Blog posts

• 

  Jan 27, 08:58 AM

  Recording News

  Well Friends and Countrymen,

  
  Don't lend me your ears unless you need some more agonizing accounting. We have Obama and that is all that counts right now. How happy I am. What a great moment. How proud Martin Luther King would be. How proud my mother, Andrea Simon would be and so many millions of others.

  I am up on the Vineyard, about to go to NY to see John Forte for the first time since he's been a free man. Another thing to be more than happy about. I must say that my friend Orrin Hatch (an otherwise amazing fact to process) was the one who helped me the most. He was convinced John should spend no more time there. That he had more than served his sentence. He spoke to President Bush himself, on John's behalf. He was brave and if you ever have the time to do it, write him a letter and let him know that he did a very good thing by getting interested in the case.

  I'm also recording a song for an album for the Stuttering Foundation that I am a part of in NY. A song that a young girl wrote and recorded. She sings it like an angel. So much better than I could ever hope to sing it. She's about thirteen or fourteen and the stutter that she has allows her to communicate 
  through the medium of singing. I know most of you know that this is what I also went through as a child, a teenager and to a lesser degree, now. I'm joining a group at Berkelee School Of Music in Boston which heals through music. It is not just stuttering. In fact, stuttering is a small part of it. We go to hospitals and sing for babies who are going through chemo therapy and for the elderly who have Alzheimer's, and for the isolated and the indigent and on and on. I am lending my name and my time to this and am very excited about it.

  A few years ago, Sally and I went to a rehab for head injury patients outside of Boston and sang for a small group of about thirty patients. It was heartbreaking and powerful and I had a very hard time getting through a song (that is a general problem I have!!!). I cried and cried and tried to keep it together. When Sally and I left and got back into our car, we hugged for a long time and then decided that in some way it was paradise. I don't know why that word came to both of us independently. There was something un-wordly about it and it made us crushed and spiritual and different and I have never 
  gotten over it. One of the girls has gotten better (though her brother sadly died) and has come to some of my concerts in a wheel chair and with a great deal of physical problems. But I get birthday and Christmas cards from her every year. It means so much to me.

  I am also working on my album which is a bizarre re-working of my old songs (some hits, some not) with Ben and David and Larry and Peter. It's largely acoustic, though I recorded That's The Way I Always Heard It Should Be to a loop on my keyboard (the only one I could find that seemed to fit). Jimmy Parr and I played the melody on top of it's keyboard, acoustic guitar sound and I sang over it and made up a string part. It's haunting. It will be for sale on Iris Records (Ben and Larry's company) as well as on this site and through itunes and I imagine other sites too. It will come out early this summer. I'm doing my vocal exercises in the car.

  It's low budget and like an indie movie. I hope you will like it. I'm also doing some songs that weren't hits (like Three Days from Anticipation) and a new song Ben, David and I wrote called There's Just No Freedom. I started it and wrote the lyrics when Jim and I were down in the Caribbean and I was fraught with worry about my career and understood that of course freedom is not about where you are in any way. In fact, sometimes it's worse when you are in a beautiful place, because you expect more   peace of mind. Other songs include: You Belong To Me which has a completely different vibe and I'm hoping to put John Forte on the track in NY, also Anticipation which has a much different meaning to me now. Never Been Gone is being done with almost a church-like feel, You're So Vain the way we did it in the live show, except with the piano/bass lick added. Coming Around Again, a very peaceful beautiful version of Let The River Run, and others (I'll save some secrets). We did some of the recording of the tracks this summer up here on the island. Frank flew up for the dearness of his soul to get some more points. It was a mess because wires were everywhere and they went up and down steps and no one could walk anywhere. Thank God it was summer and the outside was plenty gorgeous. This time I'm going to do the vocals at Jimmy Parr's and then hopefully Frank will mix it. So it will be the whole gang of the nearest and dearest. (except Mindy Joystyn who I miss every day).

  I'm not letting go of the Starbucks record (This Kind Of Love). The head of Starbucks will not stop me (maybe for a little while) from releasing that record again. I love so much of it and took so much love from the process and though Starcon expected me to do all the publicity in spite of their going out of the record business three days before This Kind Of Love came out (and I was kept in the dark), the record remains a good and strong one and I'm used to this shark like behavior from record execs. No news there.

