The 2004 tour that Paul Simon never enjoyed playing: “That wasn’t fun”
As fun as being a touring musician might sound, and as appealing as the prospect of travelling from place to place to perform in front of adoring crowds might be, the live music industry isn’t exactly always kind to the artists who exist as its lifeblood.
Musicians are often made on the stage, with the act of performing live giving them the opportunity to connect with both existing and potential new fans in the most human way possible.
You’re naked and exposed on the stage, and when you’re unafraid of showing this, people are going to connect to you more easily. If you offer nothing in this regard, then people are going to find it harder to understand what you’re trying to convey or achieve with your work, and messages can be clouded if they’re not delivered with the right amount of emphasis in the right places.
However, the stage is such a vulnerable place to be, and if you’re exhausted from the pressure of having to do this night after night, it will eventually become a chore for you to go out and please people so frequently.
You can’t guarantee that there won’t be other things going on in your life that you’d rather prioritise thinking about while you’re out on tour, and when you don’t have the space to do so, then that’s going to drain you even more. What’s more, if you don’t like the people you’re travelling around with, or become sick of their continuous presence, then that’s going to be even worse for your mental state.
Given how Paul Simon has often taken a relatively relaxed approach to touring, not making as many public appearances as some of his contemporaries, you get the feeling that he knew very well how exhausting it could be, and that he was sensible enough to give himself the space to have enough time off between tours.
However, when he was asked about how much he enjoyed touring during a 2016 interview with Uncut, he admitted that there was one in particular that he had a deep regret for having committed to, and that he knew that he’d bitten off more than he could chew.
“When the Everly Brothers were there, we had a great time,” he divulged, referring to a tour that Simon and Garfunkel embarked on with Don and Phil around 2003. However, he went on to explain how they were so swept up by the positive reception of the first tour that they attempted to recapture this feeling the following year, which fell flat.
“We did another, after that. But that wasn’t fun. Anyway. As it turns out, I had a lot on my mind, musically. As it turns out. I didn’t set out saying, ‘I have a lot that I want to accomplish.’ It just grew as I went from stage to stage.”
Simon would already have been in his sixties by this point, so it’s understandable that he’d be tired out after doing back to back tours, and while it shouldn’t be a bad reflection on the Everly Brothers, who he and Art Garfunkel were close friends with, it was a reflection of the fact that he had reached a point in his career where embarking on such rigorous touring schedules was less of a viable option for him.
