Album Review

William Ruhlmann [allmusic.com]

Carly Simon tried for a fresh start on her sixth new studio album, Another Passenger, changing to producer Ted Templeman and employing his clients the Doobie Brothers as backup musicians, along with Little Feat and other notable West Coast session players. The result was an album full of tasty licks that sometimes didn't sound much like Carly Simon. Had Elektra released ''Fairweather Father'' (a sufficiently cutting song that Simon felt compelled to write a sleeve note for, saying it didn't refer to her husband, James Taylor) or ''Dishonest Modesty,'' a finger-pointing song in the tradition of ''You're So Vain,'' as singles, they might have better represented the album than they did by instead releasing Michael McDonald's ''It Keeps You Runnin','' which had already appeared on the Doobie Brothers' Takin' It to the Streets, though it had not yet become a hit for the group. For Simon, it made the singles chart but didn't ignite her usual audience or round up a new one, and her commercial appeal continued to decline.