Harper Simon’s has his father’s larynx. Talk about having the anxiety of influence. You’re making an album of catchy folky ballads and as soon as you open your mouth everyone’s thinking of Simon and Garfunkel. You’d need to be really good. Well, Harper Simon is really good. At times the finger-picked tunes sound like something his father might do, but in general he’s got more country-leanings (and the album gets more countrified as it progresses with lashings of pedal steel), his arrangements have been influenced by lush texture-obsessed contemporary indie bands, and he’s got a few unexpected melodic inflections and lyrical twists that (my wife pointed out) have a touch of Aimee Mann about them. So Harper Simon, he’s got his father’s larynx but his own muse.