In 1974 Paul Simon was finally starting to separate himself from Art Garfunkel after Simon & Garfunkel broke up in 1970 on the back of two critically and commercially acclaimed albums in his self-titled 1972 debut and 1973′s There Goes Rhymin’ Simon. On September 5th, 1974 Simon visited ABC late-night program The Dick Cavett Show and Cavett wisely devoted most of that evening’s program to the Queens native.

All in all Paul Simon performed four songs over the course of the hour-long program starting with a solo version of the tender American Tune from There Goes Rhymin’ Simon. Then, Cavett talks to Simon about Paul’s songwriting process and as an example Paul shows Dick a new, as-of-yet uncompleted tune called Still Crazy After All These Years that would turn out to be the title track of his next album. For his final two songs of the show, Loves Me Like A Rock and Bridge Over Troubled Water, Simon was backed by gospel singing group The Jessy Dixon Singers. A new rip of the original broadcast just surfaced thanks to YouTuber gohjazz5 that we wanted to share…

Paul Simon on The Dick Cavett Show – 09/04/1974

American Tune, Paul Shows Dick A New Song He’s Working On (Still Crazy After All These Years), Loves Me Like A Rock*, Bridge Over Troubled Water*

* – w/ Jessy Dixon Singers

Scott Bernstein

Scott Bernstein co-founded Hidden Track in October 2006 and was managing editor until taking over as EiC in January 2008. Scotty also writes for Relix Magazine and curates YEMblog.com.

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