Simon and Garfunkel - Parsley, Sage, Rosemary and Thyme (1966), 4/10

Simon and Garfunkel produced plenty of good music. They also produced a substantial number of poorly written and arranged songs, several of which are on this overly acclaimed album. The obviously well written and executed songs such as “Scarborough Fair / Canticle”, “Homeward Bound”, and “The 59th Street Bridge Song” are surrounded by awful songs such as “The Big Bright Green Pleasure Machine” or the two closing tracks, the final track hardly providing anything artistically interesting. There is also a significant amount of unnecessarily indulgent pretentiousness in the lyrics of “The Dangling Conversation” or the goofy but unsuccessful Bob Dylan pastiche “A Simple Desultory Philippic”. Perhaps the melodramatic arrangements were and continue to be appealing to the masses, but their lack of musically interesting or meaningfully introspective lyrics becomes more and more disappointing as the record continues to offer hardly anything outside of a few pop hits, though these hits are outstanding in their quality of composition and musicianship. The duo recorded better albums and there would be a serious improvement in folk music after this stage in its development, yet the material they satirize is ironically far more interesting and better arranged than anything these two could offer. Art Garfunkel puts his personality fully on display, an unapologetic but very subjectively questionable artistic choice that makes this album surprisingly divisive. Paul Simon’s approach to songwriting is simultaneously solid at times and downright inane or senseless at others, making the album experience jagged and inconsistent at best.