Please Don't Tell Her

This is the flipside of "Tick Tock," on a 45 by Ritchie Cordell (see below).

It's a bitter song, sung by a man who has every right to be bitter.

"Please don't tell her that I love her," the man begins, upper lip set stiffly. "If she should ask me I'll just say/ 'I hope you're happy with your new love/ On this...

Wait for it... here it comes...

"...your wedding day.'" Aw, no!

Not only does he have to attend the wedding between his love and another, he has to pretend to be pleased on her behalf. We might find him, after enduring the ceremony with a forced smile, not on the dance floor but at the bar.

While his pride is wounded, he still has some: "I don't want her sympathy." And anyway, it would only matter to him, as her pity would be insincere: "I know that now she has forgotten/ The dream she used to share with me." Poor guy.

In short, "I must be brave, though she's untrue."

But that's the Smokey-Robinsonesque facade. Inside, of course, he's a mess. "She'll kiss his lips and say I do/ I'll shed a tear by she won't know it."

The backup singers (which sound like they include Simon), sing-- to the traditional processional melody-- "Here comes the bride/ I wanna cry." They, like a Greek chorus, let slip what's really going on.

As Inigo says in The Princess Bride: "His true love is marrying another tonight, so who else has the cause for ultimate suffering?" If he makes it through the whole deal without breaking down, he deserves to catch the bouquet.

Like "Dori Anne," this is a tale of young angst, a popular topic for the slower doo-wop numbers, of which this is one. It has a melodramatic spoken, interlude, a "ba-b-b-ba," a lot of "oooh" in the background... the works.

Simon has often said that doo-wop was one of his major influences, and here we get to hear him assaying the form himself. It's not a classic like "Silhouettes" or "Sea of Love," but it's not half bad, either.


Musical Note:
Ritchie Cordell wrote some of his own songs, which you might have heard, for Tommy James and the Shondells: "I Think We're Alone Now" and "Mony Mony." A cover of the former (by Tiffany) was succeed at the top of the charts by a cover of the latter (by Billy Idol). The only other songwriters to replace one #1 hit with another? Lennon and McCartney.

Cordell also produced "I Love Rock 'n' Roll" for Joan Jett and an album for The Ramones.

Next Song: The Pied Piper

Love & Blessings

The first thing we have to deal with is the official title of this track. The album's notes and cover use an '&,' but the website uses "And" (yes, with a capital 'A'). The Lyrics book, meanwhile, uses "and," with the grammatically correct lowercase 'a.' As there is no agreement, I am going with the &; because the album is the original document, and the one most listeners will encounter.

"Love & Blessings" is the last in the triptych of "Love" songs on this album (the others being "Love and Hard Times" and "Love is Eternal Sacred Light.").

The song seems to be about a revivification of an entire country or area. "Love and blessings/ Simple kindness/ Fell like rain on a thirsty land." This image seems to follow that of the second verse of "Boy in the Bubble": "the dry wind" "desert" "dead sand/ Falling." Here, "Fields and gardens.../ Came to life in dust and sand."

Relationships were revived as well: "as if old love was new." And business boomed, too-- along with, not in exploitation of-- this phenomenon: "Banker's pockets overflowing with gold and money."

Then the song shifts to a series of call-and-response phrases. A gospel choir sings "bop-bop-a-whoa," and the speaker replies "Ain't no song like and old song, Charlie," in reference to the fact that this is a sample of a song from 1938, at least (see the Musical Note below).

Who is Charlie? Is it Fat Charlie the Archangel from "Crazy Love, Vol II"? No, Simon uses this name to set up the next line: "Ain't no time like a good time, Charlie." A "good-time Charlie" is a "life-of-the-party" sort of fellow, so this line is a pun.

This, in turn, shifts to "Ain't no times like the good times, Charlie." The good times being, it seems, those filled with "love and blessings," "simple kindness," romance, and full granaries and coffers, all as described above.

