Talk:Simon & Garfunkel/Archive 1

Request for references
Hi, I am working to encourage implementation of the goals of the Verifiability policy. Part of that is to make sure articles cite their sources. This is particularly important for featured articles, since they are a prominent part of Wikipedia. The Fact and Reference Check Project has more information. Thank you, and please leave me a message when you have added a few references to the article. - Taxman 17:20, Apr 22, 2005 (UTC)

Organization
This article needs to be cleaned up. There is a heading called reunification that refers to events in 1996, that is listed before another heading called subsequent careers, that refers reunifications in 1975 and 1981. This article is too confusing and needs to more chronological. Rogerd 15:48, 14 May 2005 (UTC)

Citizen of the Planet
"a "new" studio duo song, "Citizen of the Planet", ironically the only song from the rejected 1983 reunion album that did not originally feature Garfunkel's vocal participation." Is this really certain? On the S&G bootleg of Hearts & Bones, Art can only be heard on two songs... Hakanand 07:11, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

This article claims that the album was completed. Simon has claimed that he did not remove Garfunkel's vocals from the recordings because Garfunkel had never got round to recording them. If the two people closest to the project cannot agree on what actually happened the I guess we will never really know for certain. Keithmall 10:16, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

It is certain that there are at least a couple of vocal recordings by AG for "Hearts and Bones". There are bootleg tracks on Youtube.

A lesson for Wikipedians
In 2004, it seemed that Simon and Garfunkel were at last going to get back together again. Do you think that there might be a lesson here for all fans of Wikipedia, in that this might be a portent of a future rapprochement between Jimmy Wales and Larry Sanger?ACEO 18:48, 16 August 2006 (UTC)

What are you talking about?--NewChampion (talk) 15:15, 17 February 2009 (UTC)

Jesus references in Mrs. Robinson??
What the heck is this topic even doing in discussion? It has nothing to do with anything on the actual page for S&G!

Wasn't Garfunkel Jewish? Why is he singing "Jesus loves you more" in the song "Mrs. Robinson" ?? Davez621 09:40, 15 September 2006 (UTC)

Thet's because the song is a soundtrack, and that it's made for the move "The Graduate". Anyways, Paul Simon, who wrote the song, never did much out of either his or Artie's jewish background. Then You might also wonder why Garfunkel has song "Oh come all ye faithful". As I said, their parents were jewish, but that does'nt mean that you can't sing about Jesus.

True, but name one Christian or Jewish artist who sings about Allah? Do you think any Christian artists sing about Hashem? (Norman Greenbaum is another example of a Jew who sang about Jesus in his song "Spirit in the Sky") Davez621
 * Another example is Leonard Cohen's Suzanne. Charlie MacKenzie 20:34, 17 September 2006 (UTC)


 * Don't forget Walking in Memphis by Jew Marc Cohn with the lyric "are you a Christian child/ma'am I am tonight."

I think it's rather commercial, all of it. Both Simon, Grafunkel and Cohn are Jewish, but it is and was Western people who are the customers of their music. If a christian artist would have to sing about that "Allah loves you", I suppose the lyric must be really intelligent to sell millions of albums. But as a Paul Simon fan, and the fact that he in my opinion allways set the writing in front of the money he earns from it,I must agree that the chorus in Mrs. Robinson is related to the movie The Graduate, and that's the only reason why Paul shoud mention it. But when S&G sang f.ex. "Go Tell it on the Mountain" on W.M.3p.m., that was in the start of their carriere, and THAT was a part of earning money. On the other side, "7 O'clock news/silent night" also is a "christian" song, but the radio in the background make the lyrics in the song rather paradoxial than a prayer.

Ok, but why is Courtney Love singing "Jesus loves you more than you will know" if she is Jewish too? I found an mp3 of the Simon & Garfunkel song "Mrs. Robinson" played by Courtney Love on the Internet.

