Still Lazy After All These Years

Retrospectives are cop-outs. A clever marketing ploy for lazy listeners, retrospectives always promise more than their slick packaging and fawning liner notes can deliver. But despite their shallowness, listeners flock to them. Led Zeppelin's pricey three CD Remasters set was so successful that guitarist Jimmy Page scrambled back to the studio to re-master the rest of their songs. Artists as varied as the Beatles, Los Lobos, and Prince have all recently repackaged their hits and rarities for posterity.

The best retrospectives come in two distinct categories: releases that the artist was painstakingly involved with during the selection and remastering of tracks (as in Paul Simon's 1964/1993), or retrospectives that collect the standout songs from fluff-filled careers, sometimes with a few unreleased tracks or B sides thrown in. This second type of retrospective is just an evolved form of the greatest hits collection and, when used for hits-oriented groups like Foreigner or ABBA, is truly a humanitarian service. Fans of "hit and run" bands like these number in the millions, and all but the most diehard fools are glad to put the days of sorting through dreary uneven albums behind them. We all have our "wish list" of bands whom we pray will someday put out such a greatest hits collection and spare us the suffering (take note Tom Petty!)

The retrospective can serve as the light at the end of a long artistic tunnel, but convenience almost always carries a cost. In the case of the Beatles 1962-1966 and 1967-70, that cost is high indeed. Originally released in 1973, these two separate, newly-re-mastered greatest hits packages (widely known as "the red" and "the blue" albums) are a butcher job. For lesser artists - such as sadly, Paul McCartney himself - four CDS would be more than enough to encompass the staying power ("I Saw Her Standing There").

Despite these serious flaws, 1962-66 and 1967-70 are still a pleasure. In a few hours' listening time, they document the most extraordinary musical evolution in modern rock. From the fresh-faced innocence of the "She Loves You" era to the mind-expanding "Strawberry Fields Forever" years, right up until the final, bitter throes that spawned "Let It Be" and "The Long and Winding Road," 1962-1970 documents not done, but a series of cultural revolutions.

The song topics are not always timeless, but the bulk of the material sounds amazingly vital. Early red album tracks sound the most dated - although in the age of AIDS, the wholesomeness of songs like "I Want To Hold Your Hand" have an unexpected safe-sex dimension. But no matter how heartfelt these pre-sexual revolution, open-hearted love songs once were, they now fall on jaded modern ears. The first disc is thus a bit monotonous, but it closes with "Yesterday," a stunning reminder of Paul McCartney's genius. We're so used to thinking of McCartney as a middle-aged "Ebony and Ivory" sap that we forget his original power. Throughout the red and the blue albums, Paul pulls his weight and more. His "Eleanor Rigby" may well be the greatest moment on the red album.

Recent press information confirms all the disillusioning rumors we've ever heard: the Beatles wrote virtually all their songs separately; the "Lennon-McCartney" credit on most of them is a blatant lie. Excepting only their earliest days, the rule was that Paul wrote the song and sang it himself, or else John did the same. Happily, though, there's no getting away from the romantic reality: the Beatles were a band, far greater than the sum of their parts. The foursome's largely dismal solo efforts - only Lennon created significant work after their breakup - is easy evidence for this "group chemistry" argument, but the best proof is the songs themselves. Lennon and McCartney tempered and sparked each other; their clashing temperaments drove them to great collaborative heights ("A Day in The Life"). Compared to songs like "Norwegian Wood," "Paperback Writer," "Revolution," and "Hey Jude," even the very best of the pair's solo work does not age well.

One solo performer who has maintained his dignity is Paul Simon. His new three CD set, 1964/1993, is a testament to artistic perseverance and reinvention. While most of Simon's very best work does stem from his early and most famous period, Simon and Garfunkel's songs had a limited cultural range and enough serious drawbacks to leave plenty of room for fruitful solo endeavors. I disagree with those who contend that Simon's finest work was done as a solo artist, but 1964/1993 certainly lends credibility to this argument. Unquestionably, Simon should be lauded for leaving the overblown orchestration and intellectual pretensions of Simon and Garfunkel behind him.

Of course, Simon has never totally shaken his homegrown New York neuroses - even his historic jaunts across continents and cultures haven't really altered his thirtysomething lyrical tendencies. But in Simon's defense, as 1964/1993 amply demonstrates, he has learned how to restrain the clunky namedropping ("A Simple Desultory Philippic") and abstract phraseology ("The Dangling Conversation") that tainted his earlier work and earned him the same kind of critical scorn that a brainier version of Meatloaf would have received.

