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Editorial Reviews
14 tracks including 2 bonus tracks. STILL SEALED but this has a small hole in the barcode art.
Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
33 of 33 people found the following review helpful
Format:Audio CD
I've always thought Simon and Garfunkel were one of the most beautifully arranged groups ever to record. Their voices are angelic. Their songs are often so emotional that I can barely stand to listen to them.
This album, Bookends, stands at the top of my list of favorite S&G recordings.
As the liner notes indicate, this is their fourth, "and arguably best, album"..."a meditation on the passage of life and the psychological impact of life's irreversible, ever-accumulating losses." That's probably what sets it apart from their other recordings to me. It's ambitious, and chock-full of import and meaning. If a progressive rock band would have attempted a concept like this in the 1970s, they would have been labeled "pretentious" or "bombastic." Yet, S&G got away with it.
Granted, there are tracks I don't like as well as others ("Save The Life Of My Child" for one), but tracks such as "America," "Voices of Old People," "Old Friends," "Bookends Theme" and "Mrs. Robinson" more than make up for the odd track or two that doesn't strike a chord within me. "Bookends Theme," alone, tugs at my heartstrings like very few songs do. And if any song seems to resonate with the spirit of the Sixties it's "Mrs. Robinson."
There really isn't anything else I can say about this album that you probably don't already know, or haven't already read in previous reviews.
Except for this: The remastering is outstanding. The voices ring out clearly, the acoustic guitars are crisp and bright and there are things going on in each track that you might not have noticed in previous editions of this album.
While S&G's previous release -- 1966's Parsley, Sage, Rosemary and Thyme -- contains many more sing-alongable songs, more that you probably know by heart, I think Bookends is their crowning achievement. If you don't yet own one of their albums, I suggest starting with this one. If this isn't available, try Parsley, Sage.
Oh, one more thing: If you can, listen with a good pair of headphones on to capture every nuance and note. You'll be amazed at the remastering, and captivated by the depth of their performances.
19 of 20 people found the following review helpful
Format:Audio CD
My wife just bought me a new record player...yeah, you read that right. I don't need some crazy ipod that holds 3,000 of my favorite songs...just give me something simple...something uncomplicated...something that puts me in touch with my soul and I'm quite the happy guy.
This album is free from all pretenses. It's sad and yet it's beautiful. It's alive and yet it feels like death is its closest companion. I'm not being maudlin, here, that's the way it is. We go through so many mini-deaths during one lifetime. We make friends. We lose friends. We're riding high one moment and the next we're flat on our backs. But it's all part of the whole. Black and white with a million shades of gray in-between.
I put on this album that I've had since the fourth grade. The record cracks and creaks, it moans and groans...it's a lot like me...but just like this record, I'm always ready to start from the beginning and be me. Who else could I possibly be?
I'm tempted to buy a brand new version of this classic on CD, but I wait until the feelings pass and cling to something I've owned for the last thirty years. I don't have much left from those days gone by. But again, that's life.
This is probably the best album that Simon & Garfunkle put out. It caught them at a time when they, too, were going through changes and transistions, endings and new beginnings.
Life's a trip...pack accordingly.
This album is free from all pretenses. It's sad and yet it's beautiful. It's alive and yet it feels like death is its closest companion. I'm not being maudlin, here, that's the way it is. We go through so many mini-deaths during one lifetime. We make friends. We lose friends. We're riding high one moment and the next we're flat on our backs. But it's all part of the whole. Black and white with a million shades of gray in-between.
I put on this album that I've had since the fourth grade. The record cracks and creaks, it moans and groans...it's a lot like me...but just like this record, I'm always ready to start from the beginning and be me. Who else could I possibly be?
I'm tempted to buy a brand new version of this classic on CD, but I wait until the feelings pass and cling to something I've owned for the last thirty years. I don't have much left from those days gone by. But again, that's life.
This is probably the best album that Simon & Garfunkle put out. It caught them at a time when they, too, were going through changes and transistions, endings and new beginnings.
Life's a trip...pack accordingly.