Maybe because it's a nice song, and she wanted to sing it. She can't just remake the text, I suppose. Andd it's a well known fact that the "christian" lyrics in the song not is supposed to salvate anyone. The text is saying to Mrs. Robinson - the main character in the movie - that Jesus loves HER, mostly to cheer her up. And Mrs. Robinson is christian. The song isn't telling each and every listener on the planet that Jesus loves THEM.

If you wonder so much about the text in Mrs. Robinson, who is Did anyone ever stop to think that maybe it was an empty reference, or, given Mrs. Robinson's aldulterous ways, a slightly sardonic comment?

I keep reading people referring to The Graduate, and that this song was written for it. This is untrue. According to the insert booklet in the Old Friends 3-disc set, Simon was writing a song about Eleanor Roosevelt titled 'Mrs. Roosevelt', Mike Nichols asked if he would change it to Mrs. Robinson for the film.

Questions
It says "They met in high school in 1953," but in 1953 they would have been 11 or 12 years old. Also, further down, it says they had known each other since playing together as kids (and they grew up practically next door to each other). I'm no expert on them, so I don't have a correction to suggest.

Anyone ever noticed that by placing a finger horizontally on the picture of the 'Bridge over troubled waters' album cover, just covering Paul Simon’s eyebrows, Art Garfunkel magically grows a spiffing Cossack style moustache?

According to this entry, "Red Rubber Ball" reached #2 in the charts. According to The Cyrkle's entry, it reached #1. Which is correct?

"Twee"'s closest equivalent in North American English would be "cutesy", I'd say. It's peculiar to Britain, I think, and I only know what it means because I read their music press....It's a highly useful word, though. --Paul Drye

It's not only a British word. It's actually entered music jargon in the States and Britain: "twee pop" is a term commonly used to refer to deliberately cute indie pop. "Preciously cute" might be a better definition.

Surely the 'soaring vocals' on Bridge over Troubled Water are mainly Paul Simon's, not Art Garfunkel's?

Nope, that's Art. --LDC

How could you think that?--NewChampion (talk) 15:14, 17 February 2009 (UTC)

Wouldn't it be better if all these pages that are being developed to outline the discography of S&G were together on one page? Eclecticology

No.--NewChampion (talk) 15:14, 17 February 2009 (UTC)

"(Lewis had refused to lip-synch and insisted on performing live, which was unprecedented on Bandstand.)" Is this really relevant?

The Television content makes no mention of the Simon and Garfunkel television special, "Songs of America," which aired on November 30, 1969 and is still commercially available on DVD. You can find this summary on one of the sellers sites:

Controversial and rare TV show containing in-studio rehearsal and recording, road travel, political viewpoints, concert performances and video montages of key events of the 1960s.

The program was originally to be a "Bell Telephone" TV special but when they saw the finished product they said, "No!" When video images of JFK, RFK and MLK were shown while "Bridge Over Troubled Waters" played, the Bell Telephone people commented, "They're all democrats, why no republicans?" Simon & Garfunkel said, "Is that what you see? How about they were all assassinated?" S&G met with CBS and they sympathized with the content and agreed to air the program.

Songs include: "America," "So Long Frank Lloyd Wright," "Bridge Over Troubled Waters," "Scarborough Fair, " "El Condor Pasa (If I Could)," "Punky's Dilemma," "Mrs. Robinson," "Mystery Train," "Feeling Groovy," "The Boxer," "Homeward Bound," "Sounds Of Silence," and several others. --Db —Preceding unsigned comment added by 66.188.14.16 (talk) 15:39, 28 March 2011 (UTC)

Tom Graph
According to the article, so called because he was fond of tracking ("graphing") hits on the pop charts. Is this true? According to Paul Simon's biography by Laura Jackson, it was due to his interest in Mathmatics. He did have a Masters of Science in Mathematics, after all. Charlie MacKenzie 20:47, 17 September 2006 (UTC)

Scarborough Fair
The article states that Martin Carthy composed Scarborough Fair; in fact, it's a traditional English ballad, whose original author is unknown. S&G's version is credited to "Trad. arr. Simon/Garfunkel". Martan 00:58, 11 February 2007 (UTC)

