Jerry Douglas/Mumford & Sons "The Boxer"

This is a cover of the Simon & Garfunkel song "The Boxer" from the new Jerry Douglas album.

Douglas is a celebrated dobro player, and the album is chock-full of guest performers, who come in to sing and otherwise fill out the songs that feature his amazing slide/picking.

This track features the band Mumford & Sons, and yes, the distinctive vocals of Marcus Mumford are front and center.

The track is listed as "Jerry Douglas, featuring Mumford & Sons and Paul Simon."

Paul Simon?!?  Where?

Give a listen.  Can you pick out Simon's voice?  Or his guitar?

Is it a little weird to have an iconic legend like Paul Simon on a track, promote that he's on the track, but then relegate him to a place where his imprint doesn't register?

Or is he there and I don't hear it?


Hear the album version on Youtube.



Hear a live version of "The Boxer" on Youtube.

Stephen Kellogg & The Sixers "Gravity"

At what point does a song that references another song, lose you?

We live in a day and age of samples and remix and such, so the idea of one song sounding like another isn't especially foreign.

But in the singer-songwriter and rock world, if your song sounds too much like another tune, well, sometimes you're written off.

Or maybe, it's just that if you don't acknowledge the similarity, you're written off.

Because the melody rip-off worked well for The Old 97s, who openly admit the the melody of "Champaign Illinois" was lifted directly from Bob Dylan's "Desolation Row."

But people (radio programmers, at least) have been less forgiving on Stephen Kellogg And The Sixers' new song "Gravity," which seems to reference the Simon & Garfunkel tune "Cecilia" pretty directly.

So they did an interesting thing. They re-recorded Stephen's delivery for that one vocal hook. And traces of the original single have all but disappeared from Youtube, leaving only this new, less-"Cecilia"-like version.

Instead of going down, the notes go up, and it's changed enough that it doesn't sound like a rip-off.

Does it work?


You can hear the original vocal line at the 20 second mark on this promotional video.

Check out the 20 second mark on Youtube.

But now all the online videos have been replaced with the new version. You can hear the new hook at 25 seconds.

Hear the song on Youtube.

And check out "Cecilia" and "Gravity" right next to each other.

Hear the comparison on Youtube.


Hear the S&G original on Youtube.

Tom & Jerry "Hey Schoolgirl"

A compliment can go a long, long way. A really long way. 50-plus years long.

Just think about the story below. Then think about the kid (or co-worker, or friend, or parent) in your life, who could benefit from some simple, straightforward acknowledgement.

"(He) remembers the time his father first heard him singing to himself in his room, and peeked in: 'That's nice, (Son). You have a nice voice' . . . The compliment was enough to make (him) think he really might want to become a singer."

The boy? Paul Simon.

I was doing a little research, ahead of playing some Simon on the air, when I came across that story, found in Marc Eliot's "Paul Simon: A Life."

Simon turned 70 years old yesterday. He's one of our greatest living songwriters.

This early Simon & Garfunkel tune (when they were billed as Tom & Jerry) may not have indicated to the world that there was a legend in the making.

But a simple compliment from a trusted voice, made all the different.


Hear the song on Youtube.