Customer Reviews

Watermark

5 star:		(20)
4 star:		(5)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

SONY - Please Remaster and re-release this brilliant record. By far the best of Art's mostly mediocre solo output. The production and the songwriting - ah, yes - the sublime songwriting by Jimmy Webb - at the top of his game - is fantastic. Art perfectly capture's Jimmy's angst- ridden lyrics and his voice is never better. This a stone classic that has never aged. I'd love to hear it using the best of today's mastering technolgy. Sony - I can guarentee you one sale right here.

I got a demo of this LP when I was working at a record store in college. Loved it from the first time I heard it. For some reason I was drawn to the enigmatic choral arrangement on a couple of songs-notably Wooden Planes. Liner notes give credit to the Oklahoma Baptist University Choir under the direction of Dr. James Woodward. This was 1977 and I lived in another state.

Jump ahead 25 years

My fiance is thumbing through my old lps and finds this one. She pulls it aside and immediately embraces the cover. Her dad was Dr. James Woodward. Although I never got to meet the man (Sadly his life was taken in a 1991 plane crash) I sure loved that arrangement, and I sure love his daughter- and now granddaughter.

Watermark is one of the most intelligent, lovely albums made in the 1970s, a reminder that not all was disco or sappy ballads. Garfunkel joins Linda Ronstadt as one of the great interpreters of Webb's pensive and often demanding songs. Webb was involved in this production and it shows: the arrangements are classy and never intrusive. The CD's best cuts include the first song, "Crying In My Sleep," with wonderful wordplay (watch Webb toy with the various meanings of "ran" in one of the verses), the Celtic "All My Love's Laughter" (with a little musical help from the Chieftains), and "Mr. Shuck and Jive" with its jazzy arrangement and embittered lyric. The title track features haunting imagery (Webb is an imagist like Dylan and Joni Mitchell--he tends to think in pictures), and there's a surreal quality to the arrangement on "Wooden Planes," a great song best done by B.J. Thomas.

This is without question Arts finest work. Along with Jimmy Webb they created one of the best Albums ever! I have spent many a saturday afternoon listening to this album and sipping Jack Daniels with my frind Gary. Thanks Art and Jimmy.

Much of this album consists of the intriguing, and sometimes troubling (e.g. the title cut) songs of Jimmy Webb, though for me the high point is the collaboration with the Chieftains on an ethereal and spooky version of "She Moved Through the Fair." It's all exquisitely sung (what else would one expect from Art Garfunkel?) and played--OK, aside from, ironically enough, one glitch on my favorite track! (Singers, remember, don't hold voiced consonants! Ah, well; quod licet Jovi non licet bovi...) Gorgeous music for whatever your mood; you'll like it a lot.

The original album was to have been released with the Jimmy Webb song Fingerpaint, but when its first single, Crying in My Sleep, didn't chart, Garfunkel hurriedly recorded What a Wonderful World, with the star power of James Taylor and Paul Simon, to kick off the new album. And Fingerpaint fell by the wayside, only to exist in the Dutch release, and maybe only for the first couple of months of the album's life there. Well, shoot, the Jimmy Webb songs here are awesome, and I'm sure his Fingerpaint is also, but when will we ever get to hear it? These days, CD rereleases always have extras tacked on, like obscure b-sides, and so forth. Columbia missed a great opportunity here. Same with the rerelease of Scissors Cut - why doesn't this include The Romance, as the European versions did, or Is This Love, which was the b-side of A Heart in New York?

Jimmy Webb is a fine songwriter.
Art Garfunkel is a fine singer.
The time and thought that has gone into this album makes it a truly memorable combination.
Has anyone, even Richard Harris or Webb himself, interpreted these songs better?
Who cares?
They are fine songs and great interpretations.
It is hard to know where to begin with accolades.
Even an early Webb song like 'Marionette' or 'All my love's laughter' shine like a diamond in this collection.
Listen to songs like 'Shine it on me' or the deceptively simple 'Someone else' to know that you are in the presence of someone who knows everything there is to know about the human condition and can express it so well in the confines of a 3 minute song.
Great songs, thoughtfully sung.

It took Art Garfunkel a year to record this beautiful album but it was well worth the effort. Recording took place all over the world, just to get into the right mood.

Art Garfunkel interpreting Jimmy Webb - who wrote all of the 12 tracks on this album - is a moving experience. I have a lot of fond memories playing this over and over again as a vinyl record in 1977 and a lot of later years, and I am glad I could replace it with this CD.

In my opinion, this still stands as Art Garfunkel's best album to date.

Beautiful songs, Jimmy Webb's words and Art Garfunkle always unique voice what a pair these two make. After almost 20 years I'm glad that those who make the decisions about what albums go to cd finally saw the light.

Watermark is a great album. It is, by far, the best release of Art Garfunkel's solo career. It's one of those overlooked musical gems that never got the attention or recognition it deserved.

Unfortunately, a lot of Art Garfunkel's subsequent work was, well, mediocre. But in 2002, Art released an excellent collaboration with Maia Sharp and Buddy Mondlock entitled "Everything Needs To Be Noticed" which, quite deservedly, seems to have brought him a lot of very favourable attention.

Check out "Everything Needs To Be Noticed." It's excellent. And if you like it, check out "Watermark". It's excellent as well. If you like one, you'll like the other.