Concept Video filmed on Martha's Vineyard
Disclaimer: This video is being not being streamed by Carly Simon's official site. We have no control over which countries will be allowed to view this video, or to the commercial content being shown.
Concept Video filmed on Martha's Vineyard
Disclaimer: This video is being not being streamed by Carly Simon's official site. We have no control over which countries will be allowed to view this video, or to the commercial content being shown.
Performed live before a studio audience on The Phil Donahue Show - April 2,1991
Performed live before a studio audience on The Phil Donahue Show - April 2,1991
Lyrics & Music by: Carly Simon
Better not tell her
That I was your lover
Better not make her
Jealous of me
Better convince her
There was nothing between us
I'm not those initials in your diary
But if you slip and my name comes up
Don't deny that you knew me
Just leave out the white nights
The moon in your window
The break in your whisper
The promises after
Better not tell her
Why you love Spanish dancing
Don't bother to say that it's hot
In the summer in Madrid
Let it all go now
Like smoke from a candle
Like the trace of a song
That you hear in the wind
But if you slip and my name comes up
Don't deny that you knew me
Just leave out the white nights
The moon in your window
The break in your whisper
The promises after
Leave out the tears and the laughter
She won't need to know
That I cried when you left
That I think of you still
But if you slip and my name comes up
Don't deny that you knew me
Just leave out the white nights
The moon in your window
The break in your whisper
The promises after
Leave out the tears and the laughter
She won't need to know
That I'd die for your love
That I still...love...you
Musicians: See Credits section
© 1990 C'est Music ASCAP
Lyrics & Music by: Carly Simon
Didn't I give you midnight
Didn't I give you the month of June
Didn't I make it all right
When everything was ruined
Didn't I say, didn't I
Didn't you say, didn't I too
Didn't we both say, didn't I
'Til didn't we say we're through
Didn't I try
Didn't I cry
Didn't I?
Sorry that your mother dropped you on your head
Maybe her mother dropped her too
In the end we all get dropped
We all get black and blue
But didn't I always love you long
When time was short
And the night was cold
Didn't I admit that I was wrong
When the anger was new
But the fight was old
Didn't I say, didn't I
'Til didn't we say we're through
Didn't I try
Didn't I cry
Didn't I
Didn't I
Didn't I do?
Musicians: See Credits section
© 1990 C'est Music ASCAP
Lyrics & Music by Carly Simon
Have you seen me lately
What was it you saw
Are you gonna catch me
With my hand in the jar
Naked singing in the choir
Have you seen me lately
Did I look O.K.
Are you gonna shame me
And take my toys away
Don't wake me unless you love me
It takes too long to fall back to sleep
Don't wake me unless you're a friend of mine
I'd rather just fall back on my dreams
Have you seen me lately
Did I miss a beat
Are you gonna make me
Get back on my feet
Don't wake me unless you love me
It takes too long to fall back to sleep
Don't wake me unless you're a friend of mine
I'd rather just fall back on my dreams
Have you seen me lately
Was I crazy?
Don't wake me
Don't wake me
Don't wake me...
