Paul Simon

Songs From Capeman

heavy-handed and insipid

Review Score:

(2/10)
Re: "The Capeman" (Broadway musical) v. "Songs from the Capeman" (recording):

1) "Songs from the Capeman" is NOT a cast recording. Only a few members of the cast perform on it, and none are featured. (Rarely are Broadway flops made into cast albums. Don't expect a "Capeman" cast album.) Even if the phrase "Concept Cast Album" meant something, "Songs from the Capeman" would not be a "Concept Cast Album".

2) Rather, "Songs from the Capeman" is what its title says it is--or would be but: none of the lyrics and little of the music (because we have mostly genre music here--deliberately a collection of musical cliches) makes sense without the story the songs tell, and the story the songs tell, I gather, is the same story the musical told. The songs here are carefully ordered so as to make a narrative; Simon's liner notes explicitly give us the context; and the recording is peppered with historical snippets of the actual Capeman speaking. (He is not a compelling creature or persuasive speaker at any time in his life.)

3) Thus if you read hastily it may appear that some persons here are reviewing the musical not the recording. But if you read more closely you will see that nearly everyone here explains directly or obliquely that he is reviewing the recording not the musical. For that matter, very few people even ATTENDED the musical.

4) Now like the vast majority of pop music and musical theatre enthusiasts I did not witness the Broadway musical "The Capeman", so I very well may be missing something, but from the evidence presented on this recording, it is difficult for me to see how someone might dislike the musical and still like the songs.

5) This is my theory: The professional theatre reviewers who were obliged to review "The Capeman" unfavorably wanted desparately to cut Simon some slack, to praise SOMETHING, so they praised "The Capeman"'s music. The amateur reviewers who are reviewing "Songs from the Capeman" favorably are merely parroting the professional reviewers without understanding them.

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