Pearls: Songs Of Goffin & King

Make no doubt about it, this is possibly Carole King's most important work since Tapestry, and why a similar album didn't follow Tapestry or its follow-up, Music, was a marketing blunder and a mystery. Missing here is Lou Adler's production, though King and her co-producer Mark Hallman are hardly inefficient. It's just that some songs get more attention than others. "Dancin' With Tears in My Eyes" opens the collection, a pleasant new addition to their repertoire, but next to "Locomotion," "One Fine Day," "Chains," and "Snow Queen," its purpose is more to bring the album full circle than to try to compete with these classics. "One Fine Day," the song the Chiffons brought Top Five, was the hit, going Top 15 from this set 17 years later. The reworking of the Freddie Scott/Bobby Vee/Donny Osmond hit "Hey Girl" is breathtaking. Here King is backed by lush production and a bluesy vocal that surpasses anything else on this record, as well as much of what was on the charts at this time. Pearls: Songs of Goffin and King is the set the artist's longtime fans craved when Tapestry made her more than a household name. This album deserves its place right next to Tapestry. ~ Joe Viglione