Saul Pymon began his musical career during the 1970’s when he teamed up with Leon Sparkfussell to form the legendary Pymon and Sparkfussell. After recording a few albums together, the duo broke up and Pymon has since launched an extremely busy solo career that has him on the road every day of the year. When not performing at numerous small bars across the country, he has memberships in several bands, including the Phoenix-based Murray Brothers Band along with the Strominger jazz trio that performs nightly in New York City. Indeed, Pymon’s life is one full of constant traveling and performing, but he just hasn’t been able to find the national recognition he has been so desperate to seek.
So it was recently that he had his big chance to gain that recognition on national television when he was selected as the musical guest on “Saturday Night Life”. He was aware this was a make-or-break moment but chose the wrong approach. Instead of performing one of the classic Pymon and Sparkfussell songs that made him so famous early in his career, Pymon chose to debut songs from his recent solo album with lyrics that had audiences all over the world scratching their heads, such as this one from his first song:
Driving down the interstate
With a bucket over my head
I said I’m driving down the interstate
With a bucket over my head
I said I’m driving down the interstate with a two-gallon bucket over my head
Are there holes in the side? No.
So I’m driving down the interstate
With a bucket over my headI can’t see where I’m going
I hope your car’s insured
I said I can’t see where I’m going
I hope your car’s insured
I said I can’t see where I’m going and I hope your car’s insured
I hope you have collision coverage because you’re going to need it
Because I’m driving down the interstate with a bucket over my head
Pymon concluded the song to some very scattered applause as a majority of people in the audience were still scratching their heads. This was not the Saul Pymon they remembered from the 1970’s, they thought. Why is this guy singing about driving down the interstate with a bucket over his head? His second song later in the show was even more bizarre:
O Mother of the mine
So heaven, so divine
I wish that I were nine
So I can at least grow a spineYou say, what’s it to you?
For I know it on the bayou
Stinky mud and closet kazoo
Does love reach out to you?
Saturday!But I pause and reflect
As one of nature’s rejects
Nothing planned or special effects
Yet I pause for collectAlas comes the day
Everything’s going your way
What can I do? What can I say?
Saturday!Any given Sunday
Follows that day Monday
Then Tuesday and Wednesday
After which is Friday comes then
Saturday!
When Pymon finished performing his second song, he was greeted with total silence from the audience. He had just bombed, big time. His appearance on “Saturday Night Life” was a disaster and he was banned from ever performing there again.
And so, Pymon is back on the endless road, performing as usual at bars across the country as well as with the Murray Brothers Band along with Strominger. This time though, he now has to deal with snickers from the audience as a reminder of his disastrous appearance on “Saturday Night Life”. He could have gained a vast audience in appreciation of his lengthy musical career but instead, he’s just another musical has-been on the stage whose career took a detour away from fame and fortune and towards struggle and snickers.
MJBDiver.com 