Musicians: See Credits section
© 1990 C'est Music ASCAP
Lyrics by: Carly Simon
Music by: Carly Simon & Teese Gohl
I've been doing a lot of thinking
About growing older and moving on
No one wants to be told that they're getting on
And maybe going away
For a long, long stay
But just how long and who knows
And how and where will my spirit go
Will it soar like jazz on a saxophone
Or evaporate on a breeze
Won't you tell me please
That life is eternal
And love is immortal
And death is only a horizon
Life is eternal
As we move into the light
And a horizon is nothing
Save the limit of our sight
Save the limit of our sight
Here on earth I'm a lost soul
Ever trying to find my way back home
Maybe that's why each new star is born
Expanding heaven's room
Eternity in bloom
And will I see you up in that heaven
In all it's light will I know you there
Will we say the things that we never dared
If wishing makes it so
Won't you let me know
That life is eternal
And love is immortal
And death is only a horizon
Life is eternal
As we move into the light
And a horizon is nothing
Save the limit of our sight
Save the limit of our sight
Musicians: See Credits section
© 1990 C'est Music ASCAP / Eau de vie Music BMI
Lyrics by: Jacob Brackman
Music by: Carly Simon
An occasional joint
A glass or two of beer
Still I would never have guessed
That you'd wind up here
In a half-way house
On a dead-end street
In a run-down part
Of a one-horse town
But just do what they say
Don't worry 'bout your girl
'Cause I won't run away
And I won't run around
And I won't let you down
And without a doubt
I'll be waiting, waiting
Waiting at the gate
When they let you out
You set the world on fire
Dancing after dark
Now you're playing solitaire
In a fenced-in park
I'm not the one to judge you
So baby don't be scared
No one gets a free ride
None of us is spared
I'll be back on the ninth
I've circled the date
Three o'clock sharp
And I won't be late
You've been through hell
I know what that's all about
And I'll be waiting, waiting
Waiting at the gate
When they let you out
The doctors have so little faith
They said you were a classic case
They said the chance is eight in ten
They'd see you back in here again
But I'm counting on you
To prove the doctors wrong
I'm imagining you, healthy and strong
Your papers all stamped
Your eyes so bright and blue
Looking like a baby picture of you
Walking down the path
Your suitcase in your hand
The howling at your back
A brand new man
Be a perfect little camper
Be a brave little scout
And I'll be waiting, waiting
Waiting at the gate
When they let you out...
Musicians: See Credits section
© 1990 C'est Music / Maya Productions ASCAP
Lyrics & Music by: Carly Simon
It's all of our birthdays this summer
One number older
Another year younger
I'll go to your party
You'll come to mine
We've given up cigarettes
We've given up wine
We've given up caffeine
And sworn off desserts
I don't try to seduce you
We don't even flirt
We're too good to be happy
Too straight to be sad
So just blow out the candles
Happy Birthday
Stay out of the ocean
Stay out of the sun
Stay in perfect shape
And be number one
We've got brilliant excuses
For having no fun
So just blow out the candles
Happy Birthday
Make love in the microwave
Think of all the time you'll save
And don't forget to make it look
As though you're working very, very hard
I'll be your lover if you will be mine
We'll go back to the garden
And have a good time
And if I'm offered an apple
I'll politely decline
So just blow out the candles
Happy Birthday
Musicians: See Credits section
© 1990 C'est Music ASCAP
Lyrics & Music by: Carly Simon
You say you're not worthy of me
But how do you know when you can't see
Your eyes where midnight catches fire
I can't describe this dizzy desire
Can you be so insecure
That you don't know what this grin is for
Do you think I always act this way
Silly and silent, and eager to stay
When you're holding me tonight
Holding me tonight
You think it's all a mistake
That I'm lost in a dream from which I'll wake
There you'll be just another guy
You could never be but I dare you to try
When you're holding me
Holding me tonight
I walk into your room
You blush when I see it in a mess
So I undress and close my eyes
A room with a view
Is in the dark with you
But that should come as no surprise
It's not a matter of mind
The choice of the heart is a different kind
It's always been a mystery
When you walk into the room
It happens to me
And when you're holding me
Holding me tonight
Musicians: See Credits section
© 1990 C'est Music ASCAP
Lyrics by: Carly Simon & Jacob Brackman
Music by: Carly Simon
When Tom came home his hair was combed
He bought snakeskin boots in Rome
That's not like him
His socks are clean, his shirt is pressed
It isn't just the way he's dressed
He smiles out of context and acts so polite
He's staying at his cousin's overnight
The protein shakes, that's not like him
