“Carolina In My Mind” (1969) #118 4/19/1969

The first single from James Taylor, the first non-British artist signed to the Beatles’ brand-new Apple label. Indeed, Paul played bass and George had an uncredited backing vocal here. The record tanked because JT was dealing with drug addiction and mental health issues and couldn’t tour to promote it. After one album for Apple, he signed with Warner Brothers where his career took off with “Fire And Rain.” This was quickly reissued and did marginally better; this is more uptempo and NOT the slower, stripped down version we know from his 1976 greatest hits LP. JT re-did the song because (1) the original master couldn’t be located, and (2) Apple likely wouldn’t have licensed it anyway. The ‘76 version is now the recognized one.