Grayslant

The first album I ever bought was Paul Simon's Graceland, on cassette.  I liked the single Call Me Al and my Wise Elder Brother suggested that I should spend my money on buying it instead of some more Technical Lego, Dungeons and Dragons modules, or other such nerdy stuff.  Sure, Paul Simon is pretty nerdy for a musician, but you've got to start somewhere.  I gave him $12 and he bought it for me at K-Mart the next time he was in town.

I had a number of misconceptions about the album though.  Such as its name.  It wasn't until I actually had it in my hand that I realized it was called Graceland, not Grayslant.  Also, it wasn't until then that I realized that the little guy in the video clip for Call Me Al was Paul Simon.  I had assumed that Chevy Chase was Paul Simon, and to this day I think he may actually be him.

It was years before I realized that the National guitar that is mentioned in the first line of the first song is actually a brand of guitar.  I thought that the National Guitar was some of guitar monument, akin to the Big Pineapple.  I think I found this out while watching a documentary about Dire Straits and they mentioned the National guitar on the cover of Brothers In Arms.  It was a revelation to me.

It was also a long time before I found out that Graceland was an actual real Elvis-related place.  I thought he was just being metaphorical, as in a Graceful Land.  I think I realized this when I heard Mark Cohn's Walking In Memphis.  Spent a while wondering why everyone was so obsessed with Memphis.  That was around the same time I found out that Priscilla Presley also had an Elvis connection.  Huh - who knew?

The funny thing was that at the time I was great friends with a kid who grew up in Zimbabwe.  I played the tape one day while we played some Dungeons and Dragons, and he remarked that the music was heaps like the songs he'd heard in Africa.  I basically thought he was full of it.  Of course, turns out he wasn't.  How about that...

Anyway, that's all from this particular Human Trampoline.  Hope you're enjoying your holidays if you're on 'em and your work if you ain't.