Good Times Come Alive With James Taylor And Carole King’s “Long Ago And Far Away” 1972

Good Times Come Alive With James Taylor And Carole King’s “Long Ago And Far Away” 1972 | I Love Classic Rock Videos

via marlonini parazzi / YouTube

James Taylor and Carole King are like peanut butter and jelly; they go so well together. With respect to their impressive catalogs individually, there’s a certain charm worth noticing when the two work together.

In the many years of their career, the two would often collaborate to create something magnificent. Rumors kept swirling around on whether the two, at one point, dated, which was a firm no according to them. Their closeness stemmed from the fact that they liked being with each other musically and never romantically. While recalling their first meeting, which was at a party back in 1969, King said: “It was like we were puppies rolling around; the music was just rolling in and around each other. His [Taylor] guitar and my piano just rolled around. And we just felt like we knew each other and had played together forever.”

Taylor once revealed that the hit song “You’ve Got A Friend,” was written in response to King to his song, “Fire and Rain” to which contained the line: “I’ve seen lonely times when I could not find a friend.” King, who originally released it for her 1971 Tapestry album, also let her dear friend Taylor record it for his 1971 Mud Slide Slim and the Blue Horizon album. If that’s not friendship, then we don’t know what is.

But with all that, King’s contribution in Taylor’s 1971 album didn’t limit only to “You’ve Got A Friend.” Its follow-up single, “Long Ago and Far Away” also featured Carole King on piano. Joni Mitchell, Taylor’s ex-girlfriend, provided its backing vocals.

However, this 1972 live performance of James Taylor presented below had King do both the piano and background vocals. With Taylor in acoustic guitar, the performance was angelic and divine, something that we could anticipate from both musicians.

You can watch the performance below.