SOMETHING OLD
Clarence Carter - Snatching It Back
1969
I am late to receiving the news that at 90 years old, southern soul legend Clarence Carter passed away on May 13, 2026. Whether it's the exquisitely beautiful Slip Away, the vulgar and hilarious Strokin', or my personal favorite, Patches, Carter brought something unique and light-hearted to the sphere of soul music.
Clarence Carter - Snatching It Back
1969
I am late to receiving the news that at 90 years old, southern soul legend Clarence Carter passed away on May 13, 2026. Whether it's the exquisitely beautiful Slip Away, the vulgar and hilarious Strokin', or my personal favorite, Patches, Carter brought something unique and light-hearted to the sphere of soul music.
Clarence Carter was born blind into a sharecropping family in Montgomery, Alabama. His superior sense of hearing no doubt played a role in his early gravitational pull toward music. At 6 years old, he enrolled in the Alabama Institute for the Deaf and Blind, where he would be taught piano. At 9, he was gifted his first guitar by his grandmother. Following his passion through adolescence and beyond, he earned his degree in music from Alabama State University in 1960, which is where he mastered theory and even learned to transcribe music charts into braille.
His career took off slowly with his group Clarence & Calvin and the Mello Men before signing to Atlantic Records as a solo artist in 1968. Touring his debut album, he met and would eventually marry his back-up singer Candi Staton, a legend in her own right. He was favored at this point by black audiences for his R&B sound, until he recorded Patches in 1970, which caught the attention of white listeners and became perhaps his most widely recognizable hit.
In between these periods, though, was the 1969 record Testifyin', a perfect time capsule of its era between its vibrant cover art and Muscle Shoals sound. This is a great record that opens with the laugh-laden, Green Onions-influenced, whistlin' Bad News before getting into Snatching It Back.
Carter, who is known now for his particularly lustful songs, had to rework the song from his original iteration titled How Can I Get It When You Keep Snatching It Back, which the studio felt was too suggestive for radio airplay. What his initial lyrics were we may never know, but the final version describes an avoidant woman who continuously "snatches" her love back from the narrator out of fear of being hurt the way she's been in the past. It features a steady bass line from the great David Hood, a fantastic horn section, a really unique guitar refrain that I suspect uses harmonics, infectious keys, and of course: the warm, familiar, baritone voice of Clarence Carter. May he rest in peace.
SOMETHING NEW
Steve Lacy - the feeling
June 5th, 2026
Steve Lacy - the feeling
June 5th, 2026
The devil's working hard to keep me alone
On my 20th birthday, Steve Lacy released Mercury, the lead single of what would become a fairly prolific record, Gemini Rights. The day after my 21st birthday, I stood close to the stage in Columbia, Maryland to see him live. As I find myself turning 24 very soon, I haven't kept from noticing that Lacy has been silent for my past two birthdays.
He released a single called Nice Shoes and appeared on the cover of Rolling Stone last summer, seemingly appearing that his comeback was imminent, but the silence resumed.
Finally, the wait is over. Oh yeah, the R&B star's third studio album, will be released on July 17, 2026. While Nice Shoes showed a departure from the musical flavor he's become known for, the feeling seems to prove that Lacy is still perfecting his signature sound. The slow-paced single depicts heartbreak, confusion, and a struggle to let go. It's layered gorgeously with dreamy vocal harmonies, lyrics sung with attitude, and melancholy production. The pain is palpable, but so is the promising nature of this next stage of Lacy's career.
SOMETHING BORROWED
Tom Rush - Sweet Baby James (James Taylor)
1970
Tom Rush - Sweet Baby James (James Taylor)
1970
A deeply personal song, James Taylor wrote Sweet Baby James for his breakthrough album of the same title as a lullaby for his nephew named after him, as well as something of a "self lullaby." It exudes utter tranquility and makes us all wish we were being rocked in a cradle once again. Alas, the chaotic world of 1970 or 2026 prohibits quiet, moonlit nights of adults achieving the same serenity babies get. The world's endless pandemonium shuns us, and says "don't baby my James."
I suppose if you can't transport yourself into the young child named James receiving his beautiful lullaby, you can at least try to step into the shoes of James Taylor. Fellow New England folk singer Tom Rush did that with his cover of the iconic song in the same year.
While nothing can beat the original for me, I really love Rush's arrangement's additions of harmonica and crescendos of mandocello, dulcimer, and strings. Where Taylor opts for a country-esque, traditional waltz that never misses its 3/4 beat with its percussion, piano, and steel guitar, Rush tries out a slower and more relaxed feeling with lusher orchestration.
SOMETHING... FOR NATIONAL DONUT DAY
Tori Amos - Doughnut Song
1996
Tori Amos - Doughnut Song
1996
June 5th is National Donut Day. While the fried saccharine torus is one of my preferred desserts, that's really the extent of my commentary on the matter. But let's talk Tori Amos, and the difference between a donut's hole and a human's wholeness.
Featured phrases in this ballad's lyrics are "I thought," "I guess," and several instances of the word "if." Those words alongside Amos' slow voice and fingers on her piano, which often feel stretched out to the point of hesitation, portray uncertainty about where her relationship stands. The only time she shows any conviction is when she says, I am sure that I hate you, but I suspect she's bluffing.
Amos references the fractured brotherhood of Cain and Abel in one lyric, and told B-Side Magazine in 1996 that it captured "the idea that you can’t have two whole beings together." The elusive lyrics seem to suggest that she is slowly accepting that she is losing part of herself with a man, and so is he. You'll never be whole by begging another to make you that way, you'll never get the depth you crave from a relationship that is shallow, and you'll never gain weight from a doughnut hole.
She is not quite ready to let go of this love, but she must sense that her partner is. In the verse beginning at 1:23, the lead vocals sing mysteriously about southern men, blood, prettiness, and metal, which fits into the album's dark themes and gritty album cover, while another layered vocal track of Amos in a lower register repeats you can tell me it's over.
Amos is a master of conveying her emotions, often anger and sorrow, through her stunning voice, and this song is no exception.