Do you suppose Kathy is feeling a tad old...hearing the news that her boyfriend from the 60's is in his 70's and on a retirement tour? (The same KATHY mentioned in Paul's "America" song covered weirdly by David Bowie, link below??)
Maybe she actually doesn't think about the little guy that much. Maybe she thinks too much about other things besides "Think Too Much." Ya think?
I think she may think, "When is another obnoxious photographer from the London Daily Fail going to come out here to an obscure part of Wales, and take another unflattering photo of me? Why pick on ME when there's momentarily no wardrobe malfunction on a Kardashian and no Hadid exposing underboob?"
Why am I mentioning Kathy? Because this is not only a music post offering a link to an odd-choice song Bowie sang as a "tribute" after 9/11, it also reviews the new bio on Paul, which didn't invade the woman's privacy by showing a photo of how she looks now. That's what TABLOIDS do, and really, SHOULD they??
It's possible that if Kathy took a long distance call and answered some questions, the new official (Paul cooperated) bio would answer any questions morbidly curious people have about her (and the song). Yet, even though asked, she chose NOT to participate in the book.
Do you suppose if somebody from the LONDON DAILY FAIL had ASKED if she'd mind him taking a picture, she would've said yes? Of course not. So the guy snapped it without her knowing about it. Right? And after that, she couldn't sue because she's a "public figure."
Link to the London Daily Fail Article
Since I like my readers to have an EASY time, and not have to click a link and then come back, I'll also give you the top part of the article, which is fair use, and I'll also show you the photo, which you'll see has no photo credit or copyright notice. Follow me:
The authorized "Paul Simon: THE LIFE" doesn't put a lid on any of the questions and controversies in the great man's life. The author doesn't analyze songs (even ones that have baffled people for years, like "Me and Julio").
The "authorized" Paul not only ignores Kathy Chitty, but ignores almost all of his wearisome bickerings with Garfunkel. He and his biogrpaher also don't explain how he and his third wife Edie ended up facing a judge in an embarrassing case of marital fighting. And NO, there's not much on the youthful first serious love affair that yielded some memorable songs.
“The Life” offers a few second-hand quotes about Kathy via a a couple she knew back then, the McCauslands. Lynne McCausland doesn’t say much: “Kathy was lovely, very gentle, very shy and quiet. Paul had his quiet and shy side, so they fit each other perfectly.”
Paul Simon, on a memorable SNL show, admitted that people come up to him and say “you take yourself SO seriously...” In “The Life,” his relationship with Kathy is taken so seriously that it becomes silly. While the woman refuses to talk, it turns out there's ONE THING she wanted to be in the book: the exact month she and Paul met. THAT is important:
“Contrary to repeated reports over the years that they met during Simon’s first trip to England in 1963 (Simon recalled simply seeing her taking tickets on the stops of the Brentwood Folk Club at the that time), they met formally in April 1964. Simon was performing at the White Swan in Romford when Dave McCausland introduced him to Kathy, a shy eighteen-year-old with long, brown hair. The date was supplied by someone close to Kathy, someone who - with both Kathy’s confirmation and permission - wanted to finally set the record straight.”
Does that make your day? Will the month of April mean something different to you know? April, come she will? He glimpsed her in 1963, but was introduced to her in 1964. The taciturn Mr. Simon, who supposedly spent weeks and weeks being grilled by his biographer only remarks: “It felt like love at first sight. I had never felt that. It was just chemistry.” Anything else? “They may not have said anything more than hello that first night, Simon remembers, but they spent time together the next night, when she and a few other Brentwood folk fans went with him to the Troubadour club in central London, where he sang three songs.”
Hey, the song about her says it all. There but for the grace of her go him.
The London Daily Fail, having snapped a Chitty, didn't offer much real information other than "the 68 year-old grandmother" leads a "humdrum life...in a quiet Welsh-speaking village...in a small, detached three-bedoom house on a quiet cul-de-sac, and catches a bus each day to her job as an administrator for a technical college, where she has worked for 25 years." That's more than "The Life" tells us about her.
