"The Boxer" | ||||
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Single by Simon & Garfunkel | ||||
from the album Bridge over Troubled Water | ||||
B-side | "Baby Driver" | |||
Released | March 21, 1969 | |||
Recorded | November 1968 | |||
Genre | Folk rock | |||
Length | 5:10 | |||
Label | Columbia | |||
Songwriter(s) | Paul Simon | |||
Producer(s) | Roy Halee, Paul Simon, Art Garfunkel | |||
Simon & Garfunkel singles chronology | ||||
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Audio | ||||
"The Boxer" on YouTube |
"The Boxer" is a song written by Paul Simon and recorded by the American music duo Simon & Garfunkel from their fifth and final studio album, Bridge over Troubled Water (1970). Produced by the duo and Roy Halee, it was released as a standalone single on March 21, 1969, but included on the album nine months later (at the time, songs that had been released this far ahead were rarely included on the next studio album). The song is a folk rock ballad that variously takes the form of a first-person lament as well as a third-person sketch of a boxer. The lyrics are largely autobiographical and partially inspired by the Bible and were written during a time when Simon felt he was being unfairly criticized. The song's lyrics discuss poverty and loneliness. It is particularly known for its plaintive refrain, in which they sing 'lie-la-lie', accompanied by a heavily reverbed snare drum.
"The Boxer" was the follow-up to one of the duo's most successful singles, "Mrs. Robinson". It peaked at No. 7 on the Billboard Hot 100. It performed well internationally, charting within the Top 10 in nine countries, peaking highest in the Netherlands, Austria, South Africa, and Canada.
The original recording of the song is one of the duo's most highly produced and took over 100 hours to record. The recording was performed at multiple locations, including St. Paul's Chapel (Columbia University) in New York City and Columbia studios in Nashville and mixed on two 8-track recorders running in sync. [1]
The version originally released by the duo features an instrumental melody played in unison on pedal steel guitar by Curly Chalker and piccolo trumpet. The song also features a bass harmonica, played by Charlie McCoy, [2] heard during the second and final verses.
In a 2008 edition of Fretboard Journal magazine, [3] Fred Carter Jr. recounts to interviewer Rich Kienzle:
I had a baby Martin, which is a 000-18, and when we started the record in New York with Roy Halee, the engineer, and Paul [Simon] was playin' his Martin—I think it's a D-18 and he was tuned regular—he didn't have the song totally written lyrically, but he had most of the melody. And so all I was hearin' was bits and pieces while he was doin' his fingerpicking... I think he was fingerpicking in an open C. I tried two or three things and then picked up the baby Martin, which was about a third above his guitar, soundwise.
And I turned down the first string to a D, and tuned up the bass string to a G, which made it an open-G tuning, except for the fifth string, which was standard. Did some counter fingerpicking with him, just did a little backward roll, and lucked into a lick. And that turned into that little roll, and we cut it, just Paul and I, two guitars. Then we started to experiment with some other ideas and so forth. At the end of the day, we were still on the song. Garfunkel was amblin' around the studio, hummin’, and havin’ input at various times. They were real scientists. They’d get on a part, and it might be there [unfinished] six weeks later.
On my guitar, they had me miked with about seven mics. They had a near mic, a distant mic, a neck mic, a mic on the hole. They even miked my breathing. They miked the guitar in back. So Roy Halee was a genius at getting around. The first time we were listenin', they killed the breathing mic. And they had an ambient mic overhead, which picked up the two guitars together, I suppose. And so, I was breathin', I guess, pretty heavy in rhythm. And they wanted to take out that noise, and they took it out and said, 'Naw, we gotta leave that in.' That sounds almost like a rhythm on the record. So they left the breathin' mic on for the mix. I played Tele on it and a Twelve-string, three or four guitars on it. I was doing different guitar parts. One was a chord pattern and rhythm pattern. Did the Dobro lick on the regular six-string finger Dobro—not a slide Dobro.
