"Graceland" - Paul Simon

Paul Simon's "Graceland" may just be my favourite album of all time. Other candidates include The Beach Boys "Pet Sounds" and The Beatles "Abbey Road". Certainly not controversial choices, but there you go. Anyways, for me this is one of the most consistent of all the great albums. On "Pet Sounds" for example, there are a couple of tracks which are just not as great as others (such as "I Know There's An Answer" or the title track). On "Graceland" every track is uniformly great, so much so that I couldn't really name a favourite track off the album. On a personal level, this album has been part of my life for probably the entire 25 years since its release. My parents had a copy of this album on cassette, which they must have purchased not too long after the album's release. I heard this album many dozens of times on road trips afterwards and it soon became a favourite of mine.

What is amazing about the album is its musical diversity. While of course it is well known that Paul Simon went to South Africa and recorded with South African musicians for most of the album, it must not be forgotten that he recorded one track with Good Rockin' Dopsie And The Twisters (a Zydeco band) and another with Los Lobos (a Hispanic Roots Rock band). It is very much a 'world album'. And the world is made that much richer by its existence.

"The Mississippi delta is shining like a national guitar" is the opening line of the title track, and that line has always resonated with me, even more since I visited the Mississippi Delta and Graceland in 2003. The music on this particular track is even a bit Countryish (or as Countryish as you'll get with South African musicians) and I did not realize until quite recently that The Everly Brothers are doing backup vocals towards the end of the song.

If by some bizarre and cruel twist of fate you DON'T have a copy of this album, then I highly recommend that you pick up the double-disc 25th anniversary edition. The reason that it is so essential is the inclusion of the phenomenally moving documentary "Under African Skies" which goes over the vast controversy which this album engendered upon its release, given the UN cultural boycott which was in effect against South Africa at the time due to the odious policies of Apartheid. It made the album that much more of a fascinating trip.

The other side of Roger Miller

I was listening to some Roger Miller the other day, and decided to write this blog not about an album, but about some songs. Roger Miller was one of the greatest Country songwriters and is best known for wacky, seemingly noveltyish songs such as "Dang Me," "Chug-A-Lug," "You Can't Rollerskate In A Buffalo Herd" (and many others) as well as the more conventional "King Of The Road" (a masterpiece of a song and his most well-known song). But what may surprise those familiar only with these songs is that Roger Miller wrote and performed some of the most dark, depressing and heartbroken songs of all time. Let's take a look at a few of them.

The first one is probably be the most disturbing. Its not so inviting title is "One Dyin' And A Buryin'". The narrator of the song and he thinks the best way for him to be free of heartache is to go down to the river.... and to end it all. The end result? "Some cryin', six carrying me". The song is very sparse, just Miller's narration and acoustic guitar. He think its foolproof but immediately admits its actually foolhardy. The most devastating lines in the song are "The love that once was warm and then just somehow turned to hate. Made my life a prison from which there’s only one escape . That’s one dyin' and a buryin'....". Believe it or not, this song made it to #10 on the Country charts and #34 on the Pop charts.

Another heartbreaking hit is "Husbands And Wives," a divorce drama. But 'drama' may not be the correct term, as the music and lyrics are anything but dramatic and in fact are resigned and contemplative. The killer line is "pride is the chief cause and the decline in the number of husbands and wives". As true today as it was forty years ago. This song also made the Top Ten on the Country Charts and the Top Forty on the Pop charts.

Finally we have Roger Miller's spectral take on "A World So Full Of Love," a song he co-wrote with Faron Young, who had a minor hit with in 1961. Miller's demo version was unreleased until its inclusion on the 3-CD set "King Of The Road: The Genius Of Roger Miller" in 1995. Accompanied by just his acoustic guitar, Miller squeezes every ounce of emotion out of unbearably dark verses such as "I know how it feels to be alive with no desire to live. I know how it feels to die inside but try hard to forgive. And my way of finding out is 'cause a love just let me down. In a world so full of love yet not enough to go around ."