The Cake and the Rain by Jimmy Webb (a memoir)

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IDLERACER
Posts: 2
Joined: Tue Mar 22, 2005 9:07 pm
Location: Los Angeles, California

Re: The Cake and the Rain by Jimmy Webb (a memoir)

Post by IDLERACER »

It's worth mentioning that the first two measures of The Bee Gees' "Words" were borrowed for the chorus of "MacArthur Park," and that they were also borrowed for the first couple of measures of "Raindrops Keep Falling On My Head." That being said, there's a few notes in "Evie" that had previously appeared in THIS earlier Jimmy Webb composition.
Martin Johnson
Posts: 462
Joined: Fri Sep 10, 2010 7:41 am

Re: The Cake and the Rain by Jimmy Webb (a memoir)

Post by Martin Johnson »

What with this forum's recent problems with spam, I've been spending more time visiting the equivalent pages of Jimmy Webb's official website and have come to the conclusion that the obvious respect and admiration we have for Webb on here is by no means fully reciprocated for Bacharach over there. In fact at least one member seems to resent the often made comparison to BB and actually used the word 'hate' in conjunction with Alfie and also wrote very contemptuously about A House is Not a Home. What made me chuckle was the irony that this person actually goes under the name 'I Love Music'!

I've been thinking about Webb's post 60s career a lot since I read his memoir and what I consider to be the truly great songs he's written during this time, namely The Moon's A Harsh Mistress, Highwayman, If These Walls Could Speak and Time Flies. I think those four songs are at least the equal of anything he wrote during the 60s and other notable songs that disprove the still often held belief that Webb somehow 'lost the knack' after 1969 include You Might as Well Smile, All I Know, When Can Brown Begin, Just This One Time, Ocean In His Eyes, When Did I Lose Your Love, That's All I've Got to Say, Let's Begin, Shattered, Easy For You To Say, Lightning In a Bottle, Adios, Still Within the Sound of My Voice, Time Enough For Love, Just Like Always, I Don't Know How to Love you Anymore, Skywriter, It Won't Bring Her Back, Wasn't There A Moment and Paul Guaguin in the Seven Seas. Two other post-60s songs I've long had a soft spot for are those gems from the Letters album, Once in the Morning and Piano and they help to top-up what would amount to a pretty impressive 20+ track compilation CD. Admittedly unlike the songs from the late 60s that came in a 3 or 4 year rush, these tunes were written over a 30+ year period and were often featured on albums of such low profile that most of the songs remain virtually unknown to the general public.

This one's better known than most of the others because it was featured on Linda Ronstadt's Get Closer album:

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Cz0YAer5t10
Last edited by Martin Johnson on Sun Aug 20, 2017 1:20 pm, edited 1 time in total.
Blair N. Cummings
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Joined: Fri Jun 11, 2004 4:14 pm

Re: The Cake and the Rain by Jimmy Webb (a memoir)

Post by Blair N. Cummings »

Martin, you probably also noticed that the JW forum is nearly as much of a wasteland now as this one has become, a similarly large percentage of erstwhile regulars having evaporated in recent times.
Notable, too, is the fact that there have been more (and more interesting) exchanges regarding JW here than on his own discussion board.
pljms
Posts: 865
Joined: Tue Feb 24, 2004 8:43 am
Location: London

Re: The Cake and the Rain by Jimmy Webb (a memoir)

Post by pljms »

Martin, someone on that forum did actually suggest a name change for that individual after that ludicrous and frankly revealing post. In fact reading the posts of one or two on that forum is often an uncomfortable experience and you sense that what once might have been merely an admiration for Webb has long strayed into the area of being an unhealthy obsession.

Although the mediocre stuff, and there's a lot of it, still sounds less than inspiring, Webb's best material since the 60s if anything sounds better now than it did back in the day, which has to be a good sign. Other songs I'd add to that already long list, Martin, are PF Sloan, Crying in my Sleep, Feet in the Sunshine, It's a Sin, Cloudman, and If You See Me Getting Smaller (I'm Leaving).
Paul
Sara D
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Joined: Mon Oct 27, 2008 4:32 am

Re: The Cake and the Rain by Jimmy Webb (a memoir)

Post by Sara D »

I was at a small social gathering a few weeks ago where Glen Campbell’s ‘Adios’ was one of the albums played. To the people there Jimmy Webb, or ‘Jim Webb’ as they remembered him, might have been in hibernation for the last 47 years for all that they knew of his activities. When I pointed out the four Webb songs on the album the general consensus was that although pleasant enough they paled in comparison to his classic hits from the 1960s, although more than one person thought the lyrics to ‘It Won’t Bring Her Back’ and especially ‘Just Like Always’ were brilliant.
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