  But I only want to think good thoughts. So I'll tell you that this is going to be our year. It's going to be the year that Obama has come to help heal and the music that comes out this year is going to reflect that.  I hope you all are well. I'll send a few photos. I'm not sure which yet.  Going to look through my little file. 

  Much love, Carly
• 

  Nov 03 2008, 11:56 AM

  This Election Eve

  Dear Friends and Countrymen,

  Lend me your ears. This is so exciting now in our land. We need that change, which has become so frequent a word that we must not overlook that it still means something.

   

  Obama is very close. Will it be a landslide? Or will we wait all night and pour more champagne and get groggier and groggier as dawn approaches and Anderson Cooper is still trying to stay fresh!

   

  I am starting to paint a Gibson guitar that is going to be auctioned off for a 'MusiCares' event where the money will go to musicians who have fallen on hard times one way or another. Of course I feel that it will not be good enough. So far I have gessoed over the wood that was stained a strange red color to appear like a great Brazilian forest cross section of one of it's rarest trees. I think maybe not. I don't know. I'm trying to think of what to paint once the gesso dries (probably tomorrow). I think I have a hook, but I'm not sure. I love to paint though and I haven't done it in a while. It's not unlike writing a song.

   

  The Atlantic City concert was so great. It was supposed to have been billed: Carly Simon with Ben Taylor and David Saw. Because some of the audience (apparently) weren't pleased with my leaving out some songs or changing the arrangements of some of what they were used to, they wrote nasty letters. I'm so surprised, that any of you wouldn't look further into what it was supposed to be or that minds were not open enough to accept new concepts. But I understand too. If I went to a Rolling Stones concert and they sang "Honkey Tonk Woman" as a ballad and really melancholy in parts, some part of me would be disturbed.

   

  The good news is that I loved it. I really loved it. It is one of the first times I ever felt really comfortable on stage. That is in large part to Ben and David and the rest of the amazing band. I think the review from Fox News was a reflection of what most of the audience felt. Of course I have a great need to please, all entertainers do, so I feel as if I want to say excuse me if I didn't come across in the way you wanted me to.

   

  I've really been thrown by this time change last night. I was up all night and was also very hot. I couldn't get even asleep and then I woke up at five and thought I'll get up and start painting the guitar and it was really four. Couldn't get back to sleep. I'm not even tired now. I think it's the thyroid pills that I was just put on for having mild hypothyroidism, or however it is pronounced.

   

  So I leave you with lots of love and high expectations for Tuesday. I'm so excited that we're going to have a little dance. Just the nuclear family, but a dance nonetheless.

   

  I love you and good night!

   

  Carly

  

   

   
• 

  Sep 23 2008, 08:42 AM

  Family & Music

  Dear friends and attendees of my home base,

  I am on my way to NY to perform with Ben. He is playing at Joe’s Pub on Saturday night and it is his launch party. I always imagine rockets and fuel at launch sites, but Joe’s Pub is actually fantastic and intimate and non fueled except by a great music and sound system. His show is so together and brilliant that I am loath to get up on stage with him even for a song, but there you have it. My usual.

  The picture here is one I took yesterday of some of my animals being fed by Richard (my adorable special sweet one). I am going to clear some pasture so that they can graze new territory and then I’m actually going to milk the sheep and goats for cheese. How the hell do I do that? If anyone knows, please give me a hint, otherwise I’m apt to go for the wrong part of the body.

  My farm is exasperatingly beautiful and leaving it even for a few days is hard. Molly is hiding under the covers right now because she sees a suitcase on the floor. But I’m so excited about Ben. Have you heard his record? cd? Whatever...it's thrilling. He has reached a pinnacle. Maybe it's the first of many.

  Sally is manifesting motherhood. I spent a few days with her last week and we walked the streets of Boston and she pushed the heaviest baby buggy you have ever seen while Bodhi was in hers or my arms. He is a gorgeous, well behaved and slightly teething almost one year old. His head is like the most perfect orb, and very heavy filled with all the brains a baby is allowed. He's almost walking but his feet are still a tiny bit too small to support his beautiful blonde haired head. He's so good and so precious.

  The ordeal with Starbucks is not to be underestimated in terms of my preoccupation with it. Their firing of everyone at Hear Music, just three days before "This Kind of Love" came out caused me some pretty serious damages. I’m hoping to re-release it elsewhere and really make people aware of it (not at Starbucks stores---perhaps we'll try tea this time).

