Feelin' Groovy

I'm seldom impressed when I go to see a gig. I don't know what it is, but I think I'm just very hard to please. My friends Robbie & Natalie always tease me about my standard review of bands I'll go and see at Glastonbury. "It was alright," becomes my stock response. And I think that can be applied to most musical performances. Unless something special happens - or if you have your head buried in the sand to the degree that you have no frame of reference - it's just very hard to be hit for six.

So it's with great pleasure that I can report one of these rare occasions. On Sunday, I was honoured to be able to see Simon & Garfunkel live in concert. They're not even touring! They're just doing a few dates in Australia and New Zealand for shits and giggles. Presumably so Art Garfunkel can scope out the competition for opening a chain of steak restaurants in the Australasian market and so Paul Simon can go to the open casting calls for the new Hobbit films.

I always see photographs of them on stage, with an acoustic guitar draped around Paul Simon, and I always wonder whether he's actually playing it or whether it's just for show. Mystery over - he's a freakin' genius. Although they were backed by a very proficient band, the songs that they performed alone with just their voices and the acoustic guitar really showcased his guitar playing.

They played practically all of their sixties singles - even throwing in my own favourite S&G song The Only Living Boy In New York, and my one of my favourite Simon tracks from his solo career, Me And Julio Down By The Schoolyard. Halfway through they each played a short solo section, so after sitting through Art Garfunkel bringing back bad memories about bunny rabbits with Bright Eyes, Paul Simon walked on stage and an African musician on an accordion played the intro to The Boy In The Bubble - the opening song off the Graceland album. Fantastic - and I was officially hit for six.

Even their band amazed me. Their lead guitarist managed - in the instrumental section of Hazy Shade Of Winter - to play a backwards guitar solo. This was previously impossible without the aid of a time-travelling device so presumably somebody has invented a new guitar pedal. Bit of a shame really - as now truly everything The Beatles recorded in the studio can be fully reproduced on stage.

Anyway, I'm going to stop gushing now.