The Common Ills: Talking entry -- Carly Simon, Carole King, Mustafa al-Kadhimi and more

Saturday, September 05, 2020

Talking entry -- Carly Simon, Carole King, Mustafa al-Kadhimi and more

Humpty Dumpty had a great fall. That's me today. We'll start with that because I'm sure I'm groggy. Had a series of errands to run this morning. Didn't finish them all because I fell in a parking lot. Didn't see a rock/loose piece of concrete and pitched forward hard onto the concrete. Somehow I managed to damage both sides of my left hand. Only the palm of my right hand, but the palm and the other side of the left hand. The doctor said the left wrist was sprained.

Despite the pandemic, others were out doing errands as well so that was a big fall in front of a large number people. I decided to laugh as I was getting up and say, "Well that hurt." Thank you to the two men who helped me as I was getting up, by the way. So I went to the doctor banged up the knees bad. The right one had the doctor concerned (and it hurt when I got home and went up the stairs) but he didn't think I hit my head. I did. It was the last thing that slammed into the concrete. While he was looking me over, he noted that a bump was coming up on my forehead and agreed I had hit my head. But the face wasn't scratched at all. I've got a big tough head. (I've really got a big head, physically big, no joke. I wasn't aware of it until senior year in high school when someone commented on it. But it's big.)

I came home and slowly went up the stairs -- the right leg hurt to bend at the knee and going up the stairs is bending the knees. I turned on the TV and went to sleep to Woody's BANANAS on TCM. Yes, my doctor had advised staying up for X hours (I don't remember the number, I'm still groggy) but I heal better with sleep. I also did not take a medication picked up today that boosts my immune system (it's somehow part of the additional drugs now that I'm back on chemo) because while it boosts that, it slows healing on the outside of the body. I've had a cut for three weeks on a finger from slicing an onion that's scabbed lightly over but not gone away due to that drug.

I got up during that time period once for the bathroom -- oh, the joys of diabetes. It was murder to walk, I had to drag the right leg. On the way back to bed, I made a little Marilyn Monroe cocktail of 2 gabapentin, a hydrocodone and 2 acetaminophens. I'm supposed to take the gabapentin daily -- several times a day -- but never do (usually forget it but sometimes skip it because it make me sleepy -- and groggy -- it's for the diabetic nerve pain).

Went back to sleep and had a series of dreams where I visited all the bookstores I've loved over the years -- many of which are now closed. :( I'm listening to Carly Simon's HELLO BIG MAN -- the video at the top is "Damn You Get To Me -- no. I told you I was groggy. It's "You Don't Feel The Same." It's one of my favorite songs from HELLO BIG MAN ("Damn You Get To Me" is also a favorite from the album). For some reason, in the dreams, in every bookstore, Carly Simon's HELLO BIG MAN was there in some form. A poster, the album (this was in four dreams), the album without the front cover, the album with an alternate cover (Peter Simon's photograph instead of Lynn Kohlman's head shot of Carly) and a songbook of HELLO BIG MAN. There was never a songbook for that album, by the way, not in real life, before anyone goes looking.

I don't understand, by the way, why artists don't sell their sheet music online at their own sites. I think Rickie Lee Jones did that for a little bit but it would make sense. Let them download it there and it would be income for you or gather it up in a folio with a -- whatever you'd call that ring binding (Carly had it on one of the songbook collections in the 90s -- THE SONGS OF CARLY SIMON). It would be easy to produce and sing your name to it and you could probably net a goodly amount from fans.

(Below is THE SONGS OF CARLY SIMON songbook with the spiral binding. Spiral binding is better for piano, you don't have to break the binding and you don't have to worry that in ten or so years the whole things falls apart.)

Carly's not Carole King in the music publishing world, but she is a strong seller. People in music publishing will talk about that endlessly. Carole is one of the few artist who has an album in sheet music that's never been out of print. TAPESTRY has been in print since the album came out. No single artist (as opposed to a group) in the US can make that claim except Carole. I've got four versions of TAPESTRY in my music room. Initially, it came out in a smaller size, by the way (the one below on the right is the original version, the one on the left is from 2016).

And I'm thinking here, they don't talk about that online. CRAPAPEDIA and the other sources don't talk about that.

Do they not have people who play music contributing?

Back to Carly. The early 80s, after TORCH, weren't a good selling period for her. HELLO BIG MAN was not a big seller and it was her first studio album of her songs (we're putting TORCH aside -- it was an album of classic torch songs plus one Carly Simon song -- and Stephen Sondheim's song was newer than the classics like "I Get Along Without You Very Well") -- her first studio album that did not get released as a songbook.

A songbook, for any who didn't know or hasn't already figured out, is also known as a folio. It's sheet music with piano-vocal-guitar arrangements. There are a number of 'evergreens' (ones that are published forever) but they're usually something like CARLY SIMON ANTHOLOGY or THE EAGLES GREATEST HITS. They're hit collections -- collections of songs that are hits -- hits on the charts, yes, but also songs that didn't really hit on the radio but hit in publishing. Again, Carole King's TAPESTRY is the only individual album that has been in songbook form since it was released. It has never gone out of print in songbook and that just doesn't happen. From 1971 forward, TAPESTRY had been in print, it sells every year and it sells like a greatest hits (possibly because it includes not just Carole's hits "It's Too Late," "I Feel The Earth Move" and "So Far Away" as well as her covers of songs she wrote that others had hits with -- "Will You Still Love Me Tomorrow?," "You've Got A Friend," "Smackwater Jack" and "You Make Me Feel Like A Natural Woman").

