The Lord

In his first original song on the first Simon & Garfunkel album-- "Bleecker Street"-- Simon refers to the many Psalms that use the imagery of sheep-herding. The "fog," he wrote, "hides the Shepherd from his sheep."

But here, the sheep are abandoning the Shepherd: "Noon and night they leave the flock."

Simon has been writing religious songs, or at least songs that reference religion, all his career, but lately they have been appearing with more frequency.

"The Lord" starts with a reference to, we think, the "Great Migration." a demographic and geographic shift in US history (roughly 1910-70) involving the migration of Blacks from the rural South to the industrial North.

But he does not capitalize the term, so it is another kind of "great migration" that he means. And if it is a religious-- or anti-religious-- one it is not a migration toward somewhere like an Eden or Promised Land, necessarily. It could be to either soft, inviting "meadow grass" or uninviting "jagged rock."

This is what happens when you leave the flock. You gain free will, but the outcome becomes uncertain.

What happens if you stay? The outcome is certain, but you lose free will: "The Lord is my engineer... the earth I ride on." This can be the engineer who steers the train, the electrical engineer who wires the system... or the engineer in the music-studio control room (later, we have "The Lord is my record producer") who determines what the song ends up sounding like, since they control how the sound is recorded and manipulated.

"The Lord... is the path I slip and I slide on," Simon writes, referencing his earlier song "Slip-Slidin' Away." He likely means us to recall its final verse: "God only knows/ God makes His plan/ The information is unavailable to the mortal man/ We... believe we're gliding down the highway/ When in fact, we're slip-slidin' away." 

Yes, he has been wrestling with the free will/determinism issue for decades. 

In the next verse, he sings of astronomical things: comets, stars, night, moons, daylight, and sunset that "now turned the evening rose." Astronomy-- and its earlier form, astrology-- impress upon us that Nature/Fate is the clockmaker, and we are but cogs in the machine.

"The Lord is the face in the atmosphere," he tells us. God is the order and system in the seeming chaos, and the way we, well, interface with it. 

Then he turns to sociological phenomena: tribes, age, "celebrations," songs-- concluding, "the endless river flows." Even if we say, "it's not nature, it's nurture" is that not still a form of determinism? Whether God or society shapes our fate, the end is the same: our fate is shaped for us.

The chorus returns but a new one is added, and now plant imagery is introduced, and a new role for God. The Lord. we are told, is both the forest and the forest "ranger" (personally, I find this a rather forced rhyme with "stranger," but let's work with what we have). More plant imagery arrives soon...

But now we have The Lord as a philanthropist as well. He is a "meal for the... poor," and a "welcome door to the stranger" as well as the one who protects forests from pollution and fires. God takes care of those who cannot care for themselves-- and, in a snide jab at the rest of humanity-- who are also not cared for by those who can afford to do so. 

Aside from forests, we are now shown "flowers" and "seeds." "Tears and flowers/ Dry over time," and what seem important now is not, in the Grand Scheme. "Memory leaves us/ Melody and rhyme," and this has been shown to be true-- those with Alzheimer's, for instance, will remember songs when they have forgotten much else. So are melodies and rhymes but dried-up tears and flowers? 

The plants don't only die, though... they live anew in "seeds": "The seeds we gather/ from the gardener's [or should that be capital-G "Gardener's"] glove/ Live forever. So, songs made by humans are dried flowers in a scrapbook, but things made by God are eternal.

Then comes the last chorus of the song, which blames God for both plague and climate change, and quotes "The Battle Hymn of the Republic." In that hymn, God "loose[s] the fateful lightning/ of His terrible, swift sword." Here, the Lord is the sword! 

In the free will/fate debate, it seems that fate wins, because it is true whether you believe it or not, whether you try to subvert it or not. "The Lord is... a simple truth surviving."

Is... is that the simple truth?

Too soon to tell-- it's not really the last part of the song. The song picks up again after the album's third song... with no new text, ending again with the same verse. 