Back to "bop-bop-a-whoa," a phrase that proves the link between gospel and doo-wop, two of Simon's favorite genres and ones referred to many times on this album in particular. But here, it seems a shorthand for... something. "Everybody [is] working for" it and one "Can't get enough of" it. But what is it? Money? Sex? Maybe it is different things for different people, the thing that makes them excited.

Tonally, we now shift back to the start of the song, with its imagery of nature and its effects on people. "If the summer kept a secret/ It was heaven's lack of rain." This is ambiguous at best. If it said, "If the summer kept a secret/ it was heaven's rain," then we would assume that the rain was held back, like a secret unspoken, and there was a drought. But "secret... lack of" is double negative of sorts. So... there was little rain, but the heavens didn't tell us about it? I think we would know how much or little rain there was, in any case! We would be the ones who were wet or dry.

From the next lines, it seems that rain was gone... but not missed, at least not by him: "Golden days and amber sunsets/ Let the scientists complain." However, the scientists soon have company in their worried grousing. The autumn leaves were "drained of color." How bad in the drought? "Ghosts in the water beg for more" (and what an evocative image!). Yet, is this true... or is it just that our "memory" was clearer?

The song ends with the speaker being "woken from [his] sleep" by "something." It seems to be the realization that "Love and blessings... [are] ours to hold but not to keep." This echoes Robert Frost's assertion that "nothing gold can stay."

Simon seems to be expressing two related themes, here. One is that the nature of abundance (and scarcity) is cyclical. The other is that people and society change in accordance with these cycles. Abundance brings warmth, which then turns cold when drought sets in. Once we become aware of this, however, we can adjust our behavior, and stay warm toward each other even when times are less kind.

Musical Note:
The "bop-bop-a-whoa" heard in the song is, appropriately for the "bridge" of the song, sampled from The Golden Gate Jubilee Quartet, specifically, their 1938 song "Golden Gate Gospel Train." (I am unsure whether the group named the song, vice versa, or if both were named for the bridge). It was BB King who pointed Simon to the group, when they met backstage at Madison Square Garden for the 25th Anniversary of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.

The song itself was covered by, of all people, Vegas belter Tom Jones.

Next Song: So Beautiful or So What

Look at That

This song, like "Train in the Distance," tells the story of a relationship, of a life, but in much more abstract terms. So abstract, in some lines there are not even words.

The song begins with the symbolic line "Drop a stone in the abyss." In a basic sense, all of our actions are only meaningful to us, in the scope of the infinite universe and its eternal timeline, naught but a stone dropped in the abyss. (Compare to the Kansas lyric, "All we are is dust in the wind.")

But in a metaphoric sense, this can refer to a conception, if one imagines the "stone" and "abyss" are a seed in a hole... or a sperm in a womb. From that beginning, "anything can happen."

Then comes a "hug and a kiss." This could be between lovers, or a parent and child. The latter seems more likely, as the next thing that happens is going "off to school." In the larger sense, it might mean something my neighbor-- who never went to a university but still built a successful business-- once said: "Every day is college, if you pay attention." As Simon puts it: "You might learn something/ You never know,"

Well, after all that school, or at least schooling, comes what? Marriage. "Lovers merge and make a wish/ They close their eyes, and now their dreams are legal." 

Then comes an image of an "eagle," which admittedly might just be there to rhyme with "legal," or it might symbolize America, nature, or other larger forces at work, against the background of which the marriage will take place. 

These images also appear in the same section of the Bible. God says he will carry the Jews out of Egyptian bondage "on the wings of eagles," and is said to have guarded the Jewish camp in the wilderness with a "pillar of cloud" by day and a "pillar of fire" by night. Here, Simon's eagle flies "over the mountain" (Mt. Sinai?) through "clouds of fire" [emphasis mine]. So there might be a sense of God protecting this love-journey the way the passage in the wilderness-- envisioned by some sages as the marriage between God and the people-- was.

Then Simon backs up for a minute to the moment of the marriage proposal: "Ask somebody to love you/ Takes a lot of nerve." No one who has every made or received a marriage proposal needs to have this explained.

