GIRLS LIKE US by Sheila Weller

Finished Mo 4/19/21

I bought the book after I watched a YouTube bio about Joni Mitchell. The book is over 600 pages and is just about everything you could possibly want to know about these three fascinating women. 

Random Thoughts:

Carly Simon is the daughter of the man who started Simon & Shyster Publishing. Carly was brought up on New York's Upper Eastside. She spent the lion's share of her inheritance on  psychotherapy. 

I didn't realize Joni was involved with Graham Nash of The Hollies. The scene in Laurel Canyon in the mid 60's must have been something.  

James Taylor was with Joni and Carly. He must have been a real lady's man in his heyday. 

Gerry Goffin and Carole King produced some of the biggest hits of the sixties. They had a 'black sound'. This reminded me of the white musicians that backed many black artists at Muscle Shoals. 

Little Eva who sang King/Goffin's composition, 'Do The  Locomotion', was their babysitter. 

Carole King  is the most successful female songwriter of the latter half of the 20th century in the US, having written or co-written 118 pop hits on the Billboard Hot 100. King also wrote 61 hits that charted in the UK, making her the most successful female songwriter on the UK singles charts between 1962 and 2005.

Much was made of Joni Mitchell's mother. She was a strong willed woman and crucial to Joni's development. They were farmers in western Canada and Joni's mother was too busy working on the farm, and Joni's mother made up for her neglect by lavishing attention on Joni. 

Joni Mitchell uses intricate open tunings on her guitars. In concert, she is surrounded by numerous guitars and all of them in different tunings. Keith Richard also uses open tuning. 

Joni was a victim of childhood polio.

Joni wrote the song 'Woodstock', yet she did not attend the festival. She was to appear on The Dick Cavett Show and didn't want to miss this very important interview. 

Joni Mitchell's biggest flaw in her life was the birth of her first daughter. She was forced to give up the child and this bothered her for decades. Later, she reunited with her daughter.

Jaco Pastorious was the bass player in her band. 

Joni is afflicted with Morgellons Syndrome. This is a condition in which individuals have sores that they believe contain fibrous material. Morgellons is not well understood, but the general medical consensus is that it is a form of delusional parasitosis. The sores are typically the result of compulsive scratching, and the fibers, when analysed, are consistently found to have originated from clothings and other textiles.

Carly Simon Simon has amassed 24 Billboard Hot 100 charting singles and 28 Billboard Adult Contemporary charting singles. Among her various accolades, she has won two Grammy Awards, from 14 nominations. AllMusic called her "one of the quintessential singer-songwriters of the '70s". 

Carly Simon is terribly shy and as a child had a stammer or stutter.

Simon first sang professionally with her sister.- The Simon Sisters. 

Simon underwent a mastectomy, chemotherapy and reconstructive surgery for breast cancer during 1997 and 1998.

All three women were married multiple times and romantically links to numerous men. Obviously, the Sexual Revolution affected the women of the era too. 

I wonder why the book didn't include Lura Nyro.