being a little pretentious. They show us a world right out of The Graduate. It’s for the sons and daughters of cocktail-sipping suburbanites who’ve sent their offspring to the finest schools to prepare them for more of the same. These offspring walk around in expensive coats and berets, books of poetry tucked under their arms. Some stanzas from “The Dangling Conversation” sum it up nicely:

And you read your Emily Dickinson
And I my Robert Frost
And we note our place with bookmarkers
That measure what we’ve lost

Ick. C’mon, Paul, get a real job, wouldja?

Yes, we speak of things that matter
With words that must be said
Can analysis be worthwhile?
Is the theater really dead?

And yet, it’s really a very pretty song that sticks with you even if the words sometimes seem just a little precious. One must remember that Paul Simon was probably one of the preeminent acoustic guitarists of the ‘60’s, and along with Roy Halee’s arrangements and production these albums sound great. Paul is also remarkably generous in giving Artie some great songs to be the lead singer on, including some of their biggest hits.

And, Paul was also aware of his own perspectives and wasn’t afraid to poke fun at himself. A great example of this is “A Simple Desultory Philippic,” which artfully skewers his own muse. It makes reference to everything going on around them in 1967. The whole album is swimming with cultural and now-historical references that really make the era come alive, up to and including the album’s final track, “Silent Night/7 O’clock News.” At the time it was chilling. Now, it’s a litany of names that anyone my age never thought they’d forget, and discover they had. References to Lenny Bruce and Richard Speck are joined with the eerily prophetic words of “Former Vice President Richard Nixon,” saying that the war in Vietnam could last “another five years.”

This album was followed in ’68 with Bookends. The album was recorded and mixed in between tours and other commitments, but it’s a clear leap forward from Parsley Sage etc. Paul’s songwriting was maturing quickly, especially in regards to his lyrics. Here’s some lines from “Punky’s Dilemma.”

Wish I was an english muffin
‘Bout to make the most out of a toaster
I’d ease myself down
Comin’ up brown

I don’t care, I love stuff like that. Songs like this and “Hazy Shade of Winter,” which the Bangles would later do an excellently rockin’ version of, were great. And he could still do the sensitive, beautiful stuff they were most famous for and that Artie’s voice was best suited for. The album may have been velcroed together piecemeal, but it’s still great.

They finished up their dual career with arguably their best work, Bridge Over Troubled Water. The title kind of said it all. Their friendship had really ended before Sounds of Silence, but there was money to be made and audiences to be wowed. Hearing yourself on the radio is pretty cool, too. Still, it was getting to the point that they couldn’t stand to be in the same room together. They decided to do one more album and call it a career. Both intended to continue on as solo acts.

Paul was again generous in giving Artie the lead on what would turn out to be their biggest hit ever, the album’s title track. If Garfunkel by himself was going to fail, he had no one to blame but himself because you couldn’t ask for a bigger gold star on your resume.

The album is startlingly good all these years later. Gone is the pretentiousness of Parsley Sage. Firmly in place are the brilliant Halee arrangements. A lot of it sounds damned odd to modern ears, but all of it sounds great. Even the slightly ragged flute duo doubling the vocal line on “El Condor Pasa” come off as haunting.

And the 1967 edition of Paul Simon would not have hesitated to write a tribute to Frank Lloyd Wright, but it would not have been as touching or beautiful as what the 1970 edition came up with. And as often happened with his best stuff, Art did a masterful job of singing the lead. Even the throwaway tunes like “Baby Driver” work.

Personally, the song I keep being impressed by on this album is “The Only Living Boy in New York.” This strikes me as the song that was missing from Bookends; the soft beautiful rambling little tune that would have made that whole album gel better. On this one, it tends to get lost. It’s also the one 40 years later that I come back to.

The penultimate tune was their tribute to their biggest influence; a live version of the Everly Brothers’ “Bye Bye Love.” And just when you think they couldn’t follow that, Simon throws on another little gem called “Song for the Asking.” A little peck on the cheek on the way out the door.