As the children's rhyme goes: "First comes love, then comes marriage, then comes baby in the baby carriage." The baby, of course, has to learn to talk. And we hear it do so: "ma ma ma," and "da da da." Then it learns to sing: "la la la/ Oom bop a doom." Now, this is Simon's imagined kid-- so when it learns to sing, it learns to sing doo-wop!

And, this is Simon's relationship song, so the relationship has to have... issues. "This is near enough to bliss." (Oh, gee, thanks... I love you too!) "Then over the top we go and down to the bottom." (Well, what did you expect, with that attitude?) "If you were looking for worries/ You got 'em." It's "Darling Lorraine" all over again.

Then there is a series of other nonsense sounds that are less recognizable: "tih," "guh," and "lih." This may represent being at a loss for words, being in a situation that's inexplicable. It may represent finding oneself, as the speaker in "Call Me Al" does, "in a strange world," in which the very words being spoken are unintelligible to him. 

Personally, I think these are supposed to represent the sounds of musical instruments. "Tih" sounds like a light, high tapping, maybe of a "high-hat" cymbal. "Guh" could be a bass or drum. And "lih" is perhaps the strumming of a guitar or other string instrument. Rhythm, bass, and treble are the basic building blocks of music worldwide, so this series of sounds may represent the learning of musical skill and composition.

Every once in a while, you also get an epiphany in life: "Come awake, come alive." And what is it, in this case? "Common sense, we survive." Evidently, there is a calming down, an acceptance, and "we"-- either this couple or the human race in general-- continues. 

And then? Why, life goes on, of course. "Down the road we go/ You might learn something, you never know. But anyway, you got to go." This last line might mean that life proceeds whether we like it to or not. Or it could mean we must "go" in the final sense: die. If so, it would be the logical end to a song about a lifespan.

The repeated title line: "Look at that!" means "Well, would you look at that!" in the astonished sense. But coupled with "look at this" every time, it implies: "Look far, look near-- and you will find the same patterns." Yes, marvel in wonderment at "that"... and now recognize it in "this," your own life...

"Just like that," in an unexpected instance. "Just like this," right now.

Next Song: Senorita with a Necklace of Tears

Bernadette

This is young Sal's song to his young love, Bernadette. Appropriately, it's a young, puppy-love song,

The bulk of the song is in the sprightly doo-wop, teen-pop mode of the 1950s, but there is a passage that is more sophisticated, jazzy, and adult. In the soundtrack album (track 4), the whole song is sung by Simon, but the notes in the Lyrics book indicate that this passage is a duet in which Bernadette sings along, possibly expressing her ability to bring him toward adulthood.

The opening cliche lyrics befit the Frankie Avalon-style music: "I got time on my hands tonight/ You're the girl of my dreams/ When I'm with you, the future seems bright."

In the more cosmopolitan passage, the lyrics are a bit more, well, lyrical: "I love you/ And the breeze that wraps around you."

This slides back into the cuter lyrics with the transitional line: "You're the smile on the Moon,"

Then we get the classic doo-wop nonsense "words" like "dom," "zoom," "wop," and "well-a-well." These surround the heartfelt words "I'm home," which is an important statement for an immigrant like Sal, who was somewhat homeless even in his Puerto Rican homeland.

Next, Sal invites Bernadette to a "hiding place in Central Park." Then Sal adds a seeming non-sequitur: "There's a wooden cross over my bed." Does this mean: "I am a good, religious boy! I just want to show you the place I have discovered for looking at the stars." Or does this mean: "My apartment, overseen my my religious family, is no place to do with you what I would, ahem, like to..." Given what we know about Sal, we assume the former explanation-- he really likes Bernadette and knows that if he wants to marry her, they will have to wait.

"The city is lit with candles/ They're shining for you, Bernadette." She really brings out the budding poet in Sal. But let's not get ahead of ourselves...

