Paul Simon - Graceland

I own a Paul Simon record. Given the 650-or-so records I've written about on here over the last seven years, this might seem like an outlier. On the other hand, there are so many Paul Simon records in existence it's only likely that one would end up in my collection; buy enough records, and one of them will eventually be by Paul Simon.

Throughout my 20's it seemed that a lot of people around me really loved Paul Simon. Near the start of that decade in my life, I bought this copy of Graceland in a charity shop in Canberra for AU$1, which was about 42p at the time. I'd already heard enough good things about it and you can't argue with that price. I think perhaps I was trying to seem a bit more eclectic in my music taste around then (regardless of whether I actually was or not). I definitely remember thinking that owning a Paul Simon record suggested I wasn't this one-dimensional character that only listened to modern rock bands, which it would have been easy to believe (in truth, I thought I was being pretty eclectic by loving an indie band like the Manics as much as I loved post-hardcore and metal, but such differences didn't seem to translate in the other hemisphere, where all of that was basically "rock").

Towards the end of my 20's, the love all my friends had for Paul Simon seemed to peak with him playing all of Graceland in Hyde Park as part of their series of summer shows; it says more that I didn't go with them, but went to see Soundgarden play two nights before in the same venue instead with Hugh and Holly (we also saw The Mars Volta for what would turn out to be the last time too). I'm sure I would have had a great time sitting in the sun with a huge group of friends watching Paul Simon play this album, but I definitely had a better time getting unnecessarily drunk, singing along and seeing Soundgarden live for the first time in my life. (Two years later we'd see Soundgarden play the same venue with Black Sabbath, Faith No More and Motorhead. Soundgarden decided that morning to play Superunknown in whole, and I had an even better time. I count myself very lucky to have seen Soundgarden twice, partly because the first time I was too drunk to really remember much in detail, other than having the time of my life.)

Here I am writing about Paul Simon and I still end up raving about a hard-rock band. Perhaps I am one-dimensional?

Anyway, I like this album. I can honestly say there is nothing else like it in my collection. I know very little about Simon and Garfunkel so can't say much about the important differences and cultural significance of this album. I'm sure countless other people have said it all much better than I ever could a million times anyway. Boy in the Middle is a great song, and the backing vocals on I Know What I Know catch me by surprise every time. The title track stays in your head for days and it's hard not to sing the chorus when thinking about the album. You Can Call Me Al was the one I knew best going into the album, a song that was surely littered over the radio when I was a kid. I once put it on a mixtape for a girl I was trying to impress - it was the only song she mentioned from it, so that was probably a sign it wasn't meant to be (again, trying to look eclectic and not one-dimensional!). It is a huge tune.

Format: 12"
Tracks: 12
Cost: £0.42 second hand
Bought: Charity shop, Canberra
When: 14/10/05
Colour: Black
Etching: none
mp3s: none

At the Drive-In - Relationship of Command

Relationship of Command is one of my all-time favourite records. I'm talking top-5 here, possibly even top-3 depending on how I'm feeling that day. From the second those pounding drums start at the beginning of Arcarsenal I know I'm going to spend the next 40 minutes smiling, foot-tapping and air-drumming away. I love it.

The first time the name At the Drive-In registered on my conscience was on a free cd on the cover of Kerrang! magazine - The Devil's Music Volume 2. The first volume in this series had been pretty influential for my friends and me (introducing us to Glassjaw, Pitchshifter, One Minute Silence and a whole load of other bands that we spent years listening to), and the second one had a couple of gems, albeit mostly songs by bands that we'd soon be embarrassed to say we liked. The two exceptions to this were Cosmonaut by At the Drive-In and Tension Head by Queens of the Stone Age (which remains to be my favourite QOTSA song). I got the cd just before a family holiday to France and spent many hours in the car with my sister's Walkman listening to those two in particular.

Somehow four whole years passed before I got a copy of Relationship of Command. I certainly heard the album more than once in that time, and even had tickets to see them on a tour that eventually never happened (they were due to play the Pyramids Center in Portsmouth on the evening of my last GCSE - IT, I think - but cancelled and broke up. Needless to say, I was pretty gutted but the show in London last summer pretty much made up for it). Anyway, Christmas 2004 my sister bought me the Fearless Records cd-reissue of Relationship (with the bonus track Extracurricular) and it quickly became a favourite of mine. I think I asked for a copy from her as a present having been reminded how much I liked them on the live Jools Holland dvd - my friend Matt had a copy and their performance of One Armed Scissor was incredible.

A year and a half later I moved to Australia for a year and my first task upon arriving in Canberra was to scope out the local record shops. Canberra had a couple - the national chain JB-Hifi and an independent (excellently) named Land Speed Records. In my first few weeks I bought a bunch of cds and one LP - this copy of Relationship of Command. The selection of vinyl in both shops was pretty impressive, but even still I was surprised to see a copy of Relationship given that the original cd had long gone out of print. At AU$18, it seemed a bit pricey, but it £'s it was a bargain (the exchange rate made things seem really expensive, which was good at stopping me from buying things unless I really wanted them). I didn't have a record player for the first few months, so it just looked pretty on my shelf while I listened to the mp3s.

So, what's to say about the album itself? It's incredible and I can't think of a post-hardcore album that comes anyway near close to it. All of the songs are great (One Armed Scissor, Invalid Letter Dept. and Cosmonaut being particular highlights) and the whole record is littered with these fantastic little moments, like the drums I mentioned on Arcarsenal, the handclaps on Enfilade or the raspy vocals on Quarantined. One of the things I always loved was that despite the huge songs along the way, I was always left with the closer Catacombs in my head and I'd be singing the huge chorus to myself for days. A lot of records don't end well, but this one saves a punch for last. The energy of the music is unstoppable and it still sounds to me as exciting as it did all those years ago, despite being nearly a teenager itself.

I got into At the Drive-in slowly over the years that followed that Christmas, picking up the other albums as and when I found them. The whole back-catalogue is being re-printed it seems, allowing me to get Vaya and In/Casino/Out on vinyl (a post on the latter in due course). Acrobatic Tenement and Relationship reissues are due out this spring apparently and I'll definitely be picking up a copy of the former. Musically, I enjoyed the other albums and they had some excellent songs but, for me at least, it's all about Relationship of Command.


Format: 12", picture sleeve
Tracks: 12
Cost: £7.61 new
Bought: JB-Hifi, Canberra
When: 16/07/05
Colour: Black
Etching: none
mp3s: no