tavis: good evening. from los angeles, i am tavis smiley. tonight, carol kane. an instant new york times bestseller. and we are glad you have joined us with carol king, >> every community has a martin luther king boulevard. it's the cornerstone we all know. it's not just a street or boulevard, but a place where walmart stands together with your community to make every day better. >> and by contributions to your pbs station from viewers like you. thank you.

tavis: pleased to welcome carole king back to the program. the subject of a "the new york times" best selling memoir, and she is out with this wonderful never before recordings of many of the top songs. good to have you back on this program. >> thank you. always a pleasure. that was a very, very young woman. it was a long time ago. tavis: this is a strong question -- strange question. do you remember? >> it takes me back. we were actually hearing a lot of feedback. i do not know that it was a big hit by any artist in particular,

but i hear the demo today, and i am stunned by how it sounds. it puts me right back there. >> -- tavis: a strange question. setting your modesty aside for a second. when you hear your demos, what do you think? >> i am glad you put it that way about the modesty, because it is very difficult for me to evaluate my own stuff. and then i say, how did that young woman know how to do that stuff? you can hear every tracked for to the demo was destines. -- every track that the demo was destined. i am arlandria when i was young, i did that.

tavis: another strange question. and this is your stuff, you can recorded any time that you want. do you ever say to yourself that you wish? >> no. "natural woman," you hear my original version presented to reach the franklin and her producers, and then i recorded later on the "tapestry" album, -- tavis: you just recorded over and over again. >> that is one of the things

that i love. tavis: let me go right inside the book. i assume you are ok talking about it, because you wrote about it. how much of your success today has to deal with your brother? >> an interesting question. my brother was intellectually disabled, and he left the home and went into a place where they could take better care of him, were more specialized. it definitely informed my life and my career. tavis: you felt like stepping

your game up, but for someone who is as young as you work, that was a lot of pressure. >> probably. but i did not see it as pressure. i have got to be an excellent -- consequently, it was. i have to do this or something might happen. i want to be excellent in everything that i do, i value excellence. excellence means so much. tavis: what about your relationship with your parents?

>> i have not really thought about that. more with my dad, he was the boy, and i was the girl, and with the boy on able to achieve most things that fathers want to have their sons achieved, i tried. again, not in a pressure way, but being a girl or a woman later. it did not stop me from trying. tavis: how has your songwriting flourished prove so much pressure -- how has your

songwriting flourished? everyone has their own process. can you put your finger on the policy? >> i write out of feeling good and wonderful. sometimes i just show up. and when i show up, something magical happens. >> one of the other characters in the book is the neighborhood that you grew up in. how much of your neighborhood, your opinion, your surroundings had to do in any way with that?

>> well, the perfect -- first piece of furniture in my parents' home was a piano, so it was there. i had some sort of get with it, said that was an opportunity. my parents exposed me to the arts, to music. i technical and lived in brooklyn, with access to new york city, -- i technically lived in brooklyn. it was a world of opportunity that maybe it's not as readily available to others to grow up in more or a rural community. they may have to travel further. tavis: it can work even in duluth, minnesota. your mother exposing you to the arts. what impact do you think that

had? i am thinking beyond that piano and being exposed to the arts, what barry >> musica all kinds. classical, broadway shows, and then the music in my teenage world, it hit at the same time as me feeling the lower half of my body hitting, and it was a good mix, and that i wanted to get into that world, so really if you expose me to and musically, it comes out. tavis: when do you recall hearing lyrics in your head? >> my first husband, my first co-writer, who wrote all of those great hits in the 1960's. he is often not credited. it is very important to me that he be credited, because he not only often wrote the lyrics but drove where the money needed to

go. after we were divorced, there is a period of time when i was not writing with him, and i began to hear lyrics myself, and often they would come out together with the music. sometimes i would actually write a lyric first. tavis: i was laughing in the book with how used to sit in cubicles. how do two songwriters sit in cubicles and work on music together? >> they are basically writing the same song upside down and sideways, and they do not hear each other until one of them stops. tavis: it made me laugh. it is like a weird way to write a song. >> it was fiercely competitive. we could write, but we also came to the office and had other stuff going on, and then don

kirschner who passed away, it just inducted into the rock-and- roll hall of fame, he would say, ok, we have got to get that next fill in the blank, and we would all go into the cubicle, and we would try to deliver that song for the one that he was going to show to the artists. there was one we were chosen for. >> there is so much. >> it is a long life. tavis: and hopefully one that is nowhere near being over yet. the way that you hustled your way. >> and a good sense. tavis: you really busted your behind and hustle and your way into making them sign you. i will let you tell a story about how you got that first