This song is of a type Simon wrote back in his pre-Simon and Garfunkel days, a la "Hey Schoolgirl." It must have been fun for him to write in that simple, happy mode again.

Musical Note:
Simon's collaborator for the lyrics of The Capeman is a very impressive, and very appropriate one. Derek Walcott is a Nobel Prize-winning poet... and a native of the Caribbean, specifically, the island of St. Lucia in the West Indies.

He favored the modern poets like TS Eliot (Simon himself likes Wallace Stevens), and also Elizabeth Bishop. He also founded a theater in Trinidad in 1959-- still running!-- and wrote as many plays as books of poems. In fact, it was this work as much as his poetry that garnered Wolcott an OBE.

Wolcott's work involves themes of religion (he grew up Methodist in a Catholic environment) and sensuality, two themes that run through The Capeman, and of course he is familiar with Caribbean imagery. As far as I can find, this play is his only foray into songwriting, although he originally trained as a painter!

Next song: The Vampires/ Shopliftin' Clothes

The Coast

Before we begin the analysis, we have to provide a glossary for some of the terms Simon uses.

I assumed "St. Cecilia" was a coastal town in Brazil, but when I went to look up exactly where it was, I discovered that St. Cecilia is the Catholic patron saint of musicians. (Now that I know this, of course, the song "Cecilia" now has an entirely new meaning or two... that music is a fickle muse, for one.) There is a Santa Cecilia neighborhood in Sao Paolo, Brazil, which is some distance from the coast itself. The Lyrics book does not capitalize the word "church," so it is not "The Church of St. Cecilia," such as the ones I found in San Francisco or LA. So let's just say this church, alongside its holy orders, has a poetic license.

A "batá" is a drum with an interesting shape, somewhat like an hourglass, but with one end larger than the other. It has a head on both ends, and it seems to originate with the Yoruba people of today's Nigeria.

The "Rose of Jericho" is a name given to several plants, but at least two share the distinction of being able to seemingly "resurrect," or revive after seeming to be dead and dried out. These are not pretty plants, an I cannot find an image in which it has blooms, let alone rose-like ones; the stems themselves form a somewhat roseate pattern. And "bougainvillea" is a beautifully flowering vine that seems to exist in most tropical climes.

The image in the opening verse is of a band-- which may or may not be related in blood as well as spirit-- being taken in by a church on a harbor, surrounded by lush growth. Even though they are too poor to rent a room, and the church is "little," there is a warmth to the image.

The speaker then comments on the poignancy of the scene, sighing: "This is a lonely life/ Sorrow’s everywhere you turn..."

And then a lower voice (but still Simon's) cynically adds: "And that’s worth something/ When you think about it/ That is worth some money." No matter how much misery there is, or how deep it is, someone is willing to capitalize on it rather than alleviate it.

The scene shifts to Washington, probably DC and not the US state, since one would not speak of something as specific as "sunlight" over such a large area. It seems that this "market" is less a supermarket (or stock market!) than an open-air farmers' market, as "we" are going "into" the sunlight. The merchandise is so varied, one feels that one has not simply been to one market but on "a trip around the world." The shoppers have made a day of it, it seems, for they started off in the "morning sunlight" and now consider "the evening meal." This meal is "negotiable," which again suggests a farmers' market, since haggling is permitted. "If there is one," might mean the shoppers have been sampling as they went and perhaps are in no mood for more food, let alone a full dinner.

Even after this jaunty spree, our two commentators chime in again with their sad assessments, the one finding "sorrow everywhere" and the other claiming that this misery "is worth some money."

So now we have two questions-- why the hand-wringing and fingertip-rubbing here... and what has this marketing trip to do with the musicians we left sleeping in the little harbor church?

Leaving the bridge aside for a moment, the next verse connects the two places and groups, by reusing the words "morning sunlight." The idea of a soul returning to Earth seems to imply the Resurrection of Jesus, as what other soul has left Earth to "return" to it? It cannot mean the idea that every soul ascends during sleep and returns, for in that case, why would "we" all gather to praise "a" soul's return, and not "our" souls' returns? If so, the "morning" in question might be Easter morning. That would also explain why a group of people happens to be at the church that a band happened to have slept at the night before.