But then, the continues again after the sixth song. And this time, there is more, new text. And this time, the Lord is less threatening than plagues and natural disasters: "The Lord is a puff of smoke... my personal joke... my reflection." God now, is reduced to... one's thoughts of God. 

Then, at nearly the last second, a third possibility occurs to our thinker: Not us deciding what happens, or God doing so, but random chance! "Are we just trial and error/ One of a billion in the universe?" This thought, however, is waved away. 

And we are right back to "The Lord is my engineer... my record producer."

But now, that fate is at least personal: "The Lord is the music that I hear." This whole time, you have to wonder how such a successful person as Simon could say that everything in his life was predetermined. He's probably been wondering that, himself.

So this is what he lands on. He has, his whole life, followed the music he heard. It has led him around the world. But now he wonders what power presented him with that music, which seemed to materialize just as he was ready to, or needed to, hear it. "The Lord is the music that I hear."

Up to now, this repeated line has been "The Lord is the earth I ride on." Now, after the Lord's being referred to again as an "engineer" in the music studio sense just 5 lines before, we have: "The Lord is my engineer/ The Lord is the train I ride on." [emphasis mine]. So we do have the other meaning of "engineer" acknowledged-- and the idea now is that once we are aboard the train, the track is laid out for us, and we are not even driving.

Then one last image: "The Lord is the coast, and the coast is clear." Let's forgive the pun for now and recall that one of Simon's relatively recent song is titled "The Coast." It would take another post to fully compare the two songs, but here it's enough to note that in that song, the coast is only described as being "injured." Here, "the coast is clear."

And what is The Lord, in the end? "The path I slip and I slide on." We are on a path, and it will take us where it is going, and any effort on our part to wander off it will result in us slipping and sliding... so why not just submit? Get on the train, and enjoy the ride. 

Next Song: Love is Like a Braid

 

Seven Psalms (album), and its instruments

In May of 2023, Paul Simon released a new album titled Seven Psalms.

Structurally, it takes two forms at once. On the one hand, as the title indicates, there are seven distinct songs here, each with its own title. On the liner notes, they are presented as discreet songs.

However, there is only one track on the album-- and Simon has said it is a suite, meant to be listened to all the way through, all at once, as if it were a piece of classical music.

Further, the first song, "The Lord," is used as a motif, and returns a few times throughout the suite-- sometimes with the same lyrics and sometimes with new ones.

Nevertheless, for the sake of clarity, each song will be dealt with individually, in its own blog post. All verses of "The Lord," even if they appear further along in the suite, will be considered part of that song, for the sake of analyzing its lyrics. 

Next Song: The Lord

MUSICAL NOTES:

Over the course of this blog, when an unfamiliar instrument was employed on a given track, I mentioned it.

Here, however, the liner notes don't specify which track used which instrument, so I will list and explain them now.

The more unfamiliar ones-- and all of these are acoustic-- include:

The gamelan: This is less one instrument than a set of them, from Indonesia, that includes mostly percussion but also some winds and strings.

The gopichand: A one-string instrument from Southeast Asia. It is shaped like a tall isosceles triangle, with a hollow gourd as the base.  

Cloud-chamber bowls: This is an array of large, glass half-bottles, designed by Harry Parch. Both their top halves and inverted bottom halves are arranged on a frame and struck, as with chime-style bells. (The bottles were originally designed for physics experiments involving radiation, in what scientists call "cloud chambers.")

[Note: More about Parch on the Musical Note section of the "Insomniac's Lullaby" entry.]

The Chromelodeon: An adapted reed organ that plays a 43-tone-per-octave scale. Another Parch invention. As the name implies, it is a variation on the melodeon, which is a reed instrument played with keys, that looks like a piano and sounds something like an accordion. 

The hadphoon: A toned percussion instrument made from metal. Sort of a circular marimba, or flat steelpan, it is placed on top a drumhead, and its metal tines (each a different width, and therefore a different tone) are struck.

The hadjira: A large, tambourine-like frame drum.

The gran cassa bass drum: Similar to the largest drum one might see in a marching band.

