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Carly Simon retired in 2008. She released her final album, This Kind of Love, on Starbucks’ music label, Hear Music, bought a house in Martha’s Vineyard and settled into a quiet life. She called the album her “last at bat” and, well, that was that.
Then the Starbucks chain floundered and according to Simon, 64, the album sold poorly due to the coffee magnate’s mismanagement of her music. The deal with Hear Music included an advance of $750,000-$1 million, a prominent marketing scheme to promote the album in all Starbucks chains and a promise that This Kind Of Love would be stocked in the thousands. Hear Music basically promised Simon the success Paul McCartney experienced with 2007’s Memory Almost Full, which debuted at #3 on Billboard’s Hot 100 and sold 1.5 million copies worldwide.
Simon is now suing Hear Music and Starbucks LLC for “concealment of material facts,” “torturous interference” and “unlawful, unfair and fraudulent business practices.” Simon claims she sunk $100,000 into the production of This Kind Of Love and her advance dwindled to $575,000; a sum Simon alleges she has never received in full. In short, This Kind Of Love sold 124,000, was ignored by critics and fans and was passed off as a failure. Simon hopes to win between $5 and $10 million from the lawsuit.
The folk music icon is also making a surprise comeback, with Never Been Gone, an acoustic homage filled with songs about young women, life’s lessons and the way she’d always thought that life should be. The album, a reworking of her greatest hits with two new songs, is out October 27 on Iris Records.
The songs seem to have given the press shy Simon a new vigor as this year will see the chanteuse in the hot seat on “The Late Show with David Letterman,” “Good Morning America” and “The Today Show.” Soft-spoken and withdrawn, Simon has admitted to various media outlets that she is “excited and nervous” to open herself up to the public again.
Simon’s newfound strength has also manifested itself in a different way and she has decided to overcome her intense fear of flying and will be playing intimate venues throughout Europe for the first time in her thirty-eight year career. Times and locations have yet to be set, but the tour will kick off in January.
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