I'm staying away even from the samples - I want to be 'surprised' by this album - I hate hearing an album for the first time but already knowing many of the songs.

Instead, I'm listening to the entire Simon & Garfunkel and Paul Simon canon this week to get me ready for next week.

Man, I am seriously looking forward to this. Six years is way too long...

SnidelyWhiplash said:

nah, p2p's/torrent leak..

booyah said:

Me too - I like the suspense makes the pay-off even better if I end up really liking it.

Paul and Brian... I never would've put them together

DiminutiveRocker said:

This is my album of the year so far.. i was blown away.


production is solid as a rock..

the 2nd song... is possibly the best.. and by far the coolest sounding one. "Everything About it is a love song"


its where the title came from...

birthday party, make a wish and close your eye's.. surprise.. surprise... surprise
[Edited 5/5/06 11:01am]

i did not hear the second song yet ... i will have to hear me a listen ... i am psyched for this album ...

Allmusic.com 4.5 out of 5 stars.


Review by Stephen Thomas Erlewine

The obvious surprise of Surprise, Paul Simon's tenth solo album and his first since 2000's underrated You're the One, is that the singer/songwriter has enlisted Brian Eno as his collaborator. At first glance the pairing seems odd, even awkward, since they seem to come from opposing backgrounds: Simon the folk-rock troubadour and Eno the avant-garde art rock adventurist. Dig a little deeper, and the similarities do surface. For one, there is the mutual shared interest in world music — most evident in Eno's productions/collaborations with Talking Heads at the turn of the '70s and on Simon's 1986 Graceland and its 1990 follow-up, The Rhythm of the Saints, but there are undercurrents running as far back as Simon & Garfunkel's "Cecilia." But more than any other singer/songwriter of his generation, Paul Simon has demonstrated a keen interest in having his albums sound unique and distinct from each other, using each album as an opportunity to explore a different sonic characteristic, so working with a sonic landscaper (as his back-cover credit on Surprise calls him) is not out of character. Similarly, Eno has not been entirely adverse to pop, either, as his ongoing collaboration with U2 proves, not to mention his productions for James or even the flamboyant pop of such early Roxy Music singles as "Virginia Plain." So, their collaboration here is unexpected, but not unnatural — in fact, it's anything but unnatural, since Surprise is as seamless and graceful as Graceland, which it resembles greatly in how it blends a new sound with Simon's songs. But where Graceland found Simon writing around existing rhythm tracks, the opposite is true here: Eno fills in the space behind songs, creating an evocative, dream-like bed for Simon's words, which, more than ever, scan equally well as poetry as they do song lyrics. Simon was shifting toward this direction on You're the One, but he pushes even harder here, largely abandoning familiar song structures — only two cuts here have something resembling a conventional chorus, and one of those is "Father and Daughter," originally released on the Wild Thornberrys soundtrack and the only track not treated by Eno — for elliptical, winding songs that demand attention.

These are songs that cry out for the kind of cinematic sounds Eno brings to them, since he helps give them structure, momentum, and emotional weight, and his "sonic landscapes" do this precisely, following the contours of Simon's words and enhancing his meaning. And while Surprise glides along easily, thanks both to Eno's seamless work and the warmth of Simon's voice, it's an album meant to be listened to closely, and it pays back that effort handsomely. With repeated plays, Simon's songs don't seem as open-ended, and there's more to discover within Eno's production, particularly in how it plays off Simon's recurring themes of faith, aging, fatherhood, and getting by in George W. Bush's U.S.A. But this is not by any stretch a protest record; "How Can You Live in the Northeast?" and "Wartime Prayers" are about the uneasiness of living in the post-9/11 America, yet they're not statements of outrage, they're about the emotional toil of the time, and they have counterparts in the wearied narrators of "Once Upon a Time There Was an Ocean" and "Outrageous." It adds up to a bittersweet undercurrent that runs through Surprise, not unlike the melancholy threaded throughout Hearts and Bones, which this also resembles in its overall introspective tone and arty bent, but this is hardly a one-dimensional record; there is gentle hope and wry humor as well, giving this music a rich elegance that makes it stand among Simon's best work. Unlike such deservedly praised comeback albums from some of his peers — such as Dylan's Love and Theft, the Rolling Stones' A Bigger Bang, Paul McCartney's Chaos and Creation in the Backyard — Simon doesn't achieve his comeback by reconnecting with the sound and spirit of his classic work; he has achieved it by being as restless and ambitious as he was at his popular and creative peak, which makes Surprise all the more remarkable.

great review ..... i will buy this tomorrow ... something that i have NOT done in ages (get a record the DAY it comes out ...)

Hmm...first listen it's a little dull, though I do like that first track. Oddly, sounds like a mashup of all his previous sounds, but it's a bit too overproduced in a prog-rock way for my taste. I'll keep listening, tho...

a "little dull" was the first thing i usually think of - when i heard track no 1 i thought that also ... but .... Paul Simon tracks do grow on ya ... they are not like Prince tracks which come out and grab ya !