"The Life" doesn't quote the guy who has had a 40 year relationship with her, Kenneth Harrison. Journeying to that "remote mountain village in North Wales," the London Daily Fail reporter at least got him to admit that they have three children, and used to live in Essex. And that Kathy's fame as a muse was never amusing to her: ‘She wasn’t very comfortable with it. We’re very good friends with Mr Simon and there’s never been a rift. I was there. I was part of that crowd as the second person to meet Paul Simon when he came to Britain in 1963. "America" is the one song which we’ll never escape from because it’s a song about America losing its way.’
It is an irony, then, that David Bowie chose to sing "America" when thousands of Americans had just lost their way...staggering from the smoke and debris at the office buildings in which they worked at 9/11.
The song was an odd choice, as "America" is more about alienation and ennui with the American dream. Paul wrote "each town looks the same to me" about touring, but in this song, it seems like this young couple may have some moments that are light-hearted (making fun of fellow passengers) but in the end, it's "toss me a cigarette..." and read some magazines, and these famous lines:
“Kathy I’m lost, I said, though I knew she was sleeping. I’m empty and aching and I don’t know why…” People looking for recollections of a passionate romance between Paul and Kathy get the sound of silence, because like most anyone's puppy love, the end came because immature people eventually drift apart and find new interests, and if they remain they would only endure everyday monotony, ennui and empty yearnings.
From “The Life” we learn…little: “In “America,” the narrator’s companion is a young woman named Kathy, which, understandably, led fans to assume that he and Kathy Chitty had taken a trip together during her visit in 1966, but there was no Simon-Kathy bus trip, Simon said. The images in the song were based on his own travels.” It’s always a little dicey, and ridiculous, to try and navigate between an artist’s fantasies and intellectual creativity, and his reality. Why be so eager to think that “America” is a journal song, and not a work of fiction?
They met in England, Paul had to come back to America, he later returned, and things just drifted. No big quotes from Paul or from Kathy. On page 237: “While on break, he flew to London to see if he and Kathy could figure out a way to make their lives compatible…he and Kathy acknowledged what had been apparent to them both for some time: their lives had simply drifted apart.” No quote from Kathy, of course. The author apparently couldn’t get Paul to comment further, so relies on a previous quote pried out of him by somebody else: “There was no big drama in our breakup,” Simon said years later. “I don’t remember ever having an argument with Kathy.”
Too bad, porn lovers, there will probably never be a graphic description of Chitty bang-bang, and how unseemly it would be to even imagine Paul Simon in the role of passionate lover. They were just a cute couple for a year or two. That's what the cover of "Paul Simon Songbook" shows you, doesn't it? She's just an old flame.
Speaking of flame, the smoke was probably still in the air, and part of the core of the WTC was still glowing orange when David Bowie joined a bunch of superstars for a “Concert for New York City.” As Tom Lehrer might cynically declare, what better way of solving problems than to fire some songs at it? “Ready, aim, SING!” Some of the stars in attendance were only there because it would be good publicity. Others sang weird defiant new songs (McCartney’s peculiar “FREEDOM”) or sing weirdly inappropriate oldies (McCartney again, doing “I’m Down.”
Why is the famous David Bowie on this blog of less renown? This blog of obscure performers? Because his cover of "America" was deemed by some to be inappropriate if not weird. For some reason known only to Sergeant Pepper’s ghost, Bowie sang the song with an oom-pah-pah waltzing tempo. Some androgynes in the band fluted it along with Ferris wheel wind toots.
What was anyone expecting? A morbid twist on ground zero by re-writing "Ground control to Major Tom?" New lyrics for "Suffer a Jet City?" No, it was good enough that he was there, being a New Yorker, even if his choice of song was odd, and the arrangement odder. Who doesn’t adore Bowie, and the vocal styles that are sort of an anemic version of Anthony Newley? The Brit decided to come live in New York, and when disaster came, he sang for "America."
DAVID BOWIE sings AMERICA - instant download or listen online. No Paypal tip whining, no grinning emoji of brattiness, no taking you to a freak site that will put spyware on you, tell you your FLASH is out of date, or re-direct you to hell.
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