Almglocken: The liner notes explains these are "Swiss tuned bells." They are metal, with handles on top and no clappers inside. They have been compared to cowbells but are more bell-like in sound; they "dong" rather than "clunk."

The Chalumeau: a Baroque reed instrument considered an early form of the clarinet.

The therobo: This is to the lute what a bass guitar is to a guitar. It has a rounded back and a very long neck. 

Fast Car (Wyclef Jean feat. Paul Simon)

[Note to Readers: This is a 2007 track that was co-written by Simon. With most such collaborations, I assume that Simon is the primary songwriter, and that he has invited others to work on the track with him-- to add their expertise in a particular genre, language, etc. In other words, they are collaborating with him.

With this song-- which appears on Wyclef Jean's album Carnival II: Memoirs of an Immigrant-- the primary songwriter seems, to me, to be the same as its primary singer, Jean. The song is attributed to seven songwriters, including both Simon and Jean; Wikipedia lists Jean first... and Simon fourth. So here, he seems to be collaborating with them.

On the one hand, how much input could one writer have among seven? On the other, if that one is Paul Simon, would the others second-guess or gainsay him? Even so, Simon does not seem to be the type to be an ungracious guest, and would likely allow his host's literary voice to be the most prominent.

When I sub-titled this blog "more or less," I mean that the list of songs discussed would be as comprehensive as possible, knowing that "every single song" was a very intense promise. I did not mean that the songs would be "more or less" his. But here we are, and this song, while certainly weighing in on the "less" side, is a Paul Simon song, and so we're going to discuss it.]

"Fast Car" was already the title of another song; it's the one that put Tracy Chapman on the map back in 1988. It went to #6 and received two Grammy nominations (it lost Song of the Year to "Don't Worry, Be Happy.")

Wyclef's song is full of many other references as well. Even before the song starts, Wyclef mentions "Jersey Boys," the musical about Frankie Valli and the Four Seasons. In the first line, he mentions Kanye West's song "Jesus Walks" from 2004. He then compares Kanye's being revived after being in a coma-- after his 2002 car accident-- to Jesus' rising from the dead.

This introduces the image of a "fast car," as in the one whose crash Kanye survived.

In the next verse, Wyclef mentions two movies starring Will Smith--  Wild Wild West (itself a reimagining of a TV show from the 1960s) and Bad Boys. Smith, now best known as an actor, began as a rapper. While Smith was never in a car crash, all I could find that related was a rumor that he and his son were killed in one... but the rumor emerged in 2019-- more than 10 years after this song was released. 

The line "some mystery, the killer get away," is true in general, but the video explains this is a reference to the still-unsolved murders of The Notorious B.I.G. and Tupac Shakur. 

Yes, the line "some of us are outlawed" plays off of the "outlaw" trope from the historic Wild West, but also acknowledges that much hip-hop music is censored or even banned, and rappers themselves often run outside the law. 

But we would know that Biggie and Tupac were meant anyway... since "Outlawz" is the name of a hip-hop group of which Shakur was a member... while "Bad Boy" is also the name of a record label (founded by Sean Combs) for which Biggie recorded. 

In the Chapman song, the "fast car" is an escape from poverty to a more comfortable life. Here, it seems that any life-- even that of a superstar millionaire-- sometimes needs escaping from: "Livin' this isn't the end of the day... jump in the fast car."

The next line seems to substantiate this, with a sentiment that goes back at least as far as the Beatles saying "money can't but me love." Here, this thought is expressed: "You don't gotta be no billionaire/ To get a ticket up to the Moon.... I'm right here." The idea of billionaires with tickets to the Moon likely refers to Elon Musk's Space X project, selling flights to outer space and someday the Moon.

Then we get another musical reference: "see clearly now." This line clearly evokes the big hit of reggae singer Johnny Nash (who passed away in 2020), with its famous line: "I can see clearly now, the rain has gone."

