Simon & Garfunkel Album: “Live from New York City, 1967”

Having been a long-time Simon & Garfunkel fan, the best thing about "Live From New York City, 1967" is that there are only (3) instruments on this CD - Paul's voice, Art's voice, and Paul's acoustic guitar. The vocal and guitar sound quality is outstanding.

The only live S & G performances I had ever seen/heard was the "Concert in Central Park". While the music was good, the tension between the duo was very evident. This live CD gives insight into what a Simon & Garfunkel concert was like in the early days - the stage banter reminds me of a very small music club setting.

If you are a Simon & Garfunkel fan or merely enjoy good folk music, "Live From New York City, 1967" is definitely worth listening to!

As a longtime S&G fan and owner of several live recordings from 1967 to 1969 (many of which are officially unreleased), I figured if this disk was blessed and sanctioned by the masters themselves, it must be about the best in the vault. Well, about 1/4th the way through it, I realized I'd apparently erred. Not to say it's a lousy performance: It just sounds very flat and lackadaisical compared with other S&G concert performances. Five songs from this show are available on the "Old Friends" boxed set--including "Red Rubber Ball," not on this cd for whatever reason)--and as it turns out those songs are played and sung with the most spirit and gusto of the bunch (particularly "A Church Is Burning," maybe the cream of the crop.) Yes, you'll get a few songs here that are difficult to find any other live versions of, but the only standouts of that group are "The Dangling Conversation" and "A Hazy Shade Of Winter," the latter being the duo's most recent hit at the time--so they likely weren't yet tired of singing it. Also, sometimes the key in which a song is played can make a difference: In the duo's performance at the legendary Monterey Pop Festival just five months after this concert, "Benedictus" and "For Emily, Wherever I May Find Her" were played and sung in a higher key than they are in this New York show--and I prefer the Monterey versions. I cannot, in good conscience, rate this cd lower than 3 stars--simply on the strength of the songs and the performers, but collectively, this is a pretty flat, going-through-the-motions performance. The 12-string guitar sounds OK, but when Paul is playing 6-string, the guitar and microphone sound like they're separated by a beach towel! If S&G and Sony were out to counter the bootleggers with this show, I'm afraid they came up a megabytes short. My alternative suggestion to those of you considering purchasing this cd is the following: First, get the "Old Friends" box if you don't already own it, for along with all the other excellent material contained therein (including two studio cuts "The Complete Columbia Studio Recordings" does not have), it boasts ten live cuts total--all very good! Then track down the seven tracks from S&G's set at the Monterey Festival which were allowed out of Lou Adler's vault for a great 1988 radio special and subsequently bootlegged. Finally, track down the widely bootlegged November 1969 performance at Miami (of Ohio) University. There's more out there, but those three sources will give you a sufficient serving of S&G performing live and on the very top of their individual' and collective game.

Four elements make up this classic live recording: Paul Simon, Art Garfunkel, an acoustic guitar and an enthusiastic audience. As the liner notes state, seats were set up on stage behind the duo to allow for more people. Thus, the concert sounds very intimate, particularly when Paul and Art talk to the audience between songs. For example, Art goes into a lengthy discussion of taking pictures for their first album cover. Hundreds of pictures were taken of them in a New York subway, standing in front of a wall as subway trains speed by. It wasn't until the photo session was over that they finally noticed what was written on the subway wall. According to Art, it was "the old, familiar suggestion." This elicits laughter and applause. He goes on to explain how a couple of years later Paul's recollection of the incident inspired him to write the song "A Poem On The Underground Wall." Their moving performance of that song is a highlight of this concert.

I especially enjoyed their live version of "A Hazy Shade Of Winter." With only the acoustic guitar for accompaniment, the song took on a folk-rock feel missing in its studio version. A real rarity is their performance of "You Don't Know Where Your Interest Lies." Only available as a single B-side, the studio version was finally included in the "Old Friends" box set. Another rare song in the box set is a live version of Paul's song "Red Rubber Ball," which was taken from the same 1967 concert. Why Columbia Records chose not to add it to this CD is a mystery to me, since there was plenty of time left to include it. For that matter, I can't understand why it took them 35 years to release this CD. Whatever the reasons, I'm very glad they remastered the recording and released this CD. Like a bottle of fine wine, this intimate concert recording has improved with age. Savor every minute of it!

Though a few of these tracks appeared on the 1997 Old Friends box set, it wasn't until 2002 that the bulk of this 1967 concert was made commercially available. Bootlegs of mid-60s S&G shows have circulated for years, but this is the first artist-and-label endorsed package, and it's about as fine a document of the era as one could hope for. The song selection includes the obvious hits, well-picked album tracks (e.g., "Leaves That Are Green") and a pair of obscurities ("A Church is Burning," from Simon's pre-S&G solo album, and a 1967 B-side, "You Don't Know Where Your Interest Lies"). The range of material that the duo had racked up by this point in their career, from charged social statements ("The Sound of Silence") to angry, introspective observations ("I Am a Rock") and jangly-pop ("The 59th Street Bridge Song (Feelin' Groovy)"), was (and remains) truly impressive.

