Paul Simon & Bruce Woodley of The Seekers

Discussion in 'Music Corner' started by audiodrome, Mar 26, 2009.

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  1. audiodrome

    audiodrome Senior Member Thread Starter

    Location:
    North Of Boston
    What's the story behind their collaboration? I know that Paul Simon spent 1965 living in England before Simon & Garfunkel became a hit and that he co-wrote a couple of songs with Woodley for The Seekers, but other than that, there doesn't seem to be much info out there.
     
  2. The Panda

    The Panda Forum Mutant

    Location:
    Marple, PA, USA
    I was thinking of that this week. When S&G played Red Rubber Ball live, they used the Seekers ending, not the Cycle version. I bet they got acquainted in England.
     
  3. audiodrome

    audiodrome Senior Member Thread Starter

    Location:
    North Of Boston
    It's strange that Bruce Woodley was Paul Simon's only collaborator, as far as I know.
     
  4. MikeM

    MikeM Senior Member

    Location:
    Youngstown, Ohio
    All I know is that in my (no doubt lone) opinion, "I Wish You Could Be Here" is the finest song Paul Simon ever had a hand in in his entire career.

    I know many will take great offense with this statement, but I stand by it. I don't hate S&G...some of their stuff I quite like...I'm just not as enamored of them as most.

    I actively dislike several Simon solo tunes, though I know there are some good things mixed in there.

    Nothing has ever moved me as much as The Cyrkle's version of the above song, though.
     
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  5. audiodrome

    audiodrome Senior Member Thread Starter

    Location:
    North Of Boston
    Why do some Paul Simon fans insist that he wrote "Red Rubber Ball" by himself?
     
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  6. Todd E

    Todd E Forum Resident

    Location:
    Hollywood-adjacent
    Because they can't read record labels?

    Google is your friend.
     
  7. audiodrome

    audiodrome Senior Member Thread Starter

    Location:
    North Of Boston
    From paul-simon.info:

    "Red Rubber Ball"

    Written by Paul Simon - some say that Bruce Woodley of the group The Seekers had co-written the song, because Simon worked with him at the time. Not very likely. The song was covered by Neil Diamond too.

    :confused: :D
     
  8. Todd E

    Todd E Forum Resident

    Location:
    Hollywood-adjacent
    "some say...
     
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  9. Ben Sinise

    Ben Sinise Forum Reticent

    Location:
    Sydney
    This one's been mentioned before, see here
     
  10. audiodrome

    audiodrome Senior Member Thread Starter

    Location:
    North Of Boston
    "Not likely" seems like a pretty stupid remark. Why is it not likely? This person is probably not aware of the fact that Paul and Bruce wrote a bunch of other songs together. He probably doesn't even know who Bruce Woodley is - a great songwriter in his own right! :)
     
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  11. audiodrome

    audiodrome Senior Member Thread Starter

    Location:
    North Of Boston
    There also seems to be a little confusion regarding the songs, "Cloudy" and "I Wish You Could Be Here." Woodley claims that he co-wrote these songs (some Seekers compilations list him as co-writer) but apparently, his friendship with Simon deteriorated and he later struggled to get his share of the royalties. His songwriting credit was incorrectly omitted from the release of Parsley, Sage, Rosemary & Thyme and several Seekers compilations. However, the Cyrkle anthology, Red Rubber Ball lists him as co-writer on both of those songs, and officially, BMI lists him as co-writer (see below) so I don't know what the deal is. The 1995 Seekers box set doesn't even include "I Wish You Could Be Here" so maybe there was some on-going conflict. IMO, he certainly could have written both of those songs. A lot of his solo compositions of that time sound like Paul Simon's and vice versa.

    Cloudy

    I Wish You Could Be Here
     
  12. Scott Stone

    Scott Stone Forum Resident

    I saw Bruce Woodley interviewed on TV recently. He said after they co-wrote Cloudy Simon decided he didn't want anyone knowing he collaborated with anyone in his songwriting and pulled the credit. I think he said there was no dispute about royalties - only the credit. Woodley's version implies it was all due to Simon's vanity.
     