The next verse puns the word "shots" meaning both "shots of alcohol" and "gunshots." The scenario framed is driving home after a "bachelor party" having had more than "51 shots." This high of a number of gunshots, however, likely refers to the death of Amadou Diallo." In 1999, he tried to enter is own home but was falsely seen as trying to break in. When he reached for his wallet to prove he was, in fact, at his own house, the police assumed he was reaching for a gun, and shot at him 41 times. That Jean adds 10 to that number may mean that Diallo was just one of many such victims of police... zeal. 

The case is seen as emblematic of the idea that black men are always suspect, even when innocent. The story is also told by Springsteen in his song "American Skin (41 Shots)."

And what kind of car was the partier about to drive? A "fast one."

[Note: An astute reader has informed me that another case of a police shooting, involving 51 bullets, was in fact the one Jean was likely referring to, instead. The victim was named Sean Bell, and the incident happened in 2006, just a year before this song dropped; Bell was in his car. The details are in the comments below. But wow... how sad that there are so many such stories that we can actually get them confused with each other...]

It is at this point that Simon begins to sing. He sings this bridge twice in the course of the song. Now, the "fast car" does not seem to be a means of escape at all, but the vehicle of the Angel of Death (compare this with Emily Dickinson imagining Death picking her up in his "carriage" in her Poem 479). 

Here, Simon sings: "When that fast car picks you up/ You will have no choice... You will weep and smile." And where is the car heading? "You will... see Heaven in the headlights." 

The next two verses confirm this. The lines about "TLC" and "Honduras" tell us that that the verse is about Lisa Lopes, a member of the R&B group TLC, who was killed, while doing charity work in Honduras, in a car accident.

The last verse is also about a car-accident victim, this time a 16-year-old who was killed crossing the street by a drunk driver in a "hit-and-run." This may refer to a famous case as well, but one I am at this point unfamiliar with.

So... putting this all together? Kanye was almost killed in a car crash, but Lisa "Left-Eye" Lopes was.
While neither Biggie or 2Pac were killed in car crashes, cars were involved, as they were killed in drive-by shootings. Amadou Diallo was killed by police shooting from behind their (parked) cars, but he was on his front porch. 

Maybe the message is that one should not put one's faith in a car to provide an escape. Cars-- and other material trappings of success-- can kill as surely as they can transport one safely. 

Instead, one should depend on God, and on people: "You don't gotta be no billionaire/ To get a ticket up to the Moon/ We all know Somebody up there" and "You need a helping hand?/ Look, I'm right here."

Next: Seven Psalms

In the Blue Light (album)

The new/altered lyrics (to previously released songs, listed below) that Simon added/changed for the In the Blue Light album, released on September 7, 2018, are discussed in the posts for those songs.

The songs on In the Blue Light-- all of which have new lyrics which significantly alter their meanings (except as noted)-- are:
 1. "One Man’s Ceiling Is Another Man’s Floor" (no lyric changes)
 2. "Love"

 3. "Can’t Run But"

 4. "How The Heart Approaches What It Yearns"

 5. "Pigs, Sheep and Wolves" (changes are cosmetic)

 6. "René and Georgette Magritte With Their Dog After the War" (just two words changed)

 7. "The Teacher"

 8. "Darling Lorraine" (one minor change)

 9. "Some Folks’ Lives Roll Easy"

 10. "Questions For The Angels" (very small changes)

They originally appeared on these albums:

There Goes Rhymin’ Simon (1973)

Still Crazy After All These Years (1975)

One-Trick Pony (1980)

Hearts and Bones (1983)

The Rhythm of The Saints (1990)

You’re The One (2000)

So Beautiful Or So What (2011)

Stranger

While being touted as a "new Paul Simon song," this is in fact a remix of "The Werewolf," the opening track to Simon's Stranger to Stranger album; the "new" track also samples "The Clock," an instrumental on this same album.

On this track, according to Spin magazine, Simon is "backed and drastically overhauled by Nico Segal... and Nate Fox of Chance [the Rapper]'s default ensemble, the Social Experiment."

