Music
Carole King
An icon turns 80
Over the course of several decades, Carole King has firmly established her place as one of the most influential songwriters of the last 50 years.
King has written or co-written over 100 songs that have charted on Billboard’s Hot 100. She has recorded 25 solo records, including 1971’s Tapestry, which topped the charts for 15 weeks. It would hold a place on the list for the next 6 years.
King got her start writing as a staff songwriter for Brill with then-husband Gerry Goffin. Between them, the two penned many hits, including “The Locomotion” for Little Eva (who happened to be the couple’s babysitter).
After the pair divorced, King moved to California’s famed Laurel Canyon, where she met and collaborated with artists like James Taylor and Joni Mitchell. Her breakthrough came with her 2nd record, Tapestry — far and away her most successful.
The first three tracks; (“I Feel the Earth Move, “So Far Away,” and “It’s Too Late”) represent the cycle of a romantic relationship.
Carole King’s Tapestry is a triumph of mass culture. In less than two years it has sold well over five million copies, putting it in a class with the best-selling albums of all time, and it is still on the charts … Such statistics are so overwhelming that they seem to…