The fact that there are "summer skies" might only refer to the summer-like nature of the skies... or to the fact of summer-- but then one can celebrate the Resurrection on any day, really.

Some, it seems, venture out into the sunrise to pray... and some, to shop. Sorrow is everywhere, and the money made off of it is in distracting people from it. Say, with an all-day, shopping trip for food, none of which is even taken home. And why travel to distant lands and spend your money there, when you can just buy your plantains, persimmons and pomegranates for more, at the local farmers' market?

The idea that only one soul in history returned in emphasized in the next line. Instead of again saying "This is a lonely life," the speaker now says "This is the only life." There is no resurrection for anyone else, and even the knowledge of one's own mortality needs to be distracted from; what could be more "lonely" or universally "sorrowful" than the finality of death?

OK, now to the bridge.

There is an error, both in the website's lyrics and, shockingly, in the Lyrics book's lyrics in the bridge of this song. Both of these sources have it:
"To prove that I love you
Because I believe in you
Summer skies, stars are falling
And if I have money
If I have children
Summer skies, stars are falling
All along the injured coast"

But the CD's liner notes have it correctly-- Simon clearly sings:
"To prove that I love you
Because I believe in you
Summer skies, stars are falling
All along the injured coast [emphasis mine]
And if I have money
If I have children
Summer skies, stars are falling
All along the injured coast"

The lines "Summer skies, stars are falling/ All along the injured coast" repeat in four different contexts. My contention is that these lines form their own chorus or refrain within the context of the bridge. Have someone else sing them, and it becomes clear. They do not necessarily fall, grammatically, as part of the phrases they follow. Taking them out, we have these unfinished phrases:

"To prove that I love you/ Because I believe in you" and "And if I have money/ If I have children" which seem to struggle to be heard against the insistent refrain, which focuses on externals: the weather, astrological events, and the somehow-- erosion? pollution? poverty?-- damaged coastline. It's as if someone were proposing to his beloved, but she was raptly watching the news.

And the news is saying that, if the coast-- the line between the land and sea, the firm and the vague, the physical and the metaphysical-- is "injured," well, Heaven is the lesser for it, too. Stars are falling over this, in commiseration. After all, the physical is not so bad a place-- we have pretty flowers here! At at least one (or One) who left it wanted to come back.

Also, taking out those lines reveals a hidden rhyme:
"If I have weaknesses/ Don’t let them blind me now...
Leaving the shadow of the valley behind me now"

The "shadow of the valley" is a reference (even if the words are reversed) to Psalm 23, which reads in part: "Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil: for Thou Art with me" (KJV). In leaving this fearsome place "behind" him, the speaker joyously declares that, while he cannot deny death, he no longer fears it-- Simon inverts the words since a valley often lies in a mountain's shadow, and to leave a valley, one must ascend.

Lastly, the seemingly throwaway nonsense lyrics: "Ooh-wah Ooh-wah, Doo-Wop a Doo-Wah" are, in fact, some of Simon's most important! They summarize the entirety of his life's musical discoveries to this point. The first set of vocalizations are African; the second are from the pre-rock "doo-wop" harmonies. The lyrics should really come with a mathematical symbol in between: "Ooh-wah Ooh-wah => Doo-Wop a Doo-Wah." From there, to here.

The song starts with poor musicians seeking shelter, and ends with what these thin human connections weave-- a rope that spans time and space.

Next song: Proof

Rene and Georgette Magritte with their Dog After the War

The title comes from a caption Simon liked to a photo of exactly that: the Belgian surrealist painter, his wife, and their dog, after WWII. The photo, I think, was in an intro of a book about Magritte and his work.