If something is incorrect feel free to amend it yourself. I've removed that bit of Trivia which also implied that Dylan's "Girl from the North Country" was based on the S&G melody whereas it predates the S&G version. It is possible Dylan could have learned the song from Martin Carthy the same way Paul Simon did. S&G's version has always been credited to Simon / Garfunkel. Keithmall 09:50, 11 February 2007 (UTC)

Discography and singles chart on main article
Does anyone else think only their studio albums and possibly their Central Park album should be listed there? They have a discography page were their various compilation albums should be listed. -LoserTalent 06:40, 28 July 2007 (UTC)

Is it "&" or "And"?
Hi, A pretty useless question here, sorry for that: is it Simon & Garfunkel, or Simon And Garfunkel? I've looked at their album sleeves, and they're pretty undecided themselves: Wednesday Morning 3AM, Sounds of Silence, Bookends, Old Friends: Live on Stage and the 1999 compilation all use an ampersand; whilst Parsley..., Bridge..., Concert in Central Park and the 1972 compilation all use 'and'. I know it doesn't matter much, but which version is 'preferred'?

90.241.133.190 08:50, 26 September Dude, does it really matter?--NewChampion (talk) 15:12, 17 February 2009 (UTC)

Unverified and illogical claims

 * The section 'Reformation and success' mentions that:

'Among the tracks on The Paul Simon Songbook that were rerecorded with electric backing for Sounds of Silence were "I Am a Rock" ... "Leaves That Are Green", "April Come She Will", "A Most Peculiar Man", and "Kathy's Song".'

'Kathy's Song', 'April Come She Will' and (as most would argue) 'Leaves That Are Green' are NOT electrified in their Sounds of Silence versions.


 * Fair enough for the first two. "Leaves That Are Green," however, has SOME sort of electric musical instrument on the recording on Sounds of Silence, especially in the opening lead-in. Absecon 59 (talk) 05:39, 4 February 2008 (UTC)


 * The section 'First breakup' claims that the electrified 'Sounds of Silence' song was released as a single with "We've Got a Groovy Thing Goin'" as a b-side.

This sounds problematic at best. 'We've got a groovy thing' is a song the features electric guitars etc. When was that electrified? And on which recording was based? As far as I know, S&G did not record an acoustic version of the song prior to 1966, upon which the 'electrified' version could be based.

So, either 'We've got a groovy...' isn't the single's b-side, or either, the single was not released until Simon returned from Europe and recorded additional electric material with Garfunkel.


 * The box set Old Friends (1997) mentions its recording date as 5 April 1965, before the single was released in September 1965 (Columbia 4-43396). The version on the single is a mono mix of the same track that appeared in mono and stereo forms on Sounds of Silence. Simon apparently was back and forth between the USA and Europe in 1965, though he seems to have spent most of the year in the UK. Absecon 59 (talk) 05:39, 4 February 2008 (UTC)


 * Finally, the section 'Second breakup' claims that:

'The LP was originally supposed to feature twelve tracks, but a disagreement over the twelfth track ensued. Simon refused to record a Bach chorale track favored by Garfunkel. Garfunkel refused to record a song Simon had written called "Cuba Si, Nixon No". No middle ground was reached, so the album was released with only eleven songs.'

There is no reference for that claim. If we consider that S&G actually played 'Cuba si, Nixon no' at the June 1972 benefit concert at Madison Square Garden (bootleg recordings exist and verify that), then the claim that Garfunkel objected to the subject matter of the song is dubious.