Simon hit the ground running, doing a self-titled album that coughed up two hit singles. There Goes Rhymin’ Simon did the same. For his third solo album, 1977’s Still Crazy After All These Years, he teamed up for one song with Garfunkel. The song, “My Little Town,” was released simultaneously on both their solo albums. This was the only glimmer of light for Artie’s solo career. Around the same time they did a reunion tour, but no album came from it except for the live one following the tour. They have occasionally repeated the reunion, but basically they just don’t like each other. They only do it because of public pressure, and it’s the only way Art can get in front of a real audience.

And as of 1986, people have finally stopped asking Simon about reunions anyway. For all his success as a solo artist it was always the hanging question; when are you getting back together with Garfunkel? In ’86 he went to South Africa and did an album that came to be called Graceland. It was a landmark event in pop music and it proved once and for all that he simply doesn’t need Art Garfunkel. Graceland reinvented and redefined Paul Simon forever.

My brother, Rett, got to meet Art Garfunkel once. He said Art came across as self-absorbed and arrogant, convinced of the supremacy of his talent.

In between Tom And Jerry and Wednesday Morning 3 AM Paul wrote a song called “Red Rubber Ball” that was a hit for a group called the Cyrkle. The song sucks. It just shows that, even for Paul Simon, it’s possible to suck.

In the mid and late 60's, Simon and Garfunkel were part of a select group of acts that defined the era. They weren't as big at the time, or as influential in the long term, as the Beatles, Stones, and Dylan. But they did lead the second rank. They kept the flame burning that the Everly Bros lit for harmony duos, and stretched the envelope musically.

They are definitely worth a listen. I personally would recommend starting with the Greatest Hits collection released in the '70's. Not every song on it was a big hit, nor did Columbia use the original studio versions of every song. The versions they did pick are striking in their differences from the original, and the whole collection works on a level that most Best Ofs don't. They left off certain singles in favor of things like a live version of "For Emily, Whenever I May Find Her" that is so much better than the version on Parsley Sage. Even if you've got all five of the original S&G albums, this one is worth having. And if you don't have anything of theirs, then there's no better place to start.

The Greatest Guitar Player in the World

A good friend of mine, Jim Ingraham of Thornton, NH was cleaning out his record collection. There were a ton of albums (you know, those big, black CD’s) that he wasn’t playing any more, and he knows that I collect, so he very graciously donated them to my ridiculously large library. So bit by bit I’m going through and playing them while I putter in my music room.

A lot of this stuff is early Contemporary Christian music from the ‘70’s. Quite frankly, a lot of it has more historical value than musical, and yet there’s a freshness and energy that sneaks through the questionable production values. They may not have had enough money or skill to sound like Zeppelin or Tull or James Taylor, but they believed what they were singing.

I put on a record by a group called Love Song and set to work doing something, probably changing the strings on a guitar. I was letting the music be a background noise, not really listening to it. The singer sang, and than a guitar solo came in. I stopped dead in my tracks. The sound was so distinctive, it could only be one person. Out of the fog of concentration it had reached in and grabbed me. I picked up the album cover and scanned the credits, and sure enough . . .

Phil Keaggy.

There’s a story – apocryphal, but a great and widely told story none the less – about an appearance by Jimi Hendrix on the Dick Cavett show. At one point Cavett asked him what it’s like to be the greatest guitar player in the world.

"I don’t know," Hendrix is supposed to have said. "Ask Phil Keaggy."

Hendrix called the tune that everybody playing a solid-body electric guitar in the 1970’s had to march to. Either you embraced him and tried your best to sound like him, or you ran screaming in the opposite direction and tried your best to NOT sound like him. Either way, there he was planted firmly in the middle of every note on the neck.

Hendrix had re-written the book on electric guitar and amplification. Love him or hate him, he had a distinctive sound that influenced absolutely everybody in the field of rock. Personally, I think Carlos Santana put it best; Jimi’s music was "wider" than anyone else’s.

One of the few that managed to distinguish himself outside the pack was a young Ohio native named Phil Keaggy. He came from the same music scene that over the years gave us Joe Walsh, Alan Freed, The Pretenders and Devo. He lost two fingers at the tender age of four in an accident on the family farm, but it didn’t keep him from being a prodigy on the guitar. He stands five feet, four inches and at certain times his singing voice sounds remarkably like Paul McCartney’s.

He came to the public’s attention when he was still in his teens. The band he was fronting, Glass Harp, got signed and he dove head-first into the rock-star lifestyle. He was on the road and high on drugs when he learned that his parents had been killed in a car accident. It caused him to re-examine his life, and before long he became a Christian.