  13. audiodrome

    audiodrome Senior Member Thread Starter

    Location:
    North Of Boston
    So Woodley gets paid for this song but doesn't get credit? Is that a common songwriting arrangement? I suppose it's not bad considering that the P,S,R &T album sold fairly well, but credit would be nice too. I think Woodley is a fine songwriter and I agree that "I Wish You Could Be Here" is a beautiful song. I also love "Little Miss Sorrow, Child Of Tomorrow," a great Woodley (non-Seekers) song that Herman's Hermits did. :)
     
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  14. audiodrome

    audiodrome Senior Member Thread Starter

    Location:
    North Of Boston
    I'm going to bump this one for the weekend. I can understand Paul Simon not wanting to include Bruce Woodley's name on the otherwise "all-Simon & Garfunkel" Parsley, Sage, Rosemary & Thyme album but I wonder why his name was omitted on the Seekers Capitol Collectors Series CD? Every other Seekers compilation I have lists him as a co-wroter on "Cloudy" and "I Wish You Could Be Here." I also wonder if the omission of "I Wish You Could Be Here" from the Complete Seekers box set was a mistake or intentional because of this conflict? That appears to be the only Seekers commercial release that was left off.
     
  15. I love Paul Simon BUT he has been known to omit collaborators on the songwriting side of things. For example, Los Lobos apparently co-wrote "The Myth of the Fingerprints" from "Graceland". It was originally a Los Lobos song without lyrics that they had written (and if you look at the chord progession, style, etc. it does resemble their music more than Simon's).

    It wasn't unheard of to pay royalities to someone not credited McCartney arranged for Northern Songs- to do so for Fixing a Hole" , "Sgt. Pepper"to Mal Evans for his lyrical contributions. Macca and Lennon wanted all the songs listed as Lennon & McCartney (except of course Georges). Northern Songs also paid a % of royalities to Harrison and Starr for their contribution the band even if they had nothig to do with writing any Lennon-McCartney songs.
     
  16. audiodrome

    audiodrome Senior Member Thread Starter

    Location:
    North Of Boston
    Thanks for that bit of info. One of my main reasons for starting this thread was to see if anyone knew more about their collaboration - who did what? We obviously know what Paul Simon is capable of, lyrically and musically, but other than the half a dozen or so Seekers' songs, I'm not that familiar with Woodley's material. If you take "Little Miss Sorrow," "Rattler," and "Come The Day," the melodies and chord changes are very similar to the stuff Simon was writing during this time and the lyrics are very good, although maybe not as "philosophical" as Simon's. Being from Australia, Woodley probably wouldn't have written "From Berkeley to Carmel," so it's fair to say that Simon most likely wrote a lot of the lyrics to "Cloudy," but as far as the melody goes it's anyone's guess. As far as I'm concerned, either one of them could have written it alone, so for me, the big mystery is who influenced who and who contributed what? Maybe Simon influenced Woodley or maybe Woodley even influenced Simon's musical ideas somewhat or maybe they were just a good match, albeit a short one. :)
     
  17. PhilCohen

    PhilCohen Forum Resident

    And Art Garfunkel wrote the lyrics for the middle section of "America",but either wasn't credited or was rapidly stripped of credit. The first release of Yes' cover version(on the Atlantic UK sampler album "The New Age of Atlantic") credited the writing to Simon & Garfunkel.
     
  18. audiodrome

    audiodrome Senior Member Thread Starter

    Location:
    North Of Boston
    I haven't seen any of the recent Seekers compilations so I wonder if his name is still in the credits. The older compilations, other than the Capitol Collectors Series, list him as co-writer but I doubt we'll ever see his credit on a S&G release. Did the original LP of P,S,R & T have Woodley's name in the credits?
     
  19. Marry a Carrot

    Marry a Carrot Interesting blues gets a convincing reading.

    Location:
    Los Angeles
    Again I ask: do you have a source for that?
     
  20. PhilCohen

    PhilCohen Forum Resident

    It's what Garfunkel himself has claimed on at least one occasion.
     
  21. Marry a Carrot

    Marry a Carrot Interesting blues gets a convincing reading.

    Location:
    Los Angeles
    Does this appear in print somewhere?
     
  22. PhilCohen

    PhilCohen Forum Resident

    It probably did, more than 30 years ago. But, as I've said at least one cover version credits Garfunkel as a co-author.
     
  23. -Alan

    -Alan Senior Member

    Location:
    Connecticut, USA
    According to this little blurb, Paul Simon wrote the song and he did a demo version with Bruce Woodley.
     

    Attached Files:

  24. audiodrome

    audiodrome Senior Member Thread Starter

    Location:
    North Of Boston
    That's weird! I wonder what that's supposed to mean? :confused:
     
  25. william shears

    william shears Senior Member

    Location:
    new zealand
    Regarding 'Cloudy' Paul Simon hints at the songs melodic origin on the track 'Leaves That Are Green' from the Sounds of Silence LP. Listen to what the harpsichord counter-melody does after the line "...crumble in your hand" and there you have the exact melodic hook from Cloudy ("... don't know where the're going and my friend neither do I-I..Cloudy...")
    So Paul had some of the melody, and the words do sound like him...
     
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