The carrot cakes, that's not like him
The oat bran flakes, that's not like him
And the sweet name he called me in his sleep last night
Oh, that's not like him
He whispers on the telephone
He goes out smelling of cologne
That's not like him
It's just a superficial thing
But he's misplaced his wedding ring
He's become quite a connoisseur of wine
He's quoting Yeats and Gertrude Stein
The Soho pub, that's not like him
The racquet club, that's not like him
Those books on love, that's not like him
And the sweet name he called me in his sleep last night
Oh, that's not like him
I caught a glimpse of Tom today
At a checkout counter, about to pay
He had a girl on his arm
I'm glad he's helping out the poor
It's not like the Tom I knew before
Something so touching it made me cry
But my heart was racing, I don't know why
Those new blue suede shoes, that's not like him
The Ray Ban shades, that's not like him
Those downtown ways, that's not like him
And the sweet name he called me in his sleep last night
Oh, that's not like him
The red suspenders, that's not like him
The berries in the blender, that's not like him
Those twelve step groups, that's not like him
And Guadeloupe, that's not like him
Those books on Zen, that's not like him
The Karate classes, that's not like him
The fishing gear, that's not like him
Not like him
That's not like him
Musicians: See Credits section
© 1990 C'est Music / Maya Productions ASCAP
Lyrics & Music by: Carly Simon
I'll take some of this
I'll have some of that
And several more of these
Now that I see it, I know what I like
So I'll like it if you please
I ain't nobody's princess
Stuck in Sunday school
I ain't nobody's fool
So I'll help myself to love
And have the whole career
Don't wrap it up
I'll eat it here
Just look at you now
The ultimate guy
Class and wit and style
Once I might have pretended
To be someone else
Attracting you with guile
But now I'm not about to dress up
In some other woman's shoes
I got nothing to lose
So I'll help myself to love
Just gather round and cheer
Don't wrap it up
I'll eat it here
I stood there patiently waiting in line
A take-out man's an O.K. plan
If you've got lots of time
Especially if he's biodegradable
I ain't nobody's princess
I ain't nobody's fool
So I'll help myself to love
There's nothing more to fear
Don't wrap it up
I'll eat it here
Musicians: See Credits section
© 1990 C'est Music ASCAP
Lyrics & Music by: Carly Simon
In a pine forest cooler than the rest of the island
Lives a young fisherman with eyes like the sea
He built his own boat and made his own cabin
But he's broken the hearts of the likes like me
Now you must understand he made me a promise
There were secrets we shared
We planted a tree
We lived in a cabin
I fished along side of him
I fell under the spell of his sorcery
When he cast me adrift at the end of the summer
It was not for another but his own privacy
I fell apart like a rose
But the scent of my longing
Remains and it weeps like an old willow tree
At night when it's still
With a yellow moon rising
When his candle is snuffed
And he's deep in a dream
I move like a cat
And crawl into his window
And lie down beside him
In a golden moonbeam
The smell of his skin is just like the summer
When our love was as fresh
As the grass in the fields
And ever so softly I kiss his eyelids
Before slipping away, my secret concealed
Though I'm in it alone
I'm still in it, in love
And love can be lonely like a sweet melody
But just maybe he feels me
Like a whisper inside him
Like an angel beside him
Keeping him company
Musicians: See Credits section
© 1990 C'est Music ASCAP
Lyrics & Music by: Carly Simon
There are a few more freckles on your shoulders
The hammock swings lower and touches the ground
The apples are ripe and the corn is past
Everyone says summer goes by so fast
And we just got here
I can hardly believe it but it's ended
The beach is a haze and old love's a ghost
Hugo is twisting his way up the coast
If you blew out to sea I'd love you most
And we just got here
Nostalgia you fake, you bitter sweet ache
The time that you take could make another heart whole
Could the truth be I won't really see
How much I love you
'Til it's over
The two of us left here alone in the house
You bleed the pipes while I bring in the plants
Put our faces in place for September's dance
If you're willing, I'm willing to take one more chance
And we just got here
Musicians: See Credits section
© 1990 C'est Music ASCAP
Have You Seen Me Lately album CD cover
Photo: Bob Gothard
Have You Seen Me Lately album CD back cover
Photo: Bob Gothard
CD Booklet photo
Photo: Bob Gothard
CD Booklet photo
Photo: Bob Gothard
Photo session outtake
Photo: Bob Gothard
Clive Davis, Simon Andrews, Bill Berger, Bill Eddy, Mary Fremgen, Kristi Keleny, Roy Lott, Jan Mullen, Davitt Sigerson, Joseph Werzinski, Dirk Ziff
Frank Filipetti and Paul Samwell-Smith. Well, it's been nice having this little chat. I love you both very much.
