The Paul Simon Songbook
The Paul Simon Songbook | ||||
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Studio album by Paul Simon | ||||
Publication |
1965 |
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Label (s) | CBS Records | |||
Title (number) |
12 |
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running time |
37:48 |
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occupation | Vocals , guitar : Paul Simon | |||
Reginald Warburton, Stanley West |
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Studio (s) |
Levy's Recording Studio |
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The Paul Simon Songbook is the first solo album by the American musician Paul Simon . It appeared in 1965, initially only on the British market. It contains compositions by Simon, most of which later became known through Simon & Garfunkel .
History of origin
After the first album by the duo Simon & Garfunkel, Wednesday Morning, 3 AM , was initially not a great commercial success, Paul Simon traveled to England , where he performed mostly alone. When the single The Sound of Silence surprisingly reached first place in the charts, the demand for another album was great. At that time, Simon & Garfunkel were already under contract with Columbia Records , which is why Simon received the offer to release a solo album on CBS Records, the British branch of the label, for which he eventually recorded 12 tracks. The song I Am a Rock was released as a single , accompanied by the B-side Leaves That Are Green . Neither the single nor the album were very successful commercially; I Am a Rock only became an international hit later in the version by Simon & Garfunkel.
In 2004 a CD version of the original recordings including two bonus tracks was released.
Track list
- I am a rock - 2:52
- Leaves That Are Green - 2:41
- A Church Is Burning - 3:38
- April Come She Will - 1:55
- The Sound of Silence - 3:19
- A Most Peculiar Man - 2:26
- He Was My Brother - 2:58
- Kathy's Song - 3:42
- The Side of a Hill - 2:28
- A Simple Desultory Philippic (or How I Was Robert McNamara'd into Submission) - 2:25
- Flowers Never Bend with the Rainfall - 2:27
- Patterns - 3:13
Paul Simon composed all of the songs - He Was My Brother and The Side of a Hill, but under the pseudonym "Paul Kane".
The CD re-release, released in 2004, contained the two bonus tracks:
- I Am a Rock (alternate version) - 2:44
- A Church Is Burning (alternate version) - 3:10
Further use
In addition to The Sound of Silence , He Was My Brother appeared on the album Wednesday Morning, 3 AM . Simon & Garfunkel later recorded most of the other songs together again: I Am a Rock , Leaves That Are Green , April Come She Will , A Most Peculiar Man and Kathy's Song for Sounds of Silence and A Simple Desultory Philippic , Flowers Never Bend with the Rainfall and Patterns for Parsley, Sage, Rosemary and Thyme published two years later .
The song The Side of a Hill was later rearranged by Simon & Garfunkel and used as a counterpoint to the English folk song Scarborough Fair , which formed the theme song for Parsley, Sage, Rosemary and Thyme .
All songs were recorded with Art Garfunkels accompaniment, except for Kathy's Song and A Simple Desultory Philippic , which remained Simon's solo songs, as well as April Come She Will , of which Garfunkel recorded a solo version.
A Church Is Burning was the only song to appear on none of the Simon & Garfunkel studio albums, but was sung by them at concerts and can thus be found on the live album Live from New York City in 1967 .
Web links
- The Paul Simon Songbook on Paul Simon's official website
- The Paul Simon Songbook on Allmusic (English)