But the song, while somewhat evocative of Magritte's magical-realist art (everything normal, but with a dream-like twist), the song focuses more on the idea that even great artists have somewhat normal lives. They shop, they dine... they dance to popular music in their underthings in their hotel room.

In this case, they dance to the doo-wop groups that prefigured 1950s harmony groups like Dion and the Belmonts and The Crew Cuts, and may have even been smoother and more sophisticated than such street-corner hoodlums: "The Penguins/ The Moonglows/ The Orioles/ And The Five Satins."

Why was this music "fobidden"? Under the Nazis, all music made by African-Americans (and African-Europeans) was considered overly sexual and rhythmic and therefore "degenerate" (their word). Completely unlike Beethoven or Wagner, of course, whose works were restrained and refined. Magritte's work was also less than approved-of by the Nazis.

The next verse has the couple shopping on Manhattan's "Christopher Street," although I saw nothing of a trip to the States in the brief bio I just read, let alone their becoming American "immigrants." As far as I know, they (and their dog) remained Belgian citizens their entire lives, although there were exhibits of Magritte's work, I see, in New York in both 1936 and "after the war" in 1965. Magritte lived until 1967, so I suppose the couple could have come in for that.

And seeing suits in the American "style" might have driven home the pain that they were between worlds. They lived in Europe, with its stodgy ways, and Europe lived in them as well. But Magritte also was struggling in Europe, especially under the Nazis. Why could he not have been American? And free to have his strange artistic visions, and have them accepted? And be free to dance to this pretty music that never should have been "forbidden" to anyone?

The music that they loved but could never fully embrace also "brought tears to their eyes," but it also seems to have cheered them back up, as it is mentioned before-- their "easy stream of laughter."

It is the bridge of the song in which things become slightly surreal. We have the image of time slipping past like hunters stalking prey (or, possibly, evading becoming prey).

And then we have, again, the image of things "intertwined." In "Hearts and Bones," Simon wrote "You take two bodies and you twirl them into one... and they won't come undone." In "When Numbers Get Serious," he wrote: "Four rolls into three/ Three turns into two/ Two becomes a one." Here, it is the couple's "belongings" that have become enmeshed. (Possibly, also, their sense of "belonging," in that one member's social circle is now the other's as well.)

The final verse of the song sees Magritte in his later years, vindicated as a great artist and "dining with the power elite" with some regularity. Then the couple finds some old recordings in their "bedroom drawer." (Evidently, they had done more than "dance" to these records.)

But why were these things "hidden away"? And why were their hearts a lifeless "cabinet" that was "cold"? Did the weariness of want wear away their passion... or was it the drive to success that sidelined it? Was it the strain of being caught between being European in body and American in spirit? Was it simply the passing of years and the onset of age?

It matters not, now. The recordings have been recovered, and with them, the fresh bloom of youth. And "now," their relationship can be as wonderful "as it was before."

It is always popular to see which musicians influenced a given musician, or what painters a given painter. But it is less common-- and perhaps even more revealing-- to discover which musicians influenced what painter... and vice versa. We can only imagine that Simon, knowing that he was influenced by both Magritte and The Moonglows, wanted Magritte to love them, too.

Lyrical Note:
When remaking this song for his In the Blue Light album, Simon made two changes to the lyrics.
Now, the "laughter" is "flowing" through the air (instead of "floating") and they "peeked" in their bedroom drawer (instead of "looked"). I agree that these words are stronger, better, and more evocative word choices.

(Note: The video is worth seeing, too. Also, I originally had a paragraph in here about how Simon did not perform this song live much; the commenters have corrected me on this, so I removed that paragraph.)

Next Song: Cars are Cars

Late in the Evening

[Note: The songs on the soundtrack of Simon's film, One Trick Pony, do explain characters and progress the plot as one might expect, but for the purposes of these analyses, they will each be treated on their own terms. While the plot of the movie is basically a "what if," as in "What if Simon had not hit it big or stayed big?" I will not speculate on the relevance of the songs to Simon's own life, or relate them to the character of Jonah Levin, whom Simon plays.]