SnidelyWhiplash said:

Yeah, I agree that Paul Simon tracks grow on you - one reason I buy his albums on release date is not that they will instantly be my favorite, but that I want to spend time soaking in the music over time. I know in a few years I will love the album more than most Prince albums (and I haven't bought Surprise yet - I'm going out at lunchtime to get it).

totally agree with ya ... i am runnin out soon to probably pick it up also .... i think ONE REASON for this is that Paul Simons words are sooo important to the songs ... and they grow on ya ... so then .. like poetry almost .... they mean something very strong for ya (unlike Prince , etc) .... i remember Paul's last album came out after the birth of my first girl ... and .... i thought it had so much to do with childhood, fatherhood , etc .... "youre the one" , etc ...

Wow, yeah, like I said before, his albums don't usually hit me as 'classic' or 'genius'on first listen, and this one is no different. Not sure about the electronic sound provided by Brian Eno - I'll definitely need to get used to this album and let it soak in.

I guess since I had posted about this, I should have expected it, but somehow I'm feeling oddly disappointed. I'm sure in three years I will think of this as a great album, though...

Paste Magazine (4 Stars)

After All These Years: Songwriting great makes stunning comeback

Paul Simon is 64 years old. That’s a lot of water—troubled or otherwise—under the bridge, and the temptation is to view him as a pleasant but irrelevant anachronism. The truth is he hasn’t released a good album since 1990’s Rhythm of the Saints, and his last sighting—the sweet but ultimately slight “Father and Daughter” from the Wild Thornberrys soundtrack—didn’t exactly inspire visions of past greatness. And that’s why Surprise lives up to its title. Co-produced by Simon and Brian Eno (U2, Talking Heads, David Bowie) and mixed by Tchad Blake (Tom Waits, Phish, Los Lobos), the 11 songs here re-establish Simon as one of our best songwriters, and they masterfully probe the uneasy malaise and melancholy that has always characterized his finest work.

Surprise is Simon’s most unabashedly autobiographical work since 1983’s Hearts and Bones. He sings about his wife, his children and the hole in his soul that seems unable to be filled. He looks for answers in family and God, but the answers are complicated, and they resonate with unresolved dilemmas. On “Sure Don’t Feel Like Love” Simon’s deceptively cheery melody masks a sucker punch as he ponders the chemistry of teardrops—mere electrolytes and salt—and why that chemistry doesn’t even begin to explain the calculus of sorrow and regret. On “I Don’t Believe” he wonders why the idyllic, sun-dappled family times are so ephemeral, and why the next day always dawns grey and bleak. Eno wraps these conundrums in his patented ambient gauze, which perfectly mirrors the disquieting, ruminative songwriting. Bill Frisell’s guitars and Herbie Hancock’s keyboards peek through occasionally, but it’s Eno’s production, and Simon’s impressive acoustic fingerpicking—again, his best since Hearts and Bones—that mark this album, sonically.

The record’s centerpiece, “Wartime Prayers,” is a musical State of the Union that can hold its own with early masterpieces like “American Tune.” There’s a deep, sorrowful dirge at the song’s heart—for the American Dream, for all the individual dreams that lie battered and torn—and it’s seasoned by the kind of hard-won humility that’s rare in anyone, and almost impossible to find in certified pop stars:

I’m trying to tap into some wisdom
Even a little drop will do
I want to rid my heart of envy
And cleanse my soul of rage
Before I’m through

It’s the kind of music that can only be made by a man whose days are numbered, and who wants to leave a legacy broader and deeper than Grammy Awards and Gold records. And Surprise is all the better for it. The context is everything, and when the by-now-familiar “Father and Daughter” finally arrives at the end of the album, with its just-this-side-of-saccharine sentiments and its doo-wop evocations on the chorus, it sounds like the natural extension of what’s come before. Dad might be a little sappy and morbid, but this is still one lucky kid.

If the lack of truly standout melodies ultimately derails this effort just short of greatness, it’s hard to find fault with such a warm, generous and open-hearted collection of songs. The real surprise is how vital Paul Simon sounds—still crazy, and still fighting for peace and sanity, after all these years.

Well, after 3 listens this album is definitely growing on me - his lyrics are like poetry, and that's a great way to absorb them - I sat down this morning and just read through the lyric booklet, and later listened to the album, which really helped me to understand and appreciate the songs more.

i did buy the album ... have NOT had time to listen due to a 1 yr old and a 6 yr old that has taken up alot of my time !!!

also - i was gonna put it in my cd player in the car ... and ... i went to take cd 4 out (Prince 3121) and ... it JAMMED .... yeah .... i could NOT play it ... or any other CD !!!!

so .... here i sit mon am ... anyways i did catch Paul Simon in SNL ... it was very neat to see him playin song no 1 with Steve Gadd (one of my fav all time drummers ! ) even after all these years ...

booyah said:

Yeah, I have to agree. A few are sinking in, "Sure Don't Feel Like Love," but that one sounds the most like his past work. This Eno sound just makes his voice sound too plain in contrast.