August 15th was Jimmy Webb’s 76th birthday. Rather then going into Jimmy’s life, I will focus on one of his many songs, ‘MacArthur Park’ .One of my favourite songs.
It doesn’t happen that often the 2 versions of a song are equally as good. The 1st version was by fellow Limerick man(although I am just a blow in) Richard Harris, the 2nd version by Disco Diva Donna Summer.
The song was released in the month I was born ,April 1968.
In an interview with Newsday in October 2014, Jimmy Webb explained:
“Everything in the song was visible. There’s nothing in it that’s fabricated. The old men playing checkers by the trees, the cake that was left out in the rain, all of the things that are talked about in the song are things I actually saw. And so it’s a kind of musical collage of this whole love affair that kind of went down in MacArthur Park. … Back then, I was kind of like an emotional machine, like whatever was going on inside me would bubble out of the piano and onto paper.”
So without any further ado the 2 versions of the song.(For those who want to bake a cake, please make sure you keep the recipe and please don’t let out in the rain)
History of Sorts 
Reblogged this on History of Sorts.
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