Glass Harp was getting ready to record its second album, and there’s a lot of talk about how the band ended. Some say that there was tension over Phil’s new lifestyle and message. Some say it was just everybody wanting to expand beyond the three-piece group’s inherent restrictions. Whatever the cause, after their third album they broke up.

From 1973 through the ‘80’s Phil’s music could best be described as Fusion/Jazz with vocals. The one exception was "Master And The Musician," his first all-instrumental album and still among his most highly regarded. His albums have never sold particularly well, but he did a lot of session work and had connections with most of the Contemporary Christian musicians of the day.

One album I would highly recommend from this era is a live set he recorded in 1977 with Second Chapter of Acts called "How the West was One." They were doing a West-coast tour, y’see. It’s a very well recorded example of his pristine mid-70’s sound. The live version of his classic, "Time" is not to be missed.

A pattern soon developed around Phil and his music. In Contemporary Christian music (also known as CCM) a big hit of the day would sell maybe 100,000 copies. Much less than that, and your contract didn’t get renewed. It’s a very unforgiving genre, but purely by necessity. After all, Christians have bills to pay, too, and there were no Michael Jacksons or U2’s to make big bucks for them. So every album had to sell well.

Phil’s did not, so it wasn’t long before his label dropped him. Another quickly picked him up along with the back catalogue, simply because of the prestige of having CCM’s only bonefide Guitar Hero. Fortunately for him, his concerts always drew well and that’s probably where he’s made most of his living. But as time has gone by, the back catalogue has gotten heavier and his albums >sigh<>

The big change came at the end of the ‘80’s with the release of "Sunday’s Child." He had done the fusion thing to death and was every serious guitarist’s secret vice; the bible thumper who burned the strings. But his audience was getting smaller and smaller and he was staring down the barrel of yet another dropped record company option. Sorry, Phil, we can’t afford you.

At any rate, he went into the studio and did something he hadn’t done for a long time; a rock and roll record. It was so good, so much fun, that it took repeated listenings to notice that there were hardly any guitar solos on it. Nobody minds, though, because it was his best album in years and still stands as one of his best ever. After that he dove headfirst back into the rock music he grew up with.

Recommended Listening:

What A Day (1973) – His first solo album, and still great after all these years.

Emerging (1977) – The Phil Keaggy Band, featuring keyboardist Phil Madeira. A great album, and it shows just how far from the Hendrix norm of the ‘70’s Phil went. Good songs, good recording. Its predecessor, "Love Broke Thru," had great songs but Buck Herring’s production made it sound stiff and flat. "Emerging" is much better.

Master and the Musician (1978) – You have to put this on, because even Phil refers to it. His first instrumental record. It was the sort of thing your label gave you permission to do, back in the day. It is really good.

Town to Town (1981) – This is much better than the record that followed it, "Play Thru Me." The differences between them are subtle. The former holds up better over time. Some of the songs on the latter are just a little twee. Town to Town just feels more relaxed, more natural. Especially good are the songs, "Full Circle" and the title track. Also really good is his rendition of the old hymn, "Rise Up, O Men of God."

Getting Closer (1985) – After "Play Thru Me," he got dropped by his label; Sparrow, I think. Phil wandered in the wilderness for a couple years, living off live shows and plugging away in his home studio. This period is captured in the album, "Underground, Volume 1." It’s got some very good tunes, but sounds very homemade. When he got signed again, his reply was "Getting Closer," and it’s a triumph. Energetic, great tunes, excellent production values, and best of all a guitar tour de force.

Way Back Home (1988) – An all-acoustic album, with themes reaching back to his childhood. A re-release on CD years later had most of the lead vocals re-recorded, which I thought was pointless. The original version I have on cassette is better. The CD also includes an extra piece that I suppose for total Phil devotees is interesting, but for my money breaks up the musical vibe too much. It’s snippets of an audio recording of a Keaggy family gathering, with Phil noodling on guitar recorded over it.

Sunday’s Child (1989) – There’s not enough one can say about this album. As I mentioned before, it’s the one that changed everything. This was Phil’s liberation. Not that the jazzy stuff wasn’t great, but this one feels more fun than anything he’s done before or since. Cameos by Russ Taff and Randy Stonehill and a couple of really good Mark Heard songs actually up the ante.