All phases of Simon's work are well represented on 1964/1993. Because Simon played a pivotal role in the selection of the tracks and the content of the liner notes, the new set provides considerable insight into his creative development. To supplement this carefully chosen collection of studio hits, obscure gems, and strong live cuts, Simon has included several rare tracks to satisfy the connoisseurs.

The most fascinating of these is a fledgling version of "Bridge Over Troubled Water" before it was Garfunkeled into legend. This is the one Simon and Garfunkel song people tend to think of as Art Garfunkel's - any why not give it to him? Simon's voice is a very good one, but Garfunkel's gave "Bridge" the soaring dimension necessary for it to reach its grandiose peak - a peak so high that Garfunkel has never bothered to climb one since. When Art recently sang the song on David Letterman, no one was thinking about Paul Simon. "The Bridge Over Troubled Water" demo, Simon's tentative plucking and straining voice notwithstanding, reminds us who was the genius and who the sidekick.

But perhaps sidekick is unfair. Either that, or we are forced into the absurd idea that Paul Simon just happened to write his greatest songs when Art Garfunkel was hanging around. The first CD is dominated by the eight Simon and Garfunkel tracks. Despite the pair's aforementioned flaws, enduring classics like "America," "Bridge Over Troubled Water," and "The Sound of Silence" cast a massive shadow over the strong Simon solo tracks that end the first CD. True, Simon's solo albums have been much less erratic than his Simon and Garfunkel efforts, but he'll also never write a song as good as "The Boxer" again. Roy Halee, who engineered all of their work up until "The Boxer," still refers to the song as "one of the best records every made."

If Simon and Garfunkel songs are the only Simon compositions that will be around fifty years from now, it will do his long career a real disservice, especially his unsung middle years. Before he exploded back into platinum status with his watershed Graceland release in 1983, Simon went through more than a decade of prolific and overlooked years. As far as Simon is concerned, a main purpose of this new set is to give his middle years the higher profile they deserve.

While not as lasting as his early work or as culturally important as his most recent, Simon's mid-period songs encompass an enormous range of styles. Every genre from gospel ("Loves Me Like a Rock") to lullaby ("St. Judy's Comet") to mild-mannered rap ("50 Ways to Leave Your Lover") is integrated into his style with equal effectiveness. The best-known songs from these years are "50 Ways," "Slip Slidin' Away," "Late in the Evening," and "Still Crazy After All These Years," (a 1991 live-from-Germany version is included here) but lesser known songs like "American Tune" and "Peace Like A River" demonstrate the depths of Simon's songwriting ability and his talent for poetic social commentary.

The famous Graceland material presides over disc three - seven of the album's songs are included on 1964/1993. The controversy that erupted over Simon's use of South African musicians during an international trade embargo is now a matter of record, but while the debate has faded, the worldwide popularity of Simon's remarkable musical-cultural fusion remains. On 1990's The Rhythm of the Saints, Simon drew his songwriting inspiration from South America, but with the exception of "The Obvious Child," the Brazilian-twinged cuts of 1964/1993 sound contrived. Unlike its jubilant South African predecessor, The Rhythm of the Saints comes off more like anthropology than collaboration.

1964/1993 closes on another high point with three solid cuts from Simon's solo Concert in Central Park (1991). The most powerful of the three is a subtle re-working of "The Sound of Silence." Instead of just playing the perfunctory standard, Simon has allowed the song to age, injecting it with new life by letting it sound old. By sparing us a vain attempt to relive his past, Simon haunts us with the present. "The Sound of Silence" has been too often dismissed as a Dylan ripoff. Ripoff or not, this restless version stands firm against anything Dylan himself has released and gives needed closure to an expansive CD set.

The question for savvy consumers remains: is it worth investing in these discs purely for their "digitally re-mastered" sound quality? The answer is a qualified no. Re-mastered CDS have been accused of having a canned quality; purists tend to harbor personal cravings for the nostalgic cracks and pops of their trusty vinyl. Because of the rare tracks and the vast scope of Simon's 1964/1993, this particular product has other benefits beyond sound quality. As for the Beatles, since the same song listing has been available for twenty years on vinyl, the purchase has less appeal. But on the Beatles 1962-66 CD, five songs do make their stereo debut, and even purists don't usually knock stereo sound.

Just so long as the worth of the original albums is not forgotten, retrospectives like these can serve a purpose. However, if you are prone to sentiment, beware these kinds of purchases. Nostalgia can be an expensive habit.

Jon Reed