Album of the 'Week': Graceland

When does politics interrupt music? The short answer to that is: when you're listening to it in my presence. The interaction between politics and music fascinates me, and bad politics in particular. On hearing a bar of Billy Joel's 'Just The Way You Are', I will, regardless of circumstance or propriety, explain how it's a sexist Trojan Horse, sneaking in controlling impulses and a heavily gendered idea of what women are for under its calm-sea sheen ("I don't want clever, conversation/Just cook my dinner right you bitch). As for 10CC's 'Dreadlock Holiday', well, the problems with that really shouldn't need explaining.

However, those songs are politically dreadful AND shit. Graceland by Paul Simon is one of the first albums I ever loved, but on listening to it recently, it was interrupted by politics. A low level buzz of wan, patronising and ill-judged politics defines the album as much as beauty and lazy refinement. For the best example, see 'Under African Skies', a haunting melody, an earworm beyond compare. Now, take its lyrics. A protagonist named Joseph is introduced and it is established that he is black and African. That is all. "The roots of rhythm remain" indeed.

Yes, this is Paul Simon's Black Album. The international legal issue around its creation is less problematic frankly - the sheer amount of hairshirted gesture politics that followed his seemingly ignorant breaking of the UN Cultural Embargo on South Africa (playing gigs outside of SA with the cream of exile talent, playing for the ANC in exile in Zimbabwe, ending all shows with the ANC anthem - check, check and check) surely made up for that. The problem more the embedded power of going somewhere with the intention of picking its talent like the coolest kid in class, and the idea of specifically yoinking players on the basis of their cultural/racial heritage. Not exactly wrong, but disquieting nevertheless.

This disquiet pervades the album. The disconnect between Simon's aging hippy lyrics, a thoroughly different musical tradition and the now laughable hi-tech of yesterday's tomorrow creates an extra queasyness and leaves behind a genuinely uncanny music. 'The Boy in the Bubble', with its dislocated pump of accordion and bass, drums synthesised and shifting volume without logic, and a lapsed idealist straining for a political point, ranks #1 in my Oddest Records of the 20th Century. And that century contained 'Ride A White Swan'.

Of course, this is criticism masquerading as praise. The real reason why I love this political and musical experiment (apart from the fact that it's a political and musical experiment) is its humility. From 'Graceland', a rare break-up song that doesn't idealise or despise either party, to 'You Can Call Me Al' - wherein a person undergoing a mid-life crisis is redeemed by the horror of the Third World ("scatterings and orphanages") - the whole album is deep structured by the lack of confidence of its narrator, their crippling fears and very timid hopes. For that, and the bass playing, this album repays listening by anyone who may be put off because of 'Scarborough Fair', the subsequent hi-jinx of Bono and Geldof and the undignified parp of synth brass.

On Colonialism

An upcoming cricket match has reminded me of a deeply illustrative bit of commentary from the 2009 test match series between the West Indies and England. In a West Indian innings during a limited overs match, the Windies were having one of their sadly all-too-rare periods where they surpass what is expected of the game, and begin scoring and hitting wildly for no loss. These are also the moments where cricket becomes the most entertaining sport on earth.

The English commentary team shifted in their seats for a few overs, audibly strategised, and decided that this was frankly disrespectful - to the bowlers, of course, but most importantly to the game. Grumbling continued, then, in one over, Kevin Pietersen achieved three successive wickets. The commentators could not have been more delighted. Order had been restored, and the underdog lay beaten.