 * I believe that Patrick Humphries' 1989 book, Paul Simon: Still Crazy After All These Years claims this, though I'm unsure of the exact page citations. Absecon 59 (talk) 05:39, 4 February 2008 (UTC)

Could someone please clarify these points? If this is not possible, then I suggest their deletion for the sake of accuracy. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 160.5.241.167 (talk) 00:38, 23 January 2008 (UTC)

I suggest you sign your posts.--NewChampion (talk) 15:18, 17 February 2009 (UTC)

Citations & References
See Footnotes for an explanation of how to generate footnotes using the  tags Nhl4hamilton (talk) 06:28, 3 February 2008 (UTC)

The 3rd link to the 500 rolling stone songs doesn't work Würdeichauchsosehen (talk) 05:32, 24 March 2011 (UTC)

Image copyright problem with Image:BridgeWater.jpg
The image Image:BridgeWater.jpg is used in this article under a claim of fair use, but it does not have an adequate explanation for why it meets the requirements for such images when used here. In particular, for each page the image is used on, it must have an explanation linking to that page which explains why it needs to be used on that page. Please check


 * That there is a non-free use rationale on the image's description page for the use in this article.
 * That this article is linked to from the image description page.

This is an automated notice by FairuseBot. For assistance on the image use policy, see Media copyright questions. --23:13, 16 May 2008 (UTC)

My Little Town
In the Subsequent careers section, it says "'My Little Town'... was the first and only new Simon and Garfunkel recording for over a decade, appearing on both Simon's and Garfunkel's solo albums released in 1975...." The way this is worded, it implies that it was the duo's first recording since 1965, which is obviously incorrect. I suspect the intended meaning was "would be the first and only recording for over a decade," i.e. until 1985, though I've never heard of this. Perhaps someone else can clarify. -- Gyrofrog (talk) 20:38, 12 December 2008 (UTC)

The Image sucks
Garfunkel is fucking creepy in that picture, change it for an album cover or something. They're supposed to be remembered as the handsome youngsters they were. 20:46, 28 September 2009 71.171.215.13 (talk)


 * I agree, but not for the same reason. It should be changed just purely because the picture is of a very low quality (very grainy and the angle is rubbish). Can anyone source another photo? Perhaps with their instruments/performing? andrewrox424  Bleep 07:38, 31 January 2010 (UTC)

Trivia
The Pop Culture section, here as in many music-related articles, is littered with references that are almost wholly without interest. Essentially, the section has become a grab-bag for anything and everything that has a remote connection with Simon & Garfunkel. I have added a Trivia template to the section to hopefully discourage other additions and encourage cleanup, though I don't really expect either of those things to happen.

If there are no objections over the next month, I plan to trim down and rewrite the section. As part of this, I intend to remove all references to songs, since the songs have their own Pop Culture sections. I presume, then, that most of this stuff is duplicated, but just in case, I will check one against the other, and if an item is notable enough, I'll move it from S&G's Pop Culture section to the song's corresponding section.

I'd appreciate hearing from other editors on this. Thanks. Allreet (talk) 20:52, 11 December 2009 (UTC)


 * I can't seem to see the Rock Profile Simon & Garfunkel parody in the trivia section, was this taken out? If not, I'll add it in.--ThePhantasos (talk) 22:57, 29 December 2009 (UTC)

← I didn't see this talk section until now, but I had noticed that the very poorly constructed trivia section had been completely removed. Since I think there should be a section here devoted to the impact they and their music have had on the popular culture, I went in and completely revamped it, making it more of a prose section organized by medium and somewhat by content internally. I don't agree that the song references should be removed - it is quite common to have material duplicated in the encyclopedia, and readers looking for information on the group should find it here, not have to suss out where it might be found in the song articles. I think this is a vast improvement over the original unconnected list of items, and gives us a structure within which to work. Tvoz / talk 21:00, 26 September 2010 (UTC)

Four of top five albums?
In the DVD about the making of "Bridge over Troubled Water", Paul Simon says that with the release of "Bookends" and "The Graduate" soundtrack, they had four of the top five albums. Is that correct (or did I misinterpret it or did he misspeak)? Bubba73 You talkin' to me? 23:41, 4 May 2011 (UTC)