Next Song: Fast Car

Like to Get to Know You

Simon's current marriage to Edie Brickell is his longest by far, of his three. However, the course of true love never does run smooth, and the couple had an argument in 2014 that-- largely due to the fact that they are a celebrity couple-- made headlines. To show the public that they were fine after this bump in the road, they released a duet titled "Like to Get to Know You." (Thanks to my readers for spotting this one!)

This simple, Everly Brothers-style song is about a longtime couple who, despite their years together, seem frustrated that they still don't know each other well. At first, this is a source of frustration-- how can this be? Yet, they re-frame it is a positive: Well, it'll be like a new relationship, then!

"You share my heart/ you share my kids and my dogs," one sings, "But I swear I don't know you at all." They other responds: "You see my face/ Every night, every day/ But I swear you don't see me at all."

Echoing the classic "They Can't Take That Away From Me," with its intimate, personal observations about the way the other wears a hat and holds a knife, they sing: "I know how you like your coffee/ I know how bad you drive."

Meanwhile, they see other couples "in the movie line" or they "check out people in the checkout line." Those other couples seem very comfortable in their intimacy. They are "holding hands and laughing," and "exchanging loving glances." Unlike this couple, who seem estranged.

Still, they "wouldn't trade places" with those couples, even so. Why not? "I'd like to get to know you again."

In the title track to his 2016 album, Stranger to Stranger, Simon wonders if they would have gotten together had they met now: "Stranger to stranger/ If we met for the first time... could you imagine us falling in love again?"

He answered this question, in a way, years before. In 2014, they each said "I don't know you at all," but that they'd "like to get to know" each other now.

What's the difference, really, if the "stranger"-- the person you "don't know at all"-- is someone you meet on the street... or in your own bedroom?

Next Song: Fast Car

Insomniac's Lullaby

The song is about a lullaby, but we have to get to that in a minute. Because the song, while about a lullaby, is itself a prayer.

After all, it starts: "Oh Lord," and anything that starts that way is a prayer. And what is the insomniac's prayer? "Oh Lord, don't keep me up all night."

It'd be a lonesome vigil. The only other one up would be the Moon, what that only has "desolate eyes." And to journey all those "miles [to] the sunrise" with only such "sockets" as "travelling companions" [OK, so that's from "Graceland," but still] would be too much to bear.

But the darkness "invites" a tune. Simon has been personifying Darkness since he called it his "old friend" all those decades ago, and maybe now we finally know why they are so long acquainted. After all, Darkness would be an insomniac's friend, or at least a familiar face. Anyway, the tune the darkness invites seems to be this very tune.

While he is awake, he hears a "siren" sound "in the distance," but instead of being upset by it-- after all, it means someone is in trouble-- he calls it a "song." To let us know he is being facetious, he complains that the sound "rattles the old window frame."

And then, something unexpected happens: "Gradually, angels reveal their existence." So, they were there the whole time, only now they are letting themselves be seen. The fact that he does not elaborate about these divine visitors, as the listener might expect, leads us to believe that the thin wisps of light that must seep into his dark room resemble angels. "There's nothing and no one to blame," he says, worried that we might accuse him of abusing alcohol (etc.), or having a tumor, what with him seeing angels and all. Maybe he could see what was really causing these angelic apparitions if he put on his glasses..? Lack of sleep can cause hallucinations, after all.

Even if this is a prayer, these visions are not angels. If they were, the speaker would not be talking so much about being alone, as he does before when he says the "desolate" Moon is his only companion, and later when he... well, let's get to that part right now.

Now comes the prayer again. This time, the thing he fears is not the daunting distance until dawn but coldness of some sort also lasting a too-long time: "winter that lasts until June." This may be the lack of human companionship... at least the sort that is awake. So again, he's alone, with no angelic company. (Also, Simon just rhymed "Moon" with "tune" and "June" so slyly we didn't notice.)

Now, two choruses and a verse into the song, we finally learn what the Insomniac's Lullaby is. It's a song that turns out to be one word long:

"Sleep."

Well, of course. What else do you need?

