The Rhythm Of The Saints

Let those who never thought culture stopped at the first world's borders, who never thought it was only happening in English, cast the first stone at Paul Simon and mock his work as patronising. To do so is to miss the point. Western music will die on its feet unless it learns to assimilate outside influences rather than repel them and if people like Simon or David Byrne or any of the other World Music daytrippers can offer a handrail to the nervous then so be it.

Despite some of the bad judgements and absurd hype that surrounded Graceland, the album did help facilities a greater awareness of indigenous African music's and the continuing upsurge of black-based popular styles. And if, as some hope, the musicians of South America will one day be to the record industry's corporate capitals what the Mississippi Delta bluesmen were to Chicago, then I'm sure that Rhythm Of The Saints will be seen as a small but significant step in that process.

The album is basically a finely-woven tapestry of Brazilian and Puerto Rican rhythms against which Simon has splashed his characteristic day-glo melodies and lurid, crazy-paving lyrics. It's far more of a complete collection than was Graceland so what it loses in terms of standout singles it gains in cohesion. The songs are also more muted and subtle, more deferential to the musical backdrop. Each track ignites into a loping percussive groove and then slowly but surely the tunes seep out from beneath the drum beats. The incongruity for incongruity's sake which Simon often seems so fond of is kept well in check throughout.

Side One is almost a continuous suite. From the stop/start understatement of 'The Obvious Child' to the soaring slurs and twists of 'Further To Fly'. Simon and his various ensembles alternate ferocious swoops with sure-handed restraint but the changes in gear are almost unnoticeable. For the South Americans, drums are more than mere ballast, they are themselves instruments of locomotion: darting, feinting, circling, disappearing and suddenly appearing again in a different spot. As a result, Simon's song structure is even more scattershot than usual. Images gush and trickle, their impact entirely dependent on what way the wind from the percussionists is blowing.

Probably most satisfying are the more loose-limbed, free-form songs like 'She Moves On' with its jazzy blasts of carnival brass, the labyrinthine 'Spirit Voices' and the frisky little track. But such is the dexterity and variety of the moods, styles and musicianship on display that each and every track contains highlights of its own.

As others have pointed out, Paul Simon's apparent determination to become more ethnographer than songwriter carries with it some dubious implications for his own artistic future. His unwillingness to apply himself lyrically to the lands of his treasure troves is also more than a little disappointing. However, for the fact that he has again successfully enmeshed Western song values into the fibres of another precious musical fabric without gelding the filly, Rhythm Of The Saints deserves to be applauded. And heard.