Paul Simon hit the injured list yesterday, cancelling the last two of his three Philadelphia shows because of intense back pain. He hasn’t been performing this song of disillusionment, written in response to Richard Nixon’s re-election in 1972, on his current out-of-retirement tour, but it sure feels apropos to the moment.
I don’t know a soul who’s not been battered
I don’t have a friend who feels at ease
I don’t know a dream that’s not been shattered
Or driven to its knees
But it’s alright, it’s alright
For we lived so well so long
Still, when I think of the road we’re traveling on
I wonder what’s gone wrong
I can’t help it, I wonder what’s gone wrong
The song has been covered by lots of people, but I haven’t heard anybody give it the heartfelt reading it deserves as well as folksinger Darrell Scott, who covered it during the G.W. Bush years.
The lyrics are Simon’s, but the the tune isn’t really American – it dates to 1600, when German organist and composer Hans Leo Hassler composed “Mein G’müt ist mir verwirret,” a secular love song. The title translates as “my mind is confused,” a phrase Simon echoes in his opening line.