Recorded and Mixed by: Frank Filipetti at Right Track Recording, NYC
Assistant Engineering by: John Herman
Mastered by: Ted Jensen at Sterling Sound, NYC
Teese Gohl: Keyboards, String Arrangements and Conducting
Steve Gadd: Drums
Jimmy Bralower: Drum Programming
Jimmy Ryan: Acoustic Guitar
Will Lee: Bass
Carly Simon: Guitars and Keyboards
Backing Vocals: Will Lee, Lani Groves, Lucy Simon, Jimmy Ryan, Paul Samwell-Smith
Better Not Tell Her - Spanish Guitar Solo: Jay Berliner
Have You Seen Me Lately - Electric Guitar: John McCurry, EWI: Michael Brecker
Life Is Eternal - Other Lead Vocal: Will Lee, Additional Percussion: Nana Vasconcelos, Add'l Backing Vocals: Sally Taylor, Ben Taylor, Julie Levine
Happy Birthday - Acoustic Bass Guitar: Jimmy Ryan ,Additional Percussion: Nana Vasconcelos, Add'l Backing Vocals: Sally Taylor, Ben Taylor
Holding Me Tonight - Trumpet: Marvin Stamm, Add'l Acoustic Guitar: Dirk Ziff, Electric Guitar: John McCurry
It's Not Like Him - (Based on a track originally produced by Davitt Sigerson and recorded by Brad Leigh), EWI: Michael Brecker
Fishermans Song - Add'l Vocals: Judy Collins, Lucy Simon
We Just Got Here - Acoustic Bass: Bruce Samuels
Management: Champion Entertainment Organization, Inc.
Photography: Bob Gothard
Design: Carolyn Quan
Hand Lettering: Kathy Schinhofen
Michael Brecker appears courtesy of GRP Records
Judy Collins appears courtesy of CBS Records
Lears magazine cover - December 1990
A Day In The Country with Carly Simon
Written by: Peter Feibleman
Cover photo: Andrew Eccles
She has an odd tendency to look like the landscape around her. She belongs to the island as much as the rocks or the cliffs or the hard, gray meadows speckled with flowers.
Peter Feibleman - a long time friend and neighbor of Carly's describes spending the day with her on Martha's Vineyard.
Tea at Carly's? Pulling into the driveway of her house, Carly parked the car, carried her groceries into the kitchen, checked to see that everybody was fine-a piece of behavior she repeats every couple of hours, either by phone or in person -and got back into the car. When I looked at her, she was still glowing with energy. "I'm having a little tea party on Wednesday," she said, pulling back onto the main road. "Will you come?"
I thanked her and said no. The last little tea party at Carly's had been the month before, when I'd walked in to find 35 or 40 people milling around, a good many of them famous.
On her life: Carly takes care of her family, friends, house, garden, neighbors, in such a way that they become the fabric of her existence. The trivia of the day is her real life. Her career is a minor key, a reflection in a pool, variations on the theme of survival.
"I'm going to New York next week for some recording...I dread it. I'm not a city person. I 'm very bad about crossing the street. I can't tell if a car's going to make a right turn or a left turn..then I watch for air-conditioners to fall on me, and I'm convinced that one of those subway gratings is going to give out under me. In New York I don't even see my friends, except for the ones who live in my building. I stay indoors all the time."
On writing songs: "I have a faucet dripping in my head all the time with melodies. They're not all good, but they're always there.
