Paul Simon (album)

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Paul Simon
Paul Simon cover
Studio album by Paul Simon
Released January 14, 1972
Recorded 1971
Genre Folk Rock
Length 34:03
Label Columbia Records, Warner Bros. Records
Producer Roy Halee, Paul Simon
Professional reviews
Paul Simon chronology
The Paul Simon Song Book
(1965)		 Paul Simon
(1972)		 There Goes Rhymin' Simon
(1973)

Paul Simon is a 1972 album by Paul Simon, released about two years after he split up with longtime musical partner Art Garfunkel. It was originally released on Columbia Records, but is now on the Warner Bros. label. Musically, it is a direct follow-up from his work with Simon and Garfunkel. The song writing quality that is revealed in Simon and Garfunkel songs like "The Only Living Boy in New York" and "Song for the Asking" is, on Paul Simon, extended and combined with a new appreciation for the album as a complete and single work of art.

The album includes many autobiographical elements. Several songs on the album make reference directly or indirectly to his rocky marriage to Peggy (nee Harper), which ended in divorce in 1975. Troubles with the marriage figure prominently on songs such as "Run that Body Down" (in which both "Paul" and "Peg" are mentioned by name) and "Congratulations".

Other themes include drugs and adolescence, especially in urban areas.

Paul Simon can most accurately be placed in the folk rock genre. As such, it owes a debt to other folk rock pioneers, such as Bob Dylan and the Everly Brothers. Joni Mitchell, a contemporaneous folk rock artist, also concentrates her albums with personal communication, perhaps more intensely. The works of Leonard Cohen also share qualities with Paul Simon, particularly the poetry of the lyrics, an area in which Cohen shows extreme talent. Of course, the albums of Simon and Garfunkel and the later works of Paul Simon share similarities with this album. Specifically, the songs "Mother and Child Reunion" and "Me and Julio Down By the Schoolyard", and some of the percussion by Airto Moreira and Los Incas, prefigure the fascination Simon had with world music, particularly on Graceland.

The album reached #4 in the U.S. and #1 in the United Kingdom and Japan.

Contents

[edit] Track listing

All songs composed by Paul Simon except where noted.

  1. "Mother and Child Reunion" – 3:05
    This song is considered to be one of the first attempts at reggae music by a white musician (although many scholars point to the Beatles' "Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da" as an earlier example of reggae by a white artist). The name has its origin in a chicken-and-egg dish which Paul Simon saw on a menu at the Chinese restaurant Say Eng Look Restaurant in New York City's Chinatown.
  2. "Duncan" – 4:39
  3. "Everything Put Together Falls Apart" – 1:59
  4. "Run that Body Down" – 3:52
  5. "Armistice Day" – 3:55
  6. "Me and Julio Down By the Schoolyard" – 2:42
  7. "Peace Like a River" – 3:20
  8. "Papa Hobo" – 2:34
  9. "Hobo's Blues" (Simon, Stéphane Grappelli) – 1:21
  10. "Paranoia Blues" – 2:54
  11. "Congratulations" – 3:42
  12. "Me And Julio Down By The Schoolyard (Demo - San Francisco 2/71) [2004 reissue bonus track]"
  13. "Duncan (Demo - San Francisco 2/71) [2004 reissue bonus track]"
  14. "Paranoia Blues (Unreleased Version) [2004 reissue bonus track]"

[edit] Personnel

[edit] Musicians

[edit] Production and Engineering

[edit] See also

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