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White has written extensively about JT in the past and researched this new book with the full cooperation of JT and his family. The book runs 430 pages and includes 68 rare black and white photos.
See White's 1997 article in MOJO magazine article about JT for a preview.
White visited JTO for a chat in October 2001. You can read the transcript.
It's difficult to imagine a more exhaustive or authoritative work about James Taylor than this, the culmination of Billboard Editor-In-Chief Timothy White's decades-long friendship and professional ties with James Taylor. James Taylor: Long Ago And Far Away is, from the start, mind-boggling in its chronological scope. For evidence read just a few pages in, where you'll join Taylor's 17th-century ancestors, tracking the Taylor bloodline through the ages and following father Ike Taylor to naval duty in Antarctica before gradually shifting the focus to JT nearly 100 pages into the narrative.
In the pages that follow, White's close familiarity with Taylor and admiration for his talents make for a sensitively presented, minutely-detailed story. Family ties are examined closely, with extensive direct observations by JT, mother Trudy and father Isaac, siblings, musical contemporaries, and ex-wives Carly Simon and Kathryn Walker. The story never lacks for direct quotes from the people who were there, and it's much richer for it. When JT describes his relationship with his father, White quotes each of them and also from family letters between the two. And when describing the impetus for "Fire And Rain," White gives us the enigmatic Suzanne's full name.
As the story progresses into JT's musical career, White's musical experience allows him to speak with authority -- at times truly encyclopedically. When a brief mention of a musical venue turns into a multi-page catalog of dozens of other artists who played there and influenced the music of the time, all but the most patient students of pop music may think about jumping ahead to when the story veers back to JT himself. Musicologists will be in heaven, though, and clearly the JT-specific parts of this 430-page book didn't get less attention because of the additional trivia.
All the major events -- and many of the minor ones -- are spelled out in great detail. From the production of every studio album to the construction of his homes on Martha's Vineyard to his relationships with his children, White was either present to document it or spoke to someone who was. It was clearly a Herculean task, as evidenced by the book's lengthy notes on sources. In fact, the post-narrative sections of the book (sources, detailed discographies for JT and all his siblings, plus an exhaustive index) span more than 50 pages. Those pages, along with the four sections of photos, make for some of the most interesting trivia found in the book.
According to the author more than 150 people were interviewed for the book, though JT did not participate and the book is strictly unauthorized. It's a 273-page hardback including an exhaustive index, 8 pages of color and black and white photos, and a foreword by the JTO webmaster. This site also features prominently in the book.
Originally set for a November 1999 release from Birch Lane Press, it was later rescheduled for November 2000 by the new publisher, Citadel Press / Kensington.
Halperin visited JTO for online chats in October 1999 and again in December 2000.
Canadian journalist and musician Ian Halperin did the homework required to encapsulate a career this long and a man this complex. Along the way, he even managed to strike an honest balance between the painful failures and unbridled successes of JT's life and professional career.
Fittingly, the story is bookended by high points, opening in Las Vegas as JT receives his 1998 Billboard Century Award. From there the story backtracks, spending much of its time in JT's formative years in North Carolina, Massachusetts, and England and tracing JT's journey via first-person interviews with his friends, family members, and even folks he met briefly along the way. Halperin even goes so far as to track down former Greenwich Village junkies who remember JT after all these years. Halperin admits that some scenes and quotes are re-created from second- and third-hand impressions, and while their inclusion does give the story more dramatic depth, they sometimes stretch the narrative's credibility.
Halperin's depiction of young JT is extremely detailed and frank, delving deeply into JT's complex family, his almost suicidal drug use, and even his reputation for womanizing early in his career. It's not a book for children, but it's not excessively lurid, either.
All the major players in JT's life are given the same detailed treatment, including JT's father Isaac, his mother Trudy, Joni Mitchell, Kathryn Walker, and especially Carly Simon. Carly's tumultuous relationship with JT spans multiple chapters, shedding light on what brought them together and the problems that eventually tore them apart.
