In early January of 1971 songwriter Carole King recorded her 2nd solo album as a singer.  When Tapestry was release a few months later, no one knew nor imagine how popular the album would become.

It was the biggest Album of 1971 remaining at the Number 1 spot for 15 weeks and on the Album Charts for over 6 years.

This is the Album’s title song.

All of the songs on the Album were written or co-written by King including a couple of songs that she had written with her ex-husband Gerry Goffin and  had been huge hits by others in the 1960s.

The Album would win the Grammy for Album of the Year.  It’s Too Late would win Record of the Year and the song You’ve Got a Friend a song on the album and also recorded by her friend James Taylor would be Song of the Year.  Taylor sang backup on her version.

Not sure when this version was recorded.

With Carole King, the song’s composer backing him on piano.

This is James Taylor’s only number 1 on the Billboard charts reaching the top spot on July 31, 1971.

The album Mud Slide Slim and the Blue Horizon, the album where this song first appeared, peaked at the Number 2 spot on the albums charts. It was prevented from reaching Number 1 because Carole Kings’s Tapestry held the top spot. King’s album included her version of her song.

The song received two Grammy Awards. James Taylor won Best Pop Vocal Performance, Male for the song. It also won Best Song of the Year. Carole King was one of the few, if not the only, person to be involved in the winning of all five of the Grammy top awards. Along with these two she also won Record of the Year for It’s Too Late. Album of the Year for Tapestry as well as Best Pop Vocal Performance, Female.

Grand Funk, the self proclaimed American Band, was pure rock band. In 1974 as they were working on their album Shinin’ On and was thinking that they may need one more song to complete it. Mark Farner as a lark began singing ‘Everybody’s doing a brand new dance now’, which with standard reaction other members of the band thought, ‘Yeah, Grand Funk doing the Locomotion’. After thought they said Why not and turned out this version of the ’60′s pop classic.

The Locomotion became the group’s 2nd Number 1 single and their biggest selling single.

The original version was done in 1962 by Little Eva, the 13 year old baby sitter of the song’s writers Carole King and Gerry Goffin.

In the 1980′s the song became a hit again this time by Australian Kylie Minogue.

Carole King has performed the song many time in her live shows. This version was from the Coming Home Concert in the early 1990′s.

In 1975 Carole King teamed with author Maurice Sendak to bring characters from some of his Children books to the television screen. Really Rosie debuted on CBS TV in February 1975.

Carole King voiced the part of Rosie as well as performing the songs. She released the album of songs that reached Number 20 on the album charts.

They expanded the story creating a stage musical that has appeared in London and Off-Broadway.

The Bee Gees had the year’s number 5 most popular song with How Can You Mend a Broken Heart. In some way 1971 could be marked as the end of one part of their career since after 1971 their popularity decreased until the rise of Disco a few years later.

Even though to some the Osmonds seemed like the white Jackson 5, the brothers had been singing together for over 10 years when they recorded their self-named album and reached the top with their most popular song One Bad Apple. Many loved it since it was the number 4 song of the year.

Tapestry was Carole King’s second solo album and it became one of the biggest selling albums of all time. The release of It’s Too Late and I Feel The Earth Move on the same single record gave disc jockeys a hard choice on which to play. While I liked both songs, my favorite side was I Feel The Earth Move.

Rod Stewart also had a two sided hit record with Maggie May and Reason to Believe. This release helped him to establish himself as s solo star and was the number 2 bestselling record of the year. My feeling is that the best song done by Stewart in 1971 was with him as the singer of Faces and their song Stay With Me.

When I first saw the song Joy to the World by Three Dog Night listed on a chart, it was listed on a top 40 chart published by a newspaper before I heard the song, I was wondering why 1) a Christmas song was doing on the charts and 2) why it was still therw in April? Since then I’ve enjoyed plenty of wine (figurately) with my friend the Bull Frog, Jeremiah.

And this list doesn’t include a couple of album tracks that not only are a couple of my favorite songs, they are favorites of many others. Led Zeppelin’s Stairway to Heaven or any other song from that album and The Who’s Won’t get Fooled Again. And even though it was recorded in 1970 and released that same year, it was in 1971 that my all time favorite song was released as single record. Chicago’s Colour My World.

Originally appeared on 6ThingsToConsider.com. Many thanks to Steven G. Atkinson for allowing this reprint.

Carly Simon was born a rich kid, her father was Richard L. Simon co-founder book publisher Simon & Schuster. In the early 1960s she recorded with her older sister Lucy and together they had a minor hit “Winkin’, Blinkin’, and Nod”. In 1971 she released her first solo album, which was also a self titled album. It featured the hit “That’s the Way I’ve Always Heard it Should Be”. Her second album Anticipation had a hit with the single of the same name, but it was a song from her third album, No Secrets that produced the song “You’re So Vain”. A song as mysterious today as it was in 1972 since she has never said who would think, “This song is about you”. Shortly later she married James Taylor. Although at times the marriage was rocky they did make nice music together.

Linda Ronstadt at one time was called the Queen of Rock. In the 1960s she was the lead singer of the folk group Stone Poneys and releasing the popular song “Different Drum” in 1967. Beginning in 1969 she began recording as a solo artist and her fourth album Heart Like A Wheel was a breakaway hit. It featured her highest charting song “You’re No Good”. Throughout the rest of the 70s and on she was a music superstar.

Stevie Nicks and her boyfriend Lindsay Buckingham were recoding together when Buckingham was invited to be a part of Fleetwood Mac replacing their departing guitarist Bob Welch. He agreed only if they would also take Stevie Nicks. Their first album with the group was Fleetwood Mac and would have the Nicks songs “Rhiannon” and “Landslide”, two songs that propelled the group to musical superstars after 8 years.

No one would disagree that the The Queen of Disco is Donna Summer. She started her career as a backup singer, and in 1975 she was working with Giorgio Moroder. Together they put together the Disco song ‘Love to Love you Baby”. this was the first of a series of hits for Summer as she topped the charts with his disco inspired songs.

We have the Queen of Rock and the Queen of disco and while Aretha Franklin will always be the Queen of Soul, she really deserves the simple title of Queen. She began recording in the 1960s and even today her voice is a strong as ever. From 1968 until 1975 she won the Grammy Award each year for Best R&B Artist. In all she has won 18 Grammy’s. One of her biggest songs, although not recorded in the 70s, was the Carole King/Gerry Goffin’s “(You Make Me Feel Like) A Natural Woman”.

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Many thanks to Steven G. Atkinson at 6 Things To Consider for allowing this to be posted here. Please give him a visit,

Not sure where this video originally appeared, but it’s a nice version of one of the best songs from her great LP Tapestry.