13 of 13 people found the following review helpful
Format:Audio CD
You know an album is good when one of the worst songs on it is the band's biggest single.
"Bookends" is Simon & Garfunkel, and 60's folk-rock, at their absolute best. While other bands were exploring complicted concepts and rock operas, S&G created a side-long song cycle about the simplest of ideas; growing up and growing old.
The album opens with a soft acoustic guitar line of the "Bookends Theme" which explodes into the psychedelic blast of "Save the Life of My Child", then fades into the glorious land and soul-searching ode "America". "Overs" deals with the subject of relationships reaching a stalemate, and "Old Friends" takes an elequent look at old age with beautiful vocals and melodies and stirring strings, and fades back into the original opening guitar line with ending coda "preserve your memories, they're all that's left you." Brilliant. And that's just the first half.
The second half, merely a collection of songs, is one of their stongest collections. The moderate hit "Fakin' It", the wry "Punky's Delemma", the rocking "A Hazy Shade of Winter" and the poppy Orwellian-with-a-twist "At the Zoo". The monster hit of "Mrs. Robinson" although brilliant in its own right, sounds almost out of place here, and ranks up as one of the weaker tracks.
The album covers a great deal of ground, musically and emotionally, and transports the listener...and does so in about a half an hour. Simon & Garfunkel do in 30 minutes what most bands can't do with a full-length cd.
At long last, this gem of an album is getting the credit it so deserves. This is (arguably) Simon & Garfunkel's greatest work as a duo, and perhaps one of the greatest albums of all time. Absoulutely essential.
Most Recent Customer Reviews
The one true Simon and Garfunkel concept album
Simon and Garfunkel/ Bookends (bonus tracks edition): Although this cannot be confused with a `rock opera', there certainly is a concept that drives this album: That concept... Read more
Published 5 months ago by J. Bynum
Quite possibly, a perfect album
I still listen to this, more than 40 years after it was released, and get tears in my eyes. It is just so good! Read more
Published 6 months ago by The Plunkster
Where It All Began
It was great adding an early Simon & Garfunkel CD to my collection. What I would really like is a list of what's included on each CD. Read more
Published 11 months ago by Kula
::sniff:: Wow!!!!!
Somehow, overlooked by me for the longest time. 'Bookends' seemed to me only as an album of which I was certainly aware and heard much praise of it. Read more
Published 12 months ago by David Franzblau
'Simon and Garfunkel's Greatest Hits': Bookends
Sometimes I feel that this is the BEST album of all time. Every track is a 'greatest hit'. It will make you laugh, cry, think, smile... Read more
Published 24 months ago by S Hauge
Simon and Garfunkel at their best
I too bought this album in 1968 the year it came out. From the very first it was my favorite of all their albums. Read more
Published 24 months ago by Stephen R. Finney
the wonder of Simon & Garfunkel
Bookends is far and away one of the best, if not the best, album that Simon & Garfunkel ever released. Read more
Published on June 3, 2009 by Matthew G. Sherwin
Bookends
Simon & Garfunkel- Bookends ****
Bookends is the [...] love child of the folk-ish movement of the mid to late 1960's. Read more
Bookends is the [...] love child of the folk-ish movement of the mid to late 1960's. Read more
Published on May 1, 2009 by Morton
If Simon and Garfunkel are bookends, I'll leave Garfunkel off the...
Side One is great: "Save the Life of My Child" is sonically interesting if a bore lyrically, "America" is magnificent and reads like a passage from "On the Road," and "Overs" isn't... Read more
Published on January 31, 2009 by Tom Benton
An Old Friend
I bought this album in 1968, stupidly warped it in the back window well of my VW while driving to college from Iowa to Oregon in 1970, and bought another copy as soon as I arrived... Read more
Published on January 3, 2009 by Gary L. Kellogg
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Bookends is Simon & Garfunkel's fourth studio release.
Paul Simon and Art Garfunkelhave been a member of Simon & Garfunkel.
Paul Simon and Art Garfunkelhave been a member of Simon & Garfunkel.
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