I never heard the total record until I heard it on the air... I thought: That’s the greatest record I heard in my life, especially after the scrutiny and after all the time they spent on it and breakin’ it apart musically and soundwise and all of it. There was some magic in the studio that day, and Roy Halee captured it. Paul and I had a really nice groove.
The song has only one drumbeat, played during the 'lie-la-lie' refrain. The session drummer Hal Blaine created the heavily reverberated drum sound with the help of producer Roy Halee, who found a spot for the drums in front of an elevator in the Columbia offices. The recording of the drum was recorded as the song was being played live by the musicians. Blaine would pound the drums at the end of the "Lie la lie" vocals that were playing in his headphones, and at one point, an elderly security guard got a big surprise when he came out of the elevator and was startled by Blaine's thunderous drums.
Hal Blaine recounted the recording process: "There we were with all these mic cables, my drums, and a set of headphones," says Blaine. "When the chorus came around—the 'lie-la-lie' bit—Roy had me come down on my snare drum as hard as I could. In that hallway, by the elevator shaft, it sounded like a cannon shot! Which was just the kind of sound we were after."
The song's lyrics take the form of a first-person lament, as the singer describes his struggles to overcome loneliness and poverty in New York City. The final verse switches to a third-person sketch of a boxer: "In the clearing stands a boxer and a fighter by his trade, and he carries the reminders of every glove that laid him down or cut him till he cried out in his anger and his shame, 'I am leaving, I am leaving,' but the fighter still remains." [4]
The chorus consists of repetitions of the non-lexical vocable "lie-la-lie". Simon stated that this was originally intended only as a placeholder, but became part of the finished song.
I didn't have any words! Then people said it was 'lie' but I didn't really mean that. That it was a lie. But, it's not a failure of songwriting, because people like that and they put enough meaning into it, and the rest of the song has enough power and emotion, I guess, to make it go, so it's all right. But for me, every time I sing that part... [softly], I'm a little embarrassed. [5]
It has sometimes been suggested that the words represent a "sustained attack on Bob Dylan". [6] Under this interpretation, Dylan is identified by his experience as an amateur boxer, and the "lie-la-lie" chorus represents allegations of Dylan lying about his musical intentions. [7] Biographer Marc Eliot wrote in Paul Simon: A Life, "In hindsight, this seems utterly nonsensical." [7]
Bob Dylan in turn covered the song on his Self Portrait album, replacing the word "glove" with "blow." Paul Simon himself has suggested that the lyrics are largely autobiographical, written during a time when he felt he was being unfairly criticized:
I think I was reading the Bible around that time. That's where I think phrases such as "workman's wages" came from, and "seeking out the poorer quarters". That was biblical. I think the song was about me: everybody's beating me up, and I'm telling you now I'm going to go away if you don't stop. [8]
It was during the recording of "The Boxer" that Art Garfunkel met his future first wife, Linda Grossman. As he recalled:
I invited Linda to the studio that night… we were working on "The Boxer." She was reluctant, but she thought she'd try it. She came, sat over the engineering console, with her chin on her wrist, staring at me, Paul and Roy for four hours. She was going to know everything. I was impressed and flattered. I like people who third-degree me, who stare at me, I feel they're interested. And we went out afterwards, and I was very charmed and we dated a lot. It took us about three years though before I had the courage to ask her to marry me. [9]
They divorced in 1975, with Art later claiming he never really loved her.
During a New York City concert in October 2010, Paul Simon stopped singing midway through "The Boxer" to tell the story of a woman who stopped him on the street to tell him that she edits the song when singing it to her young child. Simon told the audience that she removed the words "the whores" and altered the song to say, "I get no offers, just a come-on from toy stores on Seventh Avenue." Simon laughingly commented that he felt that it was "a better line." [10]
On June 3, 2016, at his concert in Berkeley, California, Paul Simon again stopped singing partway through "The Boxer", this time to announce in one sentence breaking news: "I’m sorry to tell you this in this way, but Muhammad Ali passed away." He then finished the song with the last verse: "In the clearing stands a boxer and a fighter by his trade…" [11]
"The Boxer" was originally written with a verse that is not present in the Bridge over Troubled Water version:
Now the years are rolling by me—
They are rockin' evenly.