  I’m so glad you're out there and ready to help and have already helped and supported me. I feel it. Keep the name out there. Doesn’t matter what label it's on, or if I just sell it on my site (carlysimon.com). Just keep the name out there. I believe it's mine!!!!!!

  Much love to all. I’ll be better at writing and sending letters more often.

  Carly
• 

  Jul 29 2008, 12:22 PM

  Simon Speaks - Recording

  

  Chaps,
  
  We are recording here. This is a pic of the days goings on.
  
  Nothing has really been accomplished because of technical difficulties, but boys seem to love technology. What's with them?
  
  However, yesterday we got a great track (finally doing it in the old
  fashioned way) by putting a single mike in the middle of all the players and having all kinds of leakage.
  
  It's great. Brian Wilson said that the day music dies will be when players are separated from each other by vocal booths and such. Maybe it wasn't Brian Wilson. Maybe it was me. Brian Wilson said a lot of wonderful things though.
  
  Frank Filipetti is here. Teese Gohl, David Saw, Peter Calo, Ben and myself. We are just doing this for fun. No plans to put it out except maybe to you guys. I can't believe people are just getting together for fun.
  
  "Three Days", the track we did yesterday, sounds so great and different and magical.
  Love to all,
  Carly
• 

  Jul 23 2008, 07:40 AM

  Simon Speaks - Chords & Voices

  

  Dear friends,
  
  I'm writing a song with David Saw here. Sometimes the chords lead the way. On the piano that's even more evident. You can close your eyes and splay your fingers and come up with a chord that surprises you and gives you ideas. The guitar is harder in that way for some reason. Some days the words just flow from emotions and also from things that I've read.
  
  Yesterday I read a book by a friend of mine who died when I was quite young. His name is Max Eastman and I felt amazement in reading about a life, which I only knew toward the end. I used to go to his house on the Vineyard here, but up island, and sing for him. He always liked it when I sang "John Henry". That was when my sister Lucy and I were doing plentiful folk songs and I was singing in an Odetta voice (or else, I hoped I was).
  
  Sitting here with David, I'm singing in that Odetta voice again. The kitchen, where this picture was taken, gives rise to great resonance and depth to all the acoustics. The ceiling is a dome and there is place just under the center of the dome which sounds like a cathedral.
  
  There is so much more about Max Eastman that I want to say, but maybe it's just the beginning. He was an amazing man in case you want to find a book of his on Amazon. There is a great one that followed the one I just read (Enjoyment Of Living) called "Love And Revolution". I'm going to order that and follow this man's life. He was a freedom fighter and believed in both Jesus and Marx. He lived in the village (NYC) and Provincetown, had many gorgeous wives and was the great romantic. He was also, at the age of ninety, the most handsome man I ever saw.
  
  That's it for today chaps.
  Love, Carly
• 

  Jul 07 2008, 01:14 PM

  Simon Speaks - So Many People To Love

  

  Hello chaps,
  
  I forget what day it is. I slept til ten and woke up solid sure that it was Sunday and that there would be one more day when I wouldn't have to think about who's yogurt had to be replaced in the fridge and who was moving the bed back into the room that was just painted and all the things that were unmoving and foggy and groggy and winsome during the five days that just passed. Those days celebrating our men who won our freedom and those women who sewed flags and gathered in groups to figure out ways to support their men at war.
  
  I (yes, me, in my own peaceful way) am trying to figure out what to do to support this album of mine which I love so much and during the release of which was so crushed by the system. The single of "So Many People To Love" is number 12 on the AC charts, so anyone out there who has an AC or even a Hot AC (adult contemporary) radio station, call it up and request the song!!! I was told today that 'Hot AC' is much more important than just 'AC' and so if it could get on the hot one it would be fantastic, although much harder to accomplish as they are age-ist and if you're over forty it's almost impossible. It would be such a feat to accomplish that.
  
  The other viability I think (although, also unlikely) is any r'n'b station. They mainly play urban, but this song is a possibility. I try to get everyone involved in my career to think out of the box, but if anyone has an idea, one of you, the fan base that I have and that I am extremely thankful for, put it in place and be a part of the group that discovered that the world after all, was not flat.
  
  If anyone has an idea, let it not go unheeded.
  
  Love to all.
  From the Vineyard, Carly