Give Carole her due because no other album has accomplished that. SGT. PEPPER'S LONELY HEARTS CLUB BAND, an album I love, for example has not remained in print, Pink Floyd's DARK SIDE OF THE MOON has not remained in print, and it's not noted, it's a single achievement that no other artist has had and Carole doesn't even get the recognition.

Back to Carly, even in Carly's less successful eighties career, she still sold in publishing. In fact, there was a notable increase -- a rather large surge -- in demand for her songs on sheet music (individual songs, not songbooks) starting in 1985. It was so big that in 1988 (after her comeback), HAL LEONARD would re-release her hits on individual sheet music. It's also why there wasn't a COMING AROUND AGAIN songbook. That album was Carly's comeback and it sold like crazy. But, again in 1985, she'd seen a huge surge in her publishing sales. They had a ton of old Carly Simon sheet music in various warehouses and it would have been pulped but for the demand, that surprised insiders, that started in 1985. It did result in sales of some of her songbooks as well but it was mainly her individual songs. "Haven't Got Time For The Pain," "You're So Vain" and "Jesse" were the three biggest sellers from 1985 until 1988 -- at which point, HAL LEONARD re-released those songs (and others) with the photo of Carly at the piano that was the standard black & white photo the press ran with after her Academy Award win - Grammy Win - Golden Globe win for composing "Let The River Run."

"And others''? Carly does not push "That's The Way I've Always Heard It Should Be." It's her first hit but she was ripped off on the publishing and Elephant's Memory members get some of the money from that song. It's why she doesn't perform it in any special where she does her hits. Natalie Maines was an idiot for covering it and saying she was 'honoring' Carly. Carly doesn't perform it because of the royalty situation. If you're going to honor her, pick another song.

But HAL LEONARD issued it and other songs individually on sheet music -- and they sold. Surprisingly -- these new songs usually weren't that great. I'm speaking of the printed notes on the paper. "Haven't Got Time For The Pain," for example, in its original individual form (it's the same form that's in the HOTCAKES songbook and THE CARLY SIMON COMPLETE songbook) is the arrangement from the recording session. Meaning you're playing the same music that you hear on the recording -- or close to it. The HAL LEONARD re-issue was the vocal melody fleshed out with some left hand chords. (See image below -- spiral one is the HAL LEONARD newer version, one on the right is the original version.)

Does anybody online write about any of this? If you love music and you play music, this is a topic you discuss -- I discuss -- with friends who play music -- either professionally or as a hobby.

Carly's publishing surge was the result most likely of "Anticipation" and "You're So Vain" reaching the standards level -- songs that aren't just hits but have penetrated the era and become common touchstones.

But the reason Carly was so talked about by music publishers was because her back catalogue saw this huge surge in sales -- this tremendous demand -- without an accompanying vinyl or cassette or CD surge. HELLO BIG MAN (1983) and SPOILED GIRL (1985) did not sell. They're wonderful albums -- especially HELLO BIG MAN -- but they didn't sell. So in the midst of that sales slump (it wasn't an artistic slump), for no obvious reason, Carly becomes one of the top sellers in the sheet music business from 1985 through 1990 -- "Coming Around Again," in 1986, is her come back single and it sold like crazy on sheet music.

HAVE YOU SEEN ME LATELY? would come out as a songbook. But COMING AROUND AGAIN (her 1987 best selling album) was never released as a songbook and that's because she'd been selling so well with individual songs on sheet music that HAL LEONARD assumed that was the way to go. So all of her singles from the album ("Coming Around Again," "Give Me All Night," "All I Want Is You" and "The Stuff That Dreams Are Made Of") were released on sheet music. The complaints about the lack of a songbook for the album itself did result in the inclusion/addition of that album's "Do The Walls Come Down" (a beautiful song) in THE SONGS OF CARLY SIMON.

We can take all sort of roads and avenues and distractions in a talking post.

So I woke up to TCM playing a Rolling Stones concert with the Stones performing "She Was Hot" -- a song I've always loved but it wasn't the hit it should have been -- possibly because it was during the time a video could make a hit and Anita Morris, quite frankly, was not hot. Perfect for Broadway but all wrong for the camera.

Okay, so let's move into Iraq.

Mustafa al-Kadhimi is the prime minister, has been since May 7th. He visited the US in August and barely got a press notice. It wasn't smart to plan your visit in the middle of the Democratic Party's convention. At another time, he might have gotten attention.

It's surprising that he made such a stupid move because he does know the press. He knows the press because he was the press.

I haven't shared my opinion of Mustafa here -- as Donald has noted in repeated e-mails for a month now. I was saving it for a talking entry. In the snapshots, I'm writing about what happened and I'm raising questions, etc.

My opinion of Mustafa? I'm not sure of him. He says the right things, he initiates the right things. I haven't seen any real follow through. Have you?

Mustafa was the press. That's important to grasp. Some outlets -- especially the one that used to publish him -- have applauded him like crazy. They're in love with him.

But is he doing anything?

Again, he can make strong statements and he can initiate investigations or this or that. And those garner headlines -- something he knows, as a former member of the press -- will happen.

But does he offer anything beyond that? And is he just for show?

I don't know. I'm still pondering that as well. I try to be fair and give him some time but I'm also aware that time is limited and that he's produced no results thus far. Tomorrow, he will have had four months in office and where are the results?

While he was prime minister-designate, he was promising the attacks on protesters (by government forces) would stop. So that's five months of promises and the attacks continue.

The following sites updated: