The reason that prompted Paul Simon to share a new piece of music with humanity is somewhat mundane. Although we think he retired after the 2018 Farewell tour, a seemingly coincidental event precipitated such a record encore: a dream that, as the musician explains, spent one night and prompted him to write extensively in various and consecutive early periods. in the morning
The seven psalms seem to be an artifact drawn from beyond earthly boundaries, from visions in the sleeping abyss, and from the spiritual consciousness that has always circulated Simon’s work since the days of Miss Robinson (“Heaven holds a place for those who pray”). It is a disc of seven songs of praise or supplication (these and nothing else are psalms) linked in a 33-minute loop that begins with the Lord (“The Lord is my engineer”), a divine dedication to God. / God is the land I ride”) and ends with an “amen”, mentioning the child figure and a useful eternity prophecy: “The sky is beautiful / almost homey / Children! Get ready / Time to go home.
dialogue between cows
Wrapping these lines in a transcendent perspective, a Paul Simon is minimized at the age of 81 in his weak but clear voice, guitars and dobro. He plays the strings with neat virtuosity, in an impressionistic fingering mode, and plays percussion with exotic gong and gamelan accents, along with the occasional flute, cello, and that type of lute called theorbo. Songs with balsamic features that shift chorus sketches and remnants of blues and folk: I have a professional view that Simon ironically makes the conversation between two geeks evoke a social networking dialogue.
The censoring gaze is evident in Trail of volcanoes, where it observes “the trail of volcanoes” and “refugee eruption” and concludes that “damage done / little / undoable”. These psalms aren’t angry, however, they convey a calming spirit, if possible a little more nourishing, with the voice of his wife (31-year-old) Edie Brickell in the last two tracks.
With all this, the Seven Psalms, whose cover belongs to the American landscape painter Thomas Moran, leaves a trail of inner peace beyond the implied ghosts, and while it may seem on the verge of its final resting place, it is not at all. all ominous but highly sensitive and reassuring. In the watchtower of his days, seven years after his last installment (Stranger to stranger, 2016), Paul Simon offers new and purifying songs as God appeared to him in a dream and wanted them.