Well, this is interesting. I have been listening to this song for decades and always assumed the second line, "Couldn't have been no more than one or two" meant "It couldn't have been past 1:00 or 2:00 a.m.," which would make the hour, well, late in the evening.

When I looked online for the lyrics, however, it seemed I was alone in that assessment, and that the words, most agree, are "I couldn't have been no more than one or two," as in years old. Which would be incredible poetic license, as current psychology has it that no one can remember events in their own life before the age of three, because the necessary memory structures have not set up in the brain until that point. Also, at that age, one would not necessarily have a "bed" yet, but still a crib.

So I looked at Simon's own site, which lists the lyric as only "Couldn't have been no more..." with neither "I" nor "It" to break the tie (yes, I put myself even with the rest of the intelligence on the Internet. This is less a boast than a swipe at the general quality of the information available online). His book of lyrics, titled simply Lyrics, also has just "Couldn't've." While I still believe my hearing of the lyric makes more sense, I have to side with Simon and the grammar he uses.

In my hearing, the first thing than happens is a teen is lying on his bed, then gets up to go cruising, then goes into a bar to play his guitar. It forms one relatively smooth series of events that could well take place in the span of one evening. Then there is a verse about meeting his, as we would say today, significant other, which could have also happened that night, perhaps at the mentioned "bar." So "the first thing I remember..." would not mean "...altogether, in my entire life" but simply "...about that night." Which was a significant night, worth remembering, because it's when he met his sweetheart. So that is what I was going to say here.

But now I can't. The grammar of the song has the phrase "couldn't have been" referring back to the "I" of "The first thing I remember." So.

So the song is, at first, about the speaker's first memory. He remembers his bed, a radio, and his mother laughing. It's the kind of sensory, piecemeal impression one would expect of one's earliest memory.

Then, his entire childhood is evidently a blur, because the "next thing" he remembers is walking through his neighborhood as a teen with his friends, again "late in the evening." The guys not in his "troop" are playing pool at bars and parlors, the young women are hanging out on the "stoops" of the apartment buildings (not likely houses, if there were pool parlors in the same stretch of sidewalk).

Oh, and when he was a baby, there was a "radio," and now there are "a cappella groups" busking on the street corners. Two memories, and both times the hour is late and there is "music seeping through."

OK, enough of other people making music and his being on the receiving end. Now it is our hero's turn. He has learned to play some "lead guitar" (in some concert versions, Simon changes this to "rhythm guitar"), and-- after partaking of some, um, herbal courage-- he starts "to play... and [blows] that room away."

All of his life, he has been absorbing the music seeping through. Now it is coming back out of him. Now he is replying, joining in the conversation he has been on the receiving end of since he was in his receiving blanket.

Next, we would expect another "next thing." Instead, we get another "first thing." This is because the meeting of the love of his life is a new beginning. Now empowered by his musical triumph, he has the confidence to actively pursue her as well: "I'm gonna get that girl no matter what I do."

And, shockingly enough, when did this meeting take place, and under what circumstances? "It was late in the evening, and all the music seeping through."

Music is not just a part of our speaker's life. It is the water he swims in. It has been part of his life since his earliest memories, it is the mode through which he reached adulthood, and it was the reason he was in the same place at the same time as the person he wanted to share his life with.


Musical Note: The firework-like Latinate horns were arranged by David Grusin. This is the same composer who worked on the soundtrack of The Graduate. There, he composed the instrumental music that represents the parents' generation, with Simon and Garfunkel's songs representing the youth.

It was nice of Simon to show the world that the guy who wrote the "old people" music on that soundtrack had something in him beside "The Singleman Family Foxtrot." And it's also interesting that both of Simon's movie soundtracks have Grusin contributing.

The rhythm is borrowed from one of Simon's all-time favorite tracks, Elvis' Mystery Train.

IMPACT: The song went to #6 in the US. The song as been sampled by at least two other acts.

Next Song: That's Why God Made the Movies