The singer-songwriter who turned personal stories into songs everyone could hum.
If you want the whole picture, start with 'Fire and Rain' and 'You've Got a Friend.' They're the ones that explain everything else.
When 'Fire and Rain' came out in 1970, it didn't sound like anything else on the radio. That song, along with his version of Carole King's 'You've Got a Friend,' gave people a way to talk about feeling low without having to shout. Even later tracks like 'Angry Blues' kept that same direct line to whatever was bothering him.
He signed with Apple Records in the late 1960s and put out his self-titled debut in 1970. The records kept coming after that, 'Mud Slide Slim and the Blue Horizon,' 'One Man Dog,' 'Gorilla', with musicians like Danny Kortchmar and Carly Simon showing up along the way.
Keep it compact: a lyric you come back to, a live memory, or the part of the catalog you would point someone toward first.
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