Carole King performs in 2012. Photo: Getty Images
The Plenary, February 18
CAROLE King's voice was never the point. As a singer she felt, well, like a natural woman, if you will. No acrobatics or histrionics. Just the skill and grace to stand aside and let her craft as songwriter do its work. Unfortunately, 53 years after her first hit, she's rather more prone to stumbling in the way.
Much of her Monday night show walked a wobbly tightrope between perfectly pitched memories and plain flat notes: hoarse, death-defying melodic leaps fleeing and returning to the safe harbour of her full, throbbing mid-register. If it weren't for the facts that a) love makes the world go round and b) love is like a boomerang, we might have had a problem.
As it was, it was impossible to detect the line where old time showbiz grit met the genuine joy of communion between King and her audience, as old Brill Building chestnuts like Up On The Roof jostled with a solid three-quarters of the album that every woman and her boyfriend knew backwards, Tapestry.
That first hit, Will You Love Me Tomorrow, offered a textbook illustration of her gift for killer chords. Her firm, unfussy piano work was as powerfully understated as the backing of uber '70s drummer Russ Kunkel and guitarist Danny Kortchmar.
The rest of the magic happened in the grey area between shared experience and approximate reconstruction. Yes we felt the Earth move under our feet; we knew darn well we had a friend and, with backing singers taking the hard road, A Natural Woman emerged triumphant.