"Soft Parachutes" is a song written by Paul Simon and performed in his 1980 film One Trick Pony. The song is reminiscent of his early material, which covered issues such as war and the civil rights movement. The song was written for the film, in which Simon's character, Jonah Levin, is asked to play his anti-war ballad "Soft Parachutes" at a reunion show of 1960s stars.
The song is just a fragment (chorus,verse,chorus); it would be interesting to know if it was a bit of material actually written and then abandoned in the 60's, a time in which, though Simon now says he was not much into the protest scene, he actually wrote a number of gentle anti-war songs (though nothing so overtly anti-Vietnam War).
The song is available on the soundtrack reissue of One Trick Pony.
It features only a chorus (sung twice) and one verse - it is not clear whether any other verses were written for the song.
Famous quotes containing the word soft:
“O fat white woman whom nobody loves,
Why do you walk through the fields in gloves,
When the grass is soft as the breast of doves
And shivering-sweet to the touch?”
—Frances Cornford (1886–1960)