Is One Man Dog James Taylor’s Most Misunderstood Album?
One Man Dog was an album unique to James Taylor’s discography and probably his most polarizing. Some hail it as an eccentric masterpiece and others an album filled with unfinished sketches of songs. However you feel about it, there’s no doubt that it’s definitely one of his most interesting.
In the early ’70s, Taylor was a premier singer-songwriter and the face of the movement. He achieved super stardom with 1970’s Sweet Baby James, which included some of his most renowned classics, like the title track and the gripping tale of drug addiction, “Fire and Rain.” Unlike many other acts, Taylor didn’t attempt to follow up Sweet Baby James with similar work. The album’s predecessor, Mud Slide Slim and the Blue Horizon was a sly album of quiet confidence and musical breadth.
By late 1972 it was clear that Warner Brothers wanted more work from Taylor and he delivered. Taylor released One Man Dog in November 1972 to an anticipating audience, and by this point he had carved out an interesting niche for himself.
Although he wad thought of as a “singer-songwriter,” he stayed clear of the pitfalls of the title and was canny enough to follow his muse with new sounds — not simply…
