The 1969 song Paul Simon never tired of: “I loved it”
Was 1969 the greatest year in music history?
There are a lot of albums that certainly suggest that being the case. How about The Beatles’ magnum opus Abbey Road, or Led Zeppelin’s emphatic debut and sophomore records? They had full bloody rock and roll covered while folk booming under the skyscrapers of New York and soft rock basking in the glorious sunshine of California and Laurel Canyon.
It was the year when counterculture had quite simply boomed and it felt as though the movement would sweep the globe and paint a bright new future. Music was the nuclear weapon that would enact that takeover, and there were plenty of suitors to choose from.
But of all the great icons of that time, it was the one year fans had to wait for Paul Simon. After Simon and Garfunkel released Bookends in ‘68, they took the much-needed year to craft their masterpiece Bridge Over Troubled Water, which by all metrics, both commercial and cultural, was the album of ‘70.
Simon undoubtedly garnered influence from all over the world during that time, for the inspiration was inescapable. The two aforementioned bands were leading the way in that regard, but that’s not even including the everpresence of Bob Dylan and Joni Mitchell, who were as active as ever at the end of the ‘60s.
But in a bid to achieve difference, Simon proverbially packed up his gear and moved further afield, away from the Western influence that threatens musicians into turning in copycat albums that created a homogenised classic rock landscape. Simon wanted to inject something new into his music, something that hadn’t been heard elsewhere, and so took his melodies to South America.
It was during a ‘69 tour to Paris that Simon engaged in a week-long residency at a theatre in Paris along with the South American group Los Incas. While playing with the band, Simon stumbled on an Andean folk melody that the band were playing called ‘Paso Del Condor’, which then made up the basis of his own Bridge Over Troubled Water track.
At that time, it was the greatest thing Simon heard in ‘69, forming his favourite piece of music that he was ultimately lucky enough to take and make his own. He explained, “I used to hang around every night to hear them play that. I loved it and I would play it all the time, and then I thought, let’s put words to it.”
Simon assumed that it was just an unofficially released track, kept sacred by Los Incas, who, like many South American bands, would play it to themselves. But that wasn’t exactly the case. It turned out that the Peruvian songwriter Daniel Robles originally recorded the song in 1913 and copyrighted it in the United States in 1933 during his travels in America.
So when Simon’s track came out, with his lyrics added to the melody, Robles’ son filed a lawsuit, and the folk icon then had to give Robles a composer credit on the song, with his estate getting those royalties.
Never Miss A Tale
The Far Out Classic Rock Newsletter
All the latest Classic Rock content from the independent voice of culture.
Straight to your inbox.