Who does what?
The article lacks some basic information. What instruments did Simon and Garfunkel play? What other instruments feature on their records? Did Art contribute any original material, did he arrange any of the music? - Rob — Preceding unsigned comment added by 203.109.218.126 (talk) 08:46, 2 August 2012 (UTC)

I agree with the comment about lacking basic information. It may even be erroneous when it begins "Simon & Garfunkel were an American music duo consisting of singer-songwriters Paul Simon and Art Garfunkel." Looking at the wikipedia pages for several of their albums, I did not find any songwriting credits for Garfunkel. Awesley (talk) 12:19, 9 January 2013 (UTC)


 * Simon was certainly the guy writing the songs, as in laying down melodies and lyrics, but Garfunkel had considerable input as to where they would be going musically, the songs were written with his voice in mind as intended lead, and he and engineer Roy Halee had a very large input in production and arranging. Both guys have said at various points (in interviews, Simon for instance talking to Jon Landau in 1971/72 and Garfunkel in a long interview in 1990 - those were reprinted in a collection of journalism and documents spanning their career, and then Símon's solo career, fom the mid-60s into the early 90s, the title of that book now escapes me, something like The Guide to Paul Simon - as well as in the recent documentary film) that there was a three-way creative relationship where Garfunkel and Halee had almost equal power with Simon about what to do and how to do it. During the recording of their final studio album in 1969/70 that kind of partnership broke down repeatedly, there was a lot more fighting and unease over how to do things. Triggered, but hardly just caused by Garfunkel's long absence from NYC during the movie shoot. 83.254.151.33 (talk) 23:29, 26 May 2014 (UTC)

Alias
If the duo ever used the stage name or alias of "Tom and Jerry", which is what is currently in the infobox, I strongly suggest that it is referenced right there. Otherwise, it certainly appears to any outsider as possible vandalism. --Leahtwosaints (talk) 03:05, 7 January 2013 (UTC)


 * They consistently used that moniker during their early years as recording artists, but only back then; this is well attested by lots of books and articles about Paul Simon. Also, the music they did as Tom and Jerry had little to do with anything they would be doing from The Sounds of Silence on. Both of those points need to be stated much more clearly in the early part of the article (they vocally protested when their old label released an album of their Tom and Jerry stuff selling it as Simon and Garfunkel, after they had become known as serious musicians). In the meantime, I agree that sourcing the Tom and Jerry thing in the infobox is a good idea. 83.254.151.33 (talk) 23:50, 26 May 2014 (UTC)

Concert in Central Park attendance figures
I removed the following, as there's no citation for such an impressive claim:

. . . attracted more than 500,000 people, making it the 7th-most attended concert in the history of music.

zuky79 (talk) 04:30, 11 June 2014 (UTC)

There is, I added it from the Concert in Central Park article. It was a big concert... Woodywoodpeckerthe3rd (talk) 04:44, 11 June 2014 (UTC)

Adding Psychedelic folk to list of genres
Considering what artists are listed in List of psych folk artists, I sought to add this category here, but apparently we need some discussion. I'd insist that the music of Simon & Garfunkel quintessentially embodies this style and would like to hear some arguments against this addition. Of course, I understand that this is not merely a matter of opinion; on the other hand, I didn't see any articles calling them "worldbeat", either. Allusions to psychedelia in their sound as well as lyrics (think of "Feelin' Groovy", "Patterns", "Cloudy"...) are indeed rather conspicuous. Bstephens393 (talk) 19:46, 26 July 2013 (UTC)

Paul Simon as a "guitarist"
Show me reliable sources that back up your claim that Paul Simon is so noteworthy as a guitarist that it warrants mention in the very first sentence of this article. Your edit summary "to omit "guitarist" is to slight his musical talents" is in breach of WP:POV, "Simon is a guitarist, recognized more for his guitar skill than his voice" is original research and is also unsourced. If you wish to add that Paul Simon is so noteworthy as a guitarist, you will need to add a reliable source that says this.Echoedmyron (talk) 19:32, 7 August 2014 (UTC)