I have to sit down alone to write words. I do it at night, when everybody's asleep...it's a habit I got into when the kids were still babies."
On performing: Since her collapse in the middle of a concert in '81, Carly has all but refused to go on stage, shunning all offers to perform in public.
"It's pretty bad. Standing under those blinding lights with everybody expecting something from you....I mean it isn't for me, that's all. My heart races so fast I'm afraid it'll explode."
"I'd like to do a sort of living room tour of the States and Europe this winter. I ought to be able to get through that okay; it's different if it's somebody's home."
Simon and Puritanism ~ by Stephen Holden Read
"There's a lot of coming of age on the record and thinking about what's ahead," Carly Simon said the other day of the songs on her superb recent album, "Have You Seen Me Lately?" (Arista). "It's probably a measure of being middle-aged and feeling a decaying process starting, but for someone who was brought up nonreligious, I find I have more questions and am trying to find answers more concentratedly than I've ever had to in my life."
The new album's most overtly spiritual song, written by Ms. Simon with Teese Gohl, is a cheerful folk round whose lyric speculates on the possibility of reincarnation. "Happy Birthday," another time-obsessed song, is a poignant acoustic ballad in which the 45-year-old singer and songwriter comments wryly on the Puritanism in today's health-obsessed social climate.
At her own birthday celebration, the narrator of the song wistfully ticks off activities that have become risky or frowned upon over the last decade, from drinking to lying in the sun to casual sex. "We're too good to be happy, too straight to be sad," she observes. The song ends as the singer tries to think of something to wish for that is not potentially harmful.
Ms. Simon described "Happy Birthday" as "a reflection on this age of denial we've entered."
"We can't drink or smoke or go in the ocean or have many of the pleasures we got so used to having in the 60's and 70's," she said. "Nowadays, the only thing that's O.K. to do is to exercise at a feverish pace, and I hate to exercise."
The album's most stunning moment is its title song, which will soon be released as single. "Have You Seen Me Lately?" was originally written to have been sung by Meryl Streep over the title credits of the movie "Postcards From the Edge," but was dropped. In the final cut of the film, only instrumental fragments of the tune are heard recurrently in the background.
One reason the song was not used, Ms. Simon said, was that Carrie Fisher, who adapted the screenplay from her own novel, felt it was too soft and emotional to fit the sensibility of the lead character. Another was that Mike Nichols, who directed the film, was unhappy with the front credits and decided to remove them, leaving no place for the song.
"The song is about shame, about hiding something and being very self-conscious about it and imagining everyone is noticing," Ms. Simon said. "In the film, of course, that something was drugs. The two images that I pulled out that I thought were generic enough were dream images of being naked and dancing in a church choir and of being caught with one's hand in a cookie jar. It's a dreamy, insecure song."
Grade B ~ by Greg Sandow Read
"I challenge any adult with a mature and friendly heart to resist the first few songs on your latest, even ''Life Is Eternal,'' a New Age look at mortality (''Death is only a horizon,'' you sing) that breathes an air of genuine uplift, thanks to the modestly soaring chorus you were inspired to write. "
Hi Carly:
Your music has always been my biggest inspiration, especially where life's struggles are concerned. Simply playing one of your CDs has always been able to either brighten my day or give me the strength (or "umph") I need to get through. I've always wondered what inspired "Don't Wrap It Up?" Great song and one that makes me radiate with confidence and feel like I can take on the world.
Love, Sue - Fairborn, OH
Ever since I heard your collaboration with Janet Jackson on Son of a Gun, I have been unable to stop listening to your own music. I now have your box set, and my favorite song is Better Not Tell Her. I was only 17 when the single came out and now that I am 28 and listen to it over and over, I wonder if it is a true story about someone?
So often, it seems like a tribulation such as the one in this song, happens to people. Can you explain the storyline behind the song to me? Thanks for showing me what true music is about, I have at last found it with you.
Kenneth McNamara - Las Cruces, NM
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