I am older than I once was,
And younger than I'll be.
That's not unusual;
No, it isn't strange:
After changes upon changes
We are more or less the same;
After changes we are more or less the same.
This verse was performed by Simon & Garfunkel on tour in November 1969 (this version of the song is included on the Live 1969 album), and sometimes by Simon in solo after the duo's breakup (on his Live Rhymin' album and on Late Night with David Letterman in 1987). The duo also added the verse on Saturday Night Live in 1975 and when they reunited for The Concert in Central Park in 1981. On March 30, 2020, Simon released a YouTube version dedicated to fellow New Yorkers during the coronavirus pandemic including this verse.[ citation needed ]
Upon the release of "The Boxer" as a single, Cash Box described it as a "spectacular side" and said, "First half of the ballad is in the haunting S&G folk style, but the production touches increase to build this track into a heavy fading 'Jude-ish' closer." [12] Billboard said that Simon and Garfunkel have "a sure fire chart topper in this infectious rhythm ballad with a compelling lyric line." [13]
Rolling Stone ranked the song No. 106 on the 2010 edition of their list of the 500 Greatest Songs of All Time. [14]
Weekly charts
| Year-end charts
|
Region | Certification | Certified units/sales |
---|---|---|
Spain (PROMUSICAE) [37] | Gold | 30,000‡ |
United Kingdom (BPI) [38] | Platinum | 600,000‡ |
‡ Sales+streaming figures based on certification alone. |
Cover versions of the song have been recorded by numerous artists, including Me First and the Gimme Gimmes, Bob Dylan, Neil Diamond, Emmylou Harris, The Samples, Leandro e Leonardo, Paula Fernandes, Tommy Fleming, The Celtic Tenors, Bruce Hornsby, Cake, Jonne Järvelä, Waylon Jennings, and Jess & Matt.[ citation needed ]
Joan Baez has also made the song a staple of her live concert performances, from the late 1970s to the present, including once in Italy with the Italian songwriter Francesco De Gregori, who was also singing this song during his concerts; Baez performed the song with Paul Simon and Richard Thompson at her 75th Birthday Concert at New York's Beacon Theatre in January 2016. [39]
Simon sang the song to open Saturday Night Live on September 29, 2001, the first live show following the September 11, 2001, attacks on New York City and Washington, D.C. [40]
In 2007, Simon was awarded the inaugural Gershwin Prize by the Library of Congress; Jerry Douglas, Shawn Colvin and Alison Krauss performed "The Boxer" live. [41] [42] Also in 2007, country music artist Deana Carter released a cover of the song on her sixth studio album, The Chain , which was recorded as a duet with Harper Simon.
The Bluecoats Drum and Bugle Corps performed "The Boxer" as the ballad for their 2008 show "The Knockout", and it has been a recurring encore tune for the corps ever since. [43]
Jerry Douglas and Mumford and Sons collaborated with Paul Simon on a cover of the song in 2012. It was included on Douglas' album Traveler, and on the deluxe edition of Mumford and Sons' album Babel . [44]
Simon & Garfunkel were an American folk rock duo consisting of singer-songwriter Paul Simon and singer Art Garfunkel. They were one of the best-selling music acts of the 1960s. Their most famous recordings include three US number ones: "The Sound of Silence" (1965) and the two winners of the Grammy Award for Record of the Year, "Mrs. Robinson" (1968) and "Bridge over Troubled Water" (1970). Other hits include "The Boxer" (1969), "Cecilia" (1970) and the four 1966 releases "Homeward Bound", "I Am a Rock", "Scarborough Fair/Canticle" and "A Hazy Shade of Winter", as well as the 1968 album track "America".
