“Separated twins”: The tale of Carole King and James Taylor’s lifelong connection
It’s a rare thing for two independently operating artists to form a connection as natural as the one that Carole King and James Taylor had, but it’s a marvel to behold when this kind of chemistry rears its head in an instant.
King had been active throughout the 1960s as one half of an illustrious songwriting partnership with her husband, Gerry Goffin, even writing hits for other artists while still a teenager, such as The Shirelles’ ‘Will You Love Me Tomorrow’. King was forced to grow up fast, getting married at 17 after falling pregnant with Goffin’s child, but most would have thought that the creative partnership she had with her musical and romantic partner could continue to produce wonders for generations to come.
However, their divorce in 1968 led to the two avoiding all contact with one another for a period, and with Goffin no longer in the picture, she sought a change of environment in order to meet other people who could fuel her creativity.
After decamping to Laurel Canyon, an area where many of the period’s most illustrious folk-adjacent songwriters found themselves congregating at the tail end of the decade, she befriended a group of individuals who would end up assisting her with her solo debut, with Taylor being one of the most significant people she found herself mingling with.
Instead of simply playing on her albums, Taylor offered a foil to King’s vocals and piano by accompanying her on guitar at her live shows, and they found themselves performing together live for the first time at the Troubadour in Los Angeles in 1970. They’d end up recording renditions of each other’s songs, helping each other achieve their almost simultaneous commercial breakthroughs at the start of the ‘70s, and playing crucial roles as part of the musical ensembles on each other’s early records.
The two would eventually naturally find themselves slipping out of each other’s lives as their respective careers both blossomed and took their own individual directions, but after decades of becoming more independent from each other, they reunited in 2010 to celebrate 40 years of a creative partnership that felt as though it was only capable of producing brilliance.
In a 2010 interview with NPR, the duo spoke about reuniting on stage for this landmark anniversary, and expressed how they instantly realised how perfect they were for each other, and how the connection that they shared was almost too natural, to the point where it felt somewhat spooky.
“It was an amazingly good fit,” Taylor suggested. “It just felt very familiar and as if we were twins separated at birth or something.”
While this in itself is a rather touching sentiment that highlights just how immediate their bond came into focus, King was instant in her reiteration of Taylor’s opinions. “I have to share with you,” she interjected. “When James said that about, you know, separated twins, I just looked at him because I had just had that exact thought.”
There’s forming a connection with someone, and then there’s having a connection that has seemingly always been there in the same way that twins would. People often say that twins have a freakish ability to immediately understand or finish each other’s thoughts, and on both a musical and interpersonal level, it was clear that Taylor and King possessed this ability as well.