Find Me in These Fields (1990) – And his very next album was, in my humble opinion, even better. Just as much fun, but painted with a broader brush. Phil Madeira, the keyboard player from Emerging, and John Sfarzo, Glass Harp’s drummer, made appearances on this one.

Crimson and Blue (1995) – This was sort of Phil’s last shot at rock stardom. His record company at the time made a big push with this one, and even prepared three different versions of the album. Crimson and Blue itself was aimed at the CCM audience. Another version, Blue, had some different tunes and remixes of some others and was directed toward the secular world. Yet another offshoot, Revelator, was released as a special treat to the Phil fans. The original is the best, trust me.

Phil Keaggy (1998) – This one is more acoustic, and very Irish-influenced, and it’s great.

He has also done a number of instrumental albums, most of which find their audience in the New Age Music genre. There are also instrumental things like the hard rockin’ "220." If you’re a guitar player, file it with your Satch and Vai CDs.

I have seen Phil live, hmm, lessee, four times in all. The last time was around 1991 or ‘2 or so with my wife. He and Randy Stonehill were sharing the bill in support of Sunday’s Child and Find Me In These Fields and he kicked butt. They both did, actually. Lynn went to see Stonehill and I, of course, was there for Keaggy, and we both came away impressed with the other’s performer. Phil ran his guitars through a rack as tall has he is and from there into a Vox AC30.

Before that I saw him at Gordon-Conwell College in Mass, sharing a bill with Brian Duncan. Duncan was good, but the room and their sound system made him sound muddy. For some reason, Phil’s sound was much better, especially the vocals. Maybe I’m just prejudiced. This was around ’86 or ’87, in support of Getting Closer.

I also saw him at the Creation festival in Pennsylvania around 1987. Good show but kind of overshadowed by the whole festival atmosphere. He was one of the smaller acts on the bill, so he played in the afternoon.

The first time I saw him was in 1984 at California Christian Center in Sacramento, Ca. Four-piece band with a second guitarist. It was a good show, but funny in a way. You could tell it had been a long tour; they all looked tired. Phil came out and burned the frets for three songs to get the guitar players in the room excited. Then, he and the band shifted gears and we did some serious worship. Phenomenal show!

I was there with the friend who led me to Christ, Rick Nixon. We stayed until after so he could try and talk to Phil. We hung back while all the guitar players grilled him for about half an hour with the same babble of questions I’m sure he’s put up with for years; what kind of strings do you use, how high’s your action, what are those pickups, what guitar did you use on this song . . . It was endless and he looked very tired, but was very patient and kind.

As a sidebar, this is one of the things I like about Christian concerts. The artists generally take time at the end of the show to mingle with the crowd.

Anyway, Rick and I finally got our turn. Rick explained that the Lord had put on his heart that he should pray for Olivia Newton-John. Phil had recently done some magazine ads with Randy Stonehill and the British singer, Cliff Richard. Cliff had done a movie with O N-J. Rick asked Phil (are you still with me?) if Cliff had ever mentioned Olivia’s spiritual state of mind.

Phil took this in patiently, then gave us a look like he was waiting for the punchline. Then he realized that this young man was actually concerned about Olivia Newton-John’s salvation. He smiled, and said he was sorry but the subject never came up, but I think he was touched that Rick chose to ask that question of him. It was a nice moment, and I can tell you that Phil Keaggy is an honestly nice man.

The thing that, above all else, makes him worthy of the title I gave him up top is not just his skill. Lots of people have skill. It's his versatility. Over the years he has absorbed elements from an increasingly diverse universe of the guitar. You can hear snatches of Allan Holdsworth, Andres Segovia, Michael Hedges, and many others. And yet, he is distinctly, identifiably, Phil. Nobody sounds like Phil, and he can play any kind of music.

I don’t know if he’s actually got a record deal at this time, but he still records and performs prolifically. He also freely jumps back and forth between differing styles; vocal, instrumental, electric, acoustic, retro, post-modern, and anything else that tickles his fancy. The last few years he’s also been into looping, which uses multiple layers of delay to create compositions. He’s also presided over the reformed Glass Harp, which has released new music. For more information, and corrections of the things I got wrong, click on the title.