Patti Smith

As Patti Smith first got started, the punk revolution was underway. While the folk-rock tradition of Bob Dylan may have come to an abrupt end, the poets of the world were first starting to make themselves heard, following in the footsteps of artists like Lou Reed. She may have appreciated what Simon could do with his writing, but everything about Simon and Garfunkel repulsed her when she first heard it.

Despite covering the song ‘The Boy in the Bubble’, Smith was known to be absolutely crude when talking about Simon’s music, saying that she could be extremely negative about Simon and Garfunkel if she wanted to. “Paul Simon – I don’t even like Paul Simon,” she said. “I could be extremely negative about what I think about Simon & Garfunkel songs. I just don’t like them.”

The pair were able to make nice, though, eventually coming together when fellow rock legend and New York icon Lou Reed passed away. Still, any chance of Smith listening to songs like ‘The Boxer’ or ‘The Only Living Boy in New York’ in her free time is practically a pipe dream.

Joni Mitchell

In the world of modern songwriting, Joni Mitchell is one of the reigning queens of both lyrics and melody. Whereas many can write wonderful melodies with wretched lyrics underpinning everything, listening to any of Mitchell’s songs is the audible equivalent of looking at a beautiful painting, with every word falling exactly where it’s supposed to go. Mitchell may consider herself a poet as much as she is a musician, but she only saw Simon getting in the way of himself half the time.

While Simon was known to not even put himself in the top tier of his personal favourite songwriters, Mitchell thought that he was incredibly clumsy when writing his classics. “No. Paul Simon started piling up a lot of words, more than the bar could handle, and I stopped,” she declared with a laugh when asking about who she has influenced. “If that’s what it sounds like. I better cut that out. [Further laughter erupts.]”

Instead of finding a melody to fit the words, Mitchell found it incredibly tedious hearing Simon try to fill the verse with as many words as possible before moving on to whatever’s coming next. Most songwriters of Simon’s calibre are supposed to make you think after every line, but the only thing Mitchell hears when listening to him is absolute exhaustion.

Art Garfunkel

Ever wondered why a duo is so rare in pop and rock music? As much as bands might be able to come around all the time with multiple members working off each other, it’s always a more delicate situation when there are just two people in the equation. That leaves room to develop more ego, and Art Garfunkel was never exactly shy about the problems that he had when working with his old friend in the 1960s.

Despite Simon and Garfunkel soundtracking the greatest years of the 1960s, Bridge Over Troubled Water was where everything became fractured, with Simon taking control of the studio when Garfunkel began his film career. After nixing a lot of Simon’s wilder ideas, the entire album turned into a nightmare, leading to both of them parting ways to focus on working on their own solo projects.

Simon decided the duo should split in 1970 and later admitted: “At that point, I just wanted out”. Anything was possible for the pair, and it’s a decision that Garfunkel labelled as “very strange” when speaking to the Telegraph in 2015. He said: “I want to open up about this. I don’t want to say any anti-Paul Simon things, but it seems very perverse to not enjoy the glory. Crazy. What I would have done is take a rest from Paul, because he was getting on my nerves. The jokes had run dry”.

Garfunkel scathingly continued: “How can you walk away from this lucky place on top of the world, Paul? What’s going on with you, you idiot? How could you let that go, jerk?”. Both Simon and Garfunkel may be great working off each other, but by the time they became stars, the room probably got too big to house both of them.

Bob Dylan

Any self-respecting rock and roll fan is hardly ever going to say something negative about Bob Dylan. Compared to every other lyricist that came after him, Dylan was everything a songwriter was supposed to be, following in the tradition of Woody Guthrie by writing songs that reflected the views of the people. Simon could never hope to be on Dylan’s level, but that didn’t stop him from getting on Mr Zimmerman’s bad side.

When both songwriters came face to face on Bond Street in England, they famously were ice-cold towards each other, leading Dylan to intentionally scoff at Simon during one of his shows in England. Dylan slunk to the end of the bar with the critic Robert Shelton; as a hush descended and their set began, the songwriter started guffawing at what was supposed to be a spiritual moment. The band kept playing, cutting a vicious glance in his direction, but the laughter didn’t abate, and the whole room cringed en masse.

Even though Dylan would have no part in Simon’s music at the time, he did at least come around to one song, covering ‘The Boxer’ for his album Self Portrait. On the other hand, given how Dylan was intentionally trying to sabotage his career on this record, covering a Paul Simon song to get the job done may have been his way of musically twisting the knife.

John Lennon

With any kind of success, a fair bit of ego always comes. No one is going to get praise from the masses and not have a little bit of self-confidence, but it’s all about keeping that spirit in check. Simon does not have such a filter, and when he decided to step to one of the biggest names in music, John Lennon wasn’t looking to take the high road.

As Lennon entered his political phase with the song ‘Power to the People’, Simon’s comments about it sounding poor led to the former Beatle lashing out in the press. When bringing up every other plastic rock star he came across, Lennon would call Simon a “singing dwarf” compared to Dylan and Mick Jagger.

Since this was a post-primal-therapy-Lennon who had just gone through some of the most harrowing episodes of his life, there’s no telling what the ruthless Lennon would have gotten into had Simon critiqued him years before.