Went to see the inimitable Paul Simon at the Wembley Arena on Friday night, and despite having possibly the worst seats in the house (far back right), it was still an amazing concert. I don’t know much of his stuff after the prodigious Graceland (which won real South African ethnic artistes Ladysmith Black Mambazo a Grammy), but the little yiddish geezer really ripped through one helluva set. At first glance, we weren’t expecting much from the large, predominantly, um, mature crowd, but after only 40 minutes or so a sizeable mob forced its way through the entirely seated Arena to the front (much to the obvious chagrin of the toffs who’d forked out some serious Sterling for front row tickets). Paul kept the vibe ticking over with classics like Diamonds On The Souls Of Her Shoes, Graceland, You Can Call Me Al, 50 Ways To Leave Your Lover, Slip Slidin’ Away and Me And Julio Down By The Schoolyard.
It was great and the crusty crowd were up for it. They positively swallowed him up.
To top things off, Paul pulled out numerous ditties from “that era” when he and fomer-girlfriend Art Garfunkel were still very much into each other. Course, Paul isn’t blessed with the angelic falsetto of the curly-mopped Garfunkel, but his voice is still surpringly supple given his age. We were treated to classics like Cecilia, Mrs Robinson, The Loneliest Boy in New York and Bridge Over Troubled Water. I had goosebumps all over my body. It was marvellous!
After two rousing encores, we pulled a sneaky duck to try and beat the hordes to Wembley Park station, only to discover yesterday that we had missed an unprecedented third encore in which el Paulio had cranked out a finale including Homeward Bound and The Boxer, two of the greatest Simon & Garfunkel songs ever. I was a little upset – I love The Boxer. It makes me weepy.
All in all, a fantastic way to kick of the weekend. I can thank the Sringboks for ruining the rest of it, however. Although The Puzzle in Earlsfield rocked quite hard last night anyways.
I can’t say that I’m really looking forward to next Saturday when rugby’s two biggest losers get together to mud wrestle over a big, fucking wooden spoon. I’m getting bored of losing.