Wednesday Morning, 3 A.M. is the debut studio album by the American folk rock duo Simon & Garfunkel. Following their early incarnation as rock 'n' roll duo Tom and Jerry, Columbia Records signed the pair in late 1963. The album was produced by Tom Wilson and engineered by Roy Halee. The cover and the label include the subtitle "exciting new sounds in the folk tradition". Recorded in March 1964, the album was released on October 19.
Parsley, Sage, Rosemary and Thyme is the third studio album by the American folk rock duo Simon & Garfunkel. Produced by Bob Johnston, the album was released on October 24, 1966, in the United States by Columbia Records. Following the success of the re-release of their debut single "The Sound of Silence", Simon & Garfunkel regrouped after a time apart while Columbia issued their second album, a rushed collection titled Sounds of Silence. For their third album, the duo spent almost three months in the studio working on instrumentation and production.
Bookends is the fourth studio album by the American folk rock duo Simon & Garfunkel. Produced by Paul Simon, Art Garfunkel and Roy Halee, the album was released on April 3, 1968, in the United States by Columbia Records. The duo had risen to fame two years prior with the albums Sounds of Silence and Parsley, Sage, Rosemary and Thyme and the soundtrack album for the 1967 film The Graduate.
Simon and Garfunkel's Greatest Hits is the first compilation album from Simon & Garfunkel, which was released on June 14, 1972, two years after Simon & Garfunkel had parted ways.
Paul Frederic Simon is an American singer-songwriter known for his solo work and his collaborations with Art Garfunkel. He and his school friend Garfunkel, whom he met in 1953, came to prominence in the 1960s as Simon & Garfunkel. Their blend of folk and rock, including hits such as "The Sound of Silence", "Mrs. Robinson", "America" and "The Boxer", served as a soundtrack to the counterculture movement. Their final album, Bridge over Troubled Water (1970), is among the bestselling of all time.
Paul Simon is the second solo studio album by American singer-songwriter Paul Simon. It was released in January 1972, nearly two years after he split up with longtime musical partner Art Garfunkel. His first solo album was recorded in England in 1965 but remained unreleased in the U.S. until 1981, when it appeared in the 5-LP Collected Works boxed set. Originally released on Columbia Records, Paul Simon was then issued under the Warner Bros. label and is now back with Columbia through Sony. The album topped the charts in the United Kingdom, Japan and Norway and reached No. 4 on the U.S. Billboard Pop Albums. In 1986 it was certified platinum.
"Bridge over Troubled Water" is a song by the American folk rock duo Simon & Garfunkel, released in January 1970 as the second single from their fifth studio album, Bridge over Troubled Water (1970). It was written by Paul Simon and produced by Simon, Art Garfunkel and Roy Halee.
"America" is a song performed by American music duo Simon & Garfunkel, which they included on their fourth studio album, Bookends, in 1968. It was produced by the duo and Roy Halee. The song was later issued as the B-side of the single "For Emily, Whenever I May Find Her " in 1972 to promote the release of the compilation album Simon and Garfunkel's Greatest Hits. After peaking in the charts in July 1972, the song was switched to the A-side of the single and re-entered the charts in November 1972.
"I Am a Rock" is a song written by Paul Simon. It was first performed by Simon as the opening track on his album The Paul Simon Songbook which he originally recorded and released in August 1965, only in the United Kingdom. Paul Simon and Art Garfunkel, as the American folk rock duo Simon & Garfunkel, re-recorded it on December 14, 1965, and included as the final track on their album Sounds of Silence, which they released on January 17, 1966. It was released as a single in 1966, and subsequently included as the B-side of the 1971 A-side reissue of "The 59th Street Bridge Song ".
"A Simple Desultory Philippic (Or How I Was Robert McNamara'd Into Submission)" is a song written by American singer-songwriter Paul Simon. Originally recorded for Simon's 1965 UK-only debut, The Paul Simon Songbook, it was recorded soon after by Simon and his partner, Art Garfunkel, for the duo's third album Parsley, Sage, Rosemary and Thyme.
Roy Decker Halee is an American record producer and engineer, best known for working with Simon & Garfunkel, both as a group and for their solo projects.