Even more interesting is that the entire concert was recorded without additional accompaniment: Garfunkel sings and Simon sings and plays acoustic guitar. Their stripped-down (or, more accurately, not-built-up-and-electrified) arrangements of tunes from "The Sound of Silence" LP, as well as later songs like "A Hazy Shade of Winter," are both disconcerting and impressive. Simon's qualities as a guitar player were no secret by this point in his career (having been featured on the duo's albums), but his talent and feel as a live performer shows off an added dimension. The bent, plucked notes of "Blessed," the signature introductory lick of "Homeward Bound," and the instrumental run through Davey Graham's "Anji" are just some of the highlights.

This is a pitch-perfect document of folk-rock legends in their prime, capturing not only their artistry, but the freedom and intensity of the times itself. The recording and performance are both crisp and present - a must-have for all S&G fans.

On January 22, 1967, two men and a single guitar drew a sold-out crowd to Philharmonic Hall (now Avery Fisher Hall) in Lincoln Center for what's now one of the best-known concerts from Simon and Garfunkel's career together. In fact, this and the post-duo Concert in Central Park are the only performances you can hear without resorting to bootlegs, and the fact that this one took place mid-career is something special.

The tension present in the 1981 concert in Central Park isn't in this recording; this is from before artistic differences and career choices got the better of their friendship.

This is from the heat of the moment, a set list straight from the era rather than constructed in retrospect, a collection of now-obscure album tracks that audiences of the mid-60s would have recognized, and brand new songs from an album and a single the group had released only two months earlier (Parsley, Sage, Rosemary, and Thyme and "A Hazy Shade Of Winter"), and songs that weren't fully formed yet ("You Don't Know Where Your Interest Lies").

This is about two 24-year-olds in cable knit sweaters with more confidence and stage presence than their ages should allow.

My copy of Live From New York City, 1967 is in the limited edition packaging, with a prismatic background replacing the white areas of the black-and-white package art and text, and the insert glued to the inside of the heavy, fingerprint-prone cardboard cover. The album's liner notes are exceptional and include a few nice black-and-white photos. Opening the case for the first time seals the deal as you see the black CD with their names printed in white, and the ampersand and the album name in the silver of the CD itself. The presentation is very understated and elegant.

Early in the concert, we're treated to an awfully clear, sincere version of "Sparrow," followed by an especially gentle "Homeward Bound." A little further along, they enunciate everything really nicely in "The Dangling Conversation," and actually in quite a lot of things - it seems to happen more frequently in live performances than in album cuts.

I know I gush over "Anji" in reviews every chance I get, so bear with me, but it's a nice chance to concentrate on just the guitar, the only instrument present aside from their voices. And it's a beautiful rendition, too. "I Am A Rock" also sounds really nice here, though I can't quite put my finger on why.

In the home stretch, it's almost like we're back in Wednesday Morning, 3 a.m. again with an acoustic guitar version of "The Sound Of Silence." This brings it to something like five or six distinct versions of the song, and I still hold that the acoustic versions are much better than the more popular "rockified" version from Sounds Of Silence. The best part of this particular performance of it is that the guitar doesn't get lost under the voices as it does in the original; the rock version has an influence on how strongly and loudly Paul plays his guitar, so the strong beats and loud melody and chords are there (note especially the end of the last verse, during "the words of the prophets are written on the subway walls") without having to put up with electric guitar and drums.

What's great is that the boys give commentary on some of the songs, often concerning what sparked Paul to write certain songs. I love commentary, as it's not something you get from normal albums.

Paul introduces an early version of "You Don't Know Where Your Interest Lies" with "Here's a song I've almost finished." The crowd responds to the song with polite but unenthusiastic applause. It doesn't contain the "Indications indicate" interlude that it later took on, but it's of note because it's the only song at the concert that no one would have heard before. "A Hazy Shade Of Winter" didn't appear on an album until over a year later, but the single was released in early November 1967 and had only recently fallen off the Billboard charts, so it's a sure bet people had already heard it.

Art tells the story of Wednesday Morning, 3 a.m.'s cover art as a lead-in to "A Poem On The Underground Wall." It's a funny story, and it's weird to think that a good chunk of the audience probably was familiar with that picture. Art's vocal falterings as he speaks ("um," "ah") and the laughter of the audience at all the right places are great reminders of the high level of intimacy between the performers and the audience on this occasion.

Art talks about the time put into writing and recording "The Dangling Conversation," and he also remarks that "The Dangling Conversation" was their favorite song in their repertoire at the time. Almost two years later, in October 1968, he said that "Overs" (from Bookends) had been his "favorite song for quite some time." It's interesting, because the two songs are actually quite similar thematically - beautiful but sad, dealing with stagnation in relationships that you want desperately not to stagnate.

Near the end, as the audience shouts for more, Paul smiles and says, "Just a little kid, you cannot yell like that at me." Then, with true childlike glee, he responds to an audience member's request with a delighted "'Hey, Schoolgirl!' Who said that?" before launching into "For Emily, Whenever I May Find Her," performed to angelic perfection in a solo by Art.

Despite the absence of "Red Rubber Ball," this is a once-in-a-lifetime thing. It's the only full-length live recording in the S&G published canon that's from any point during their career. It's a great experience and a rare treat - definitely worth listening to.

(original review by Andrea L. Robinson)