The book isn't flawless, but it's by far the most complete and exhaustively-researched work ever written about JT and comes highly recommended.
-- Joel Risberg - November 7, 2000
When he was seventeen years old, his demons led him to a Massachusetts mental institution where he confronted them the only way he knew how, by writing his first songs. Thirty years later, Taylor's songs are among the most popular in the annals of music, but the demons are still with him.
But unlike many of his contemporaries who faced a similar struggle, Taylor managed to emerge as an inspirational figure. Fire and Rain traces this remarkable path, including his troubled marriage to pop star Carly Simon and the premature alcoholism-related death of his brother: Taylor's ten-month stay in the exclusive private psychiatric institution where he finished high school; His self-imposed exile to England where he submitted some of his music to the Beatles' Apple Records, which signed him to his first record contract in 1968. Paul McCartney mentored Taylor's early career; The story behind his second album, Sweet Baby James, which contained the song "Fire and Rain" about the hopelessness of mental illness and suicide; As Taylor's fame increased, so did his problems with heroin, alcohol, and mental illness. In the seventies, the singer nearly fell over the edge many times.
Kirkus Reviews
James Taylor: Long Ago And Far Away
James Taylor: Long Ago And Far Away is a biography of JT by Billboard magazine editor-in-chief Timothy White. It is now available from Amazon.com.
Our Review
If James Taylor is to be believed, an autobiography is unlikely. You should look no further than his songs for his take on life, he says, and most fans are inclined to believe him. The songs don't tell us everything, though. It's natural to crave more information about the man behind the songs, the performances, and of course the real story behind "Fire And Rain."
Other Reviews
Boston Globe - December 4, 2001
Fire And Rain: The James Taylor Story
Fire And Rain: The James Taylor Story, by Ian Halperin, is the first biography of JT and the first book-length JT biography of any kind.
Our Review
After a 30-year career and a stack of successful albums, it's hard to imagine why JT is just now the subject of his first biography. Fire And Rain: The James Taylor Story was certainly a long time coming, arriving late in JT's career and then delayed another year when the original publisher went out of business just before its release. In the end, though, it was worth the wait.
Other Reviews
Seattle Times - December 8, 2000
More Information
From the Publisher
Many musicians sing about heartache, despair, and confusion, but few have experienced those feelings more intensely than James Taylor, who rose from a childhood of privilege as the son of an affluent medical school dean to become a modern-day troubadour and pop superstar.
The turbulent life, loves, and career of pop star James Taylor. With such classic hits as ``You've Got a Friend,'' ``Carolina on my Mind,'' ``Handyman,'' ``Mexico,'' and ``Fire and Rain,'' the venerable Taylor has been one of popular music's biggest stars since the late '60s, when he went to England to begin his recording career. As Halperin shows repeatedly, Taylor, who battled an addiction to heroin and other drugs for years, has not had an easy time of it. His story, however, hardly starts out as the saga of a tortured artist. He was born to Isaac and Trudy Taylor, a happy, loving couple who lived in an upper-middle-class region of Massachusetts, waiting to occupy a great deal of the biographer's time. Halperin contends that the younger Taylor's self-destructive habits were inherited by the men in his family (James's older brother, Alex, also suffered from a heroin addiction, which eventually killed him). Halperin, glossing over James's normal teenage angst and his isolation from other young people, also makes a case, a much stronger one, that James began his descent into addiction when Isaac began to withdraw from his family. Whatever their cause, James's feelings of alienation would lead him into a mental hospital during his late teens. Even after Taylor's first taste of success, with 1970's Sweet Baby James, which landed him on the cover of Time in 1971, he would slip back into battles with drugs and alcohol. According to Halperin, those consistent transgressions into his old ways, together with their mutual jealousies, eventually destroyed his marriage to fellow pop star Carly Simon. Despite the amount of time Halperin spends on Taylor's considerable difficulties, the affection he has for Taylor's music, best exhibited by the interviews with fans that are scattered throughout the book, shines throughout.