Live 1969 is the fourth live album by Simon & Garfunkel, released through Columbia Records. It consists of live recordings captured on the duo's final North American tour, prior to the release of their Bridge over Troubled Water album. Fifteen of the album's seventeen tracks are previously unreleased, with the exceptions being the live versions of "For Emily, Whenever I May Find Her" and "Kathy's Song", both of which initially appeared on Simon & Garfunkel's 1972 Greatest Hits album.
"Mrs. Robinson" is a song by American folk rock duo Simon & Garfunkel from their fourth studio album, Bookends (1968). The writing of the song was begun before the 1967 film The Graduate, which contained only fragments of it. The full song was released as a single on April 5, 1968, by Columbia Records. Produced by Simon & Garfunkel and Roy Halee, the song was written by Paul Simon, who offered parts of it to movie director Mike Nichols alongside Art Garfunkel after Nichols rejected two other songs intended for the film. The Graduate's soundtrack album uses two short versions of "Mrs. Robinson". The song was additionally released on the Mrs. Robinson EP in 1968, which also includes three other songs from the film: "April Come She Will", "Scarborough Fair/Canticle", and "The Sound of Silence".
"Cecilia" is a song by American musical duo Simon & Garfunkel. It was released in April 1970 as the third single from the duo's fifth and final studio album, Bridge over Troubled Water (1970). Written by Paul Simon, the song's origins lie in a late-night party, in which the duo and friends began banging on a piano bench. They recorded the sound with a tape recorder, employing reverb and matching the rhythm created by the machine. Simon later wrote the song's guitar line and lyrics on the subject of an untrustworthy lover.
Sounds of Silence is the second studio album by the American folk rock duo Simon & Garfunkel, released on January 17, 1966. The album's title is a slight modification of the title of the duo's first major hit, "The Sound of Silence", which originally was released as "The Sounds of Silence". The song had earlier been released in an acoustic version on the album Wednesday Morning, 3 A.M., and later on the soundtrack to the movie The Graduate. Without the knowledge of Paul Simon or Art Garfunkel, electric guitars, bass and drums were overdubbed under the direction of Columbia Records staff producer Tom Wilson on June 15, 1965. This new version was released as a single in September 1965, and opens the album.
Angel Clare is the debut solo studio album by Art Garfunkel, released on September 11, 1973. It is his highest-charting solo album in the United States, peaking at No. 5 on the Billboard 200, and includes his only US Top 10 hit as a solo artist, "All I Know". It also contained two other Top 40 hits, "Traveling Boy" and "I Shall Sing". It was produced by long-time Simon & Garfunkel producer Roy Halee, alongside Art Garfunkel.
"My Little Town" is a 1975 song by the American duo Simon & Garfunkel. It was written by Paul Simon, who produced the track along with Art Garfunkel and Phil Ramone. The song was included on the 1975 solo releases from both Simon and Garfunkel (Breakaway). It would not appear on any of the duo's albums until the 1997 anthology box set Old Friends and the 1999 compilation album The Best of Simon and Garfunkel. It was the first single release credited to the duo since the 1972 release of "America", released in conjunction with Simon and Garfunkel's Greatest Hits.
Bridge over Troubled Water is the fifth and final studio album by the American folk rock duo Simon & Garfunkel, released on January 26, 1970, by Columbia Records. Following the duo's soundtrack for The Graduate, Art Garfunkel took an acting role in the film Catch-22, while Paul Simon worked on the songs, writing all tracks except Felice and Boudleaux Bryant's "Bye Bye Love".
The Concert in Central Park is the first live album by American folk rock duo Simon & Garfunkel, released on February 16, 1982, by Warner Bros. Records. It was recorded on September 19, 1981, at a free benefit concert on the Great Lawn in Central Park, New York City, where the pair performed in front of 500,000 people. A film of the event was shown on TV and released on video. Proceeds went toward the redevelopment and maintenance of the park, which had deteriorated due to lack of municipal funding. The concert and album marked the start of a three-year reunion of Paul Simon and Art Garfunkel.
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