You Belong to Me

 I think it's time that I made a rather terrible confession.  I...um...am rather obsessed with...um...Carly Simon.  Okay, there, I admitted it.

It's a bit embarrassing, I know.  I've been listening to a ton of 70's styled pop lately mixed with some early 80's pop.  Carly Simon.  Linda Ronstadt.  Stephen Bishop.  Jackson Browne.  Am I just showing my age?  Perhaps.  Maybe I've finally crossed into that land of being truly old.  Sigh.

Back to Carly...  I don't know what it is but there's just somethin'.  And, to be completely honest, I got my first Carly album, "The Best of Carly Simon", for free back in the days of the Columbia House/BMG 10 CD's for 1 penny days.  I kind of got it on a lark and never thought I'd actually like it.  However, about 2 minutes into the opening track, the classic "That's the Way I've Always Heard it Should Be", one of the true greats, in my opinion, and my jaw completely hit the floor.  This was back around 2000 maybe?  So, yeah, I wasn't really that old and I was already hooked.

I will never forget talking about this embarrassment back then at work with this much older lady named Margaret.  She immediately said, "Oh, yeah, Carly Simon!  I don't know what it is but every time she comes on the radio my husband goes ape sh*t."  I'm not making that up...those were her exact words, and this from a woman that I had never even heard swear before, although maybe she did a lot and I was just never around to hear it.  Regardless, I guess I'm kind of in the same club as her husband.

I just recently picked up "Boys in the Trees", now that I've fully accepted that I'm probably going to buy at least every single earlier album of hers.  I had "No Secrets" on my phone for well over a year and would walk almost daily to it.  I just never got sick of it.  Call me crazy but I think "The Right Thing to Do" is quite possibly one of my favorite songs of all time and I find myself singing it around the house almost daily.

My newest favorite which never fails to stop me in my tracks is "You Belong to Me".  I mean, what the hell?  Maybe I've completely lost my mind, I don't know, but I simply love this song.  I mean, I treat this song like other people would treat some hard rocking anthem from somebody like AC/DC.  I must have lost it.

She has tons of goofy and terribly cheesy tunes as well but somehow I can overlook it which is pretty unusual for me.  Strangely, I can't stand James Taylor, her husband back then, who happens to sing on quite a few tracks and what I'd consider almost ruin them.  It's just something about that voice of hers and especially her harmonies.  Did I mention that it all started because of the new age artist Andreas Vollenweider?  I got his album "Eolian Minstrel" also from the Columbia House days and there's a song on it called "Private Fires" that Carly sings lead vocals on.  All I can say is that it's been one of the most haunting songs to me ever since I first heard it around 1996 and this is what eventually led me to get the greatest hits album.

Maybe I've just always been an old soul?  I remember back in the early 90's, back when I was in my 20's only, where this guy I worked with did a massive double take when he asked what I was currently listening to at home, and my response was Al Stewart.  He laughed, thinking I was joking, looked uncomfortable when he realized I wasn't, and then said in a snarky manner, "You know, I just have a hard time seeing you 'rockin' out' to Al Stewart on a Friday night."  I thought to myself, well, you don't know me very well, now, do you?  I still 'rock out' to Al Stewart, in fact I still consider "Between the Wars" one of the all time greats.

Well, thanks for listening and allowing me to tell my deep dark 'secret'.  I feel slightly better.  I'm actually considering writing/recording a 70's pop styled album in the near future.  If that happens, then you'll know that I've completely lost it.