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<strong>paul</strong> <strong>simon</strong> – 1984 <strong>playboy</strong> <strong>interview</strong> small black beetles: the overkill<br />
Playboy: Why not?<br />
Simon: In terms of performing, I've never really been<br />
comfortable being a professional entertainer. For me, it's<br />
a secondary form of creativity. I'm not a creative performer.<br />
I'm a reproducer onstage of what I've already created. I<br />
guess everyone who goes on the stage is exhibitionistic,<br />
but there are limits to what I'll do to make a crowd<br />
respond.<br />
Playboy: What did you expect creatively from a Simon and<br />
Garfunkel tour?<br />
Simon: Nothing. I thought I was going to get an emotional<br />
experience from it. I felt I wasn't really present for Simon<br />
and Garfunkel the first time around.<br />
Playboy: Where were you?<br />
Simon: I wasn't home, the same way that I wasn't present<br />
for the concert in the park when it was happening. I mean,<br />
a phenomenon occurs and it's recognized as a<br />
phenomenon. But because you're in the middle of it, you<br />
just think that it's your life - until it's over. And then you<br />
look back and say, "What an unusual thing happened to me<br />
in the Sixties." So there it was. A chance to go and reexperience,<br />
to a certain degree, what I hadn't really<br />
experienced the first time. Some of those hits from the<br />
Sixties I just had no interest in anymore, musically. But I<br />
had an interest in experiencing what it was like being the<br />
person who wrote and sang those songs.<br />
Playboy: How was the experience?<br />
Simon: I liked it. And I began to think about the songs. I<br />
remember playing a concert somewhere in the middle of<br />
Germany. It's strange enough to be in Germany, and when I<br />
finished playing, I was thinking, I hate Homeward Bound.<br />
And then I thought, Why do I hate it? I said "Oh, I hate the<br />
words." So I went over them. And then I remembered<br />
where I wrote it. I was in Liverpool, actually in a railway<br />
station. I'd just played a little folk job. The job of a folk<br />
singer in those days was to be Bob Dylan. You had to be a<br />
poet. That's what they wanted. And I thought that was a<br />
drag. And I wanted to get home to my girlfriend, Kathy in<br />
London. I was 22. And then I thought, Well, that's not a<br />
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