The next verse seems to be about death. "They say all roads lead to a river." While I have never heard "they" say any such thing (all roads lead to Rome, I thought) it is true that every major city is built around a river-- every city more than 100 years old, at least. A river was necessary as a source of water, but also transportation of people and goods.

But, "they" supposedly continue, "one day/ The river comes up to your door." Well, there are plenty of places that don't flood, so this must mean something else. What comes to every door? Only, as Franklin said, "death and taxes."

Hearing this axiom, the speaker asks, "How will the builder of bridges deliver us all/ To the faraway shore?" This is less sincere doubt than simple amazement. When watching a magic trick or feat of athletic prowess, we mutter, "How does he do it?" but only rhetorically.

This is a much nicer metaphor for death than some hooded skeleton reaping our souls with a huge blade, isn't it? A walk across a bridge, is all death is. (Or, if you're Jacob or Robert Plant, you may prefer a ladder or stairway.)

In the next iteration of the chorus, the speaker again asks for sleep, but now so that he can avoid having to face "questions [he doesn't] understand" and "wrestle [his] fears." This is completely understandable. Who wants to do that, all night?

"The sound in my ears/ Is the music that's sweeping the land/ The Insomniac's Lullaby." Maybe the "lullaby" is the agglomeration of sounds coming from everyone insomniac's radio and stereo. Or maybe it's his own radio, and he's listening to contemporary pop (on his headset, so as not to wake his wife) for inspiration. After all, a musician likes to stay current.

Finally, he arrives at dawn, the "light from the East." It is "soft as a rose," and that color, too. "As if all is forgiven," meaning that the questions and fears of the night are resolved, or at least feel that way.

"Wolves become sheep" at this time. The nocturnal animals, like wolves and burglars, are replaced by pleasanter ones, like sheep and ice-cream truck drivers. Also, the menacing gray clouds of night are supplanted by white, woolly ones.

It might be a reference to his song "Pigs Sheep and Wolves," but more likely it's a circling-back to the "Werewolf" of the opening track.

Alternately, one famous sleep aid is "counting sheep"; the idea of imagining sheep jumping a fence, and counting them doing so, is said to help one drift off. This connection of sheep and sleep is possible because of how the song ends: "We are who we are/ or we're not" but either way, "At least we'll eventually all fall asleep."

Like any good bedtime story, the song-- and the album-- end with a yawn and a "nighty-night."

Is the song about death? Is "we'll all fall asleep" about... the Big Sleep, as it is in Hamlet? I don't think so. There are no insomniacs when it comes to death, no "in-necr-iacs." Some people complain, "I just can't sleep," but no one complains, "I just can't die." So this is about sleep, and to the degree it is about the lack thereof, it is about the resolution of that issue.

It's also a very pretty song.

Simon has recently stated that he is retiring from music. If he is, he has earned it. But I can't imagine he is. Music has been his entire life. Now, he is 75. He just finished working on an album and touring the world in support of it. He's tired, is all, and he's talking like a tired person. Once he has a vacation, I bet we'll get another album-- or two-- out of him yet.

I just think that if he stops making music, he'll die. And he isn't ready to do that yet.


MUSICAL NOTE: Bobby McFerrin does the background vocals. In pop circles, he is considered a one-hit wonder because of the dippy-- but perfectly so-- song "Don't Worry, Be Happy." In jazz circles, he is considered a living legend and one of the greatest vocalists ever to live, able to create whole arrangements with just his voice and body slaps. In classical circles, he is that fun conductor who sings the notes along with the instruments and harmonizes with them. Just go on YouTube, type in his name, and enjoy.

Some of the instruments were invented by a man named Harry Partch, who could hear 43 tones to an octave; most mortals can hear only 12. So had to invent instruments to make those sounds. They have names like: cloud chamber bowls, sonic canons, kithara and the chromelodeon. The original instruments are at Montclair State University, in New Jersey, where the song was recorded. (More in the entry on the Seven Psalms album).

Next Song: Like to Get to Know You