Bookends by Simon and Garfunkel

Bookends, Simon & Garfunkel's fourth album, hit the racks on Columbia on April 3, 1968, and it's the sound of the duo reaching past the coffeehouse hush for something with more ambition. Paul Simon, Art Garfunkel and Roy Halee produced it themselves, piecing it together over the better part of a year, with John Simon (no relation to Paul) stepping in to help shape the songs when the songwriter's well ran dry.

Side one is a song cycle that follows a life from childhood to old age, and Simon's words turn over youth, disillusion, love gone complicated and the long walk toward mortality. Side two rounds up earlier singles and castoffs meant for The Graduate, including the hit version of "Mrs. Robinson", which went all the way to number one. The album topped the charts in America and Britain and put the pair right up with Dylan, the Beatles and the Stones at the front of the counterculture.

Written with AI assistance from RockLists chart data, MusicBrainz and Wikipedia.