Town Top Ten: Her Town Too (#5)

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It's a dark and stormy day here in the land of the big horse race. Thankfully, the temperature is rising or we'd be in some serious doo-doo (with a couple of feet of snow). I'll take the rain and 65 degrees. I'll also give: in this case, another song from my list of favorites with "town" in the title. Here's the next one. #5: Her Town Too - James Taylor & J.D. Souther I was supposed to see J.D. Souther last night in Cincinnati. Oh, well.... I've seen J.D., and I've seen James. And, I've met them both. That's cool. What's even cooler is they teamed up for this painful and personal song about divorce. Although it's obvious to associate the song with Taylor's divorce from fellow singer Carly Simon, he actually wrote it about Peter Asher (Taylor's and Linda Ronstadt's producer) going through a divorce. When a divorce (and the accompanying wounds) are fresh things can be difficult: "he gets the boys in the band, some of them his friends, some of them her friends, some of them understand." Just seven years earlier Carly and James had a huge duet hit with a cover of "Mockingbird." Then, as their marriage was crumbling, Taylor, along with J.D. Souther (who sings two lines on his own, but that's enough for JT to credit him on the artist line of the single), drop this gorgeous heartache on the world. According to Picky Wedia, this was Taylor's last top 40 hit. That's a shame, because he's made some good music since then. But then, his label keeps releasing white-bread ballad covers of R&B songs ("Up on a Roof"????), so it may be understandable why JT's top 40 career has faltered since this song. But man, what a song. Her Town Too Written by James Taylor, J. D. Souther, and Waddy Wachtel Recorded by James Taylor & J.D. Souther From Dad Loves His Work (Taylor), 1981 It's got nothing to do with pity (BTW, the vocal track for the video is different than the track on the LP/45):