Paul Simon
Surprise

THE REVIEW

For forty years now, the name Paul Simon has evoked echoes of songs that have rightfully entered the collective imagination as a pleasant succession of refrains, music, and lyrics that have marked the simple story of a contemporary songwriter from across the ocean. And for those who have had the pleasure of listening to these songs, sometimes of extraordinary beauty.

It's no secret that Simon had recently reached a challenging point in his career, which at sixty-four seemed to be showing signs of faltering. Then, thanks to a providential, albeit occasional and in some respects bizarre convergence, Simon came into contact with the "wizard" Eno with whom he managed to overcome the state of "impasse".

As someone observed before me, it is surprising how Simon sings in "Surprise" with his natural and still crystal-clear voice, as if around him there is still the usual background of mostly exclusively acoustic instruments, whereas Eno has woven his "Sonic Landscapes" with "discreetly ethnic" aromas and flavors or, in any case, with a hint of "world music".

The songs, already airy in writing, reach climates of varying intensity, even rhythmic, suggesting a Simon who is confident and, in my opinion, convincing, about the goodness of the project. There are 11 songs in which Simon's traditional lyricism meets the imaginative electronic details of Brian Eno in an unexpected and at times thrilling creative phenomenon due to the harmonic effects that ensue.

If we then add that musicians of indisputable talent like Steve Gadd, Bill Frisell, or Gil Goldstein have been chosen, it will not be difficult to understand how all the pieces seem to fit together. Simon, in fact, is not new to the many and varied possibilities of contaminations. Already "Graceland" or "Rhythm Of the Saints" sounded in this direction; after six years of silence, when already a thousand doubts were looming over the songwriter's future, Simon however managed to dispel them in a simple way: by letting himself be enveloped by climates unusual and curious for him.