contract. >> the first meeting, i just went through the phone book, according to the advice of one person. in the as days, some more eager to see new talent anywhere they could find it, a teenage girl off of the street, why not? and i played the piano. they did not sign me. they liked what they heard. tavis: they did not sign you. i am just impressed that you went through the phone book and got a meeting with them. whom does that prove >> nobody does, and everything is corporate, but this was the company with three or four people, and they were seeing people, and this was a joy. they go to bars and churches. they go wherever music was all over the country, and they found people like ray charles and ruth brown and lavern baker, and they

found these people. they were open to it. it is not like that anymore. tavis: they did not sign you. >> they did not. there was the place i went because paul anka, and i loved his song "diana." he was only a few months older than i, and i thought if he could do it, i could do it. and there was the hook in "diana," and i wanted to ask the producer, and he had me in and listen to my song and mcmillian the next one and the next one, and i said i do not have any more, and i got a contract. it was amazing. at 15. tavis: i have is going to say that. at 15.

what did jerry and ahmed say years later about not signing you? >> they wanted to sign me later, but it was not synchronous did. much later, i recorded a couple of albums for atlantic, but they encouraged me, and they had songs that i had written or jerry handwritten. >> a very -- tavis: very courageous about your marriage is, including one that was abusive. >> yes. tavis: many i have to spend more time going back through vain carole king play list -- through the carole king play lists. did i miss anything? >> the man who was abusive to me

it was rick, just so we clarify who was not. i was taken over. his personality took me over, and he influenced my songs, and i do not really think i did my best work when i was with him. if it did come out, i really cannot specify. tavis: as i said, go back through my carole king lists, because maybe the way it came out is not doing your best work. >> i think that is right. i was trying to speak for him in a lot of cases, and he wanted to be a star, and he is a vehicle -- and i was the vehicle for that. he is gone. i do not think he was happy being here, and he overdosed on drugs and took himself out of the mets. it was scary to write about it because it was a very painful thing. i figure if there is one woman,

and there are some men like this, as well, but one woman out there who thinks it is her fault and that she deserves to be treated that way, my message is you do not deserve to be treated that way. you deserve to be safe, and if it can happen to me, it can happen to you, and it can happen to anybody, so that was my reason to put it in the book. it could happen to carole king. i had money and fame and a support system and friends, but i fell into it. i states, too long. after you are smacked upside the head, and you stay, and in the book, i do not want to talk about it here because it is so complicated, but in the book, i outlined why women stay. i used to say the i would never stay with a man like that and that i would leave them in a new york minute, but i did not.

we stay until we realize. tavis: if not released through your expression, which is songwriting, how did you navigate your way out of it? navigate your way through? >> through is more complicated, but navigating out of it was that i came to a realization that it was time to go, and i took my children and went away, and while i was away, he overdosed on drugs, so i was already on the way out. i finally came to the realization that this was detrimental. tavis: onto happier stuff. >> on to have your stuff, but i do hope that people read that in that situation, and i even put a little box and the book of where to go to get help. tavis: happier times. as you know, i am a huge fan of

you and of james taylor. i am there in the front row. >> i know. i saw you. tavis: maybe you thought i was stalking you guys because i saw you so many times on tour. >> a friend, a special connection musically that i have not experienced with people in the same way, and again, i describe this in the book in such a wonderful lovely way. i put myself back in the moment of playing with him before the same time. it is the same when we come together. for years, we do not see each other or play, and here we are, below, and that is what happened on the "troubadour" tour. and at the club in 2007, and -- tavis: i was there for that,

too. >> i treasure that you were there and being part of that phenomenon. i have had a remarkable life. i seem to be in such good places at the right time. if you had asked me to sum up my life -- tavis: i am there to see you and j.t., and i am kind of bouncing, and the person next to me is bouncing, and it is jane fonda. this is a real moment of bouncing next to jane fonda at "troubadour.": you spent an old chapter talking about gratitude, and you have talked about people whose gift is going to be expressed. strange and a good way. somebody spends a chapter, just talking about gratitude and the

work of others. >> inspiring. paul newman. bono with his world tour and at eliminating third world debt. god knows we all need eliminating it. just people committing themselves. people who take their fame and their success and spend time really working for a cause, and my cause, there are a million great causes. eliminating poverty. because i live there, i am uniquely qualified. how it fits together as an ecosystem, and i found myself lobbying since 1990 i think to protect the northern rockies, and i have made all of these friends really on both sides of the aisle, people who care about the environment, and i just love the work because we have not gotten there yet, but just

meeting all of those people who really want to make a difference is important to me. it is in the book. tavis: you have a home in idaho. by about 33 years by my account. what has that space, or put another way, being away from the rat race, not being in new york, not being an l.a., my word the solitude of being in that space? >> i think it can only have made it better. i think that i am stimulated to right by the turmoil of the city, by the confusion, by the problems, but i am also nourished by the solitude, the closeness of nature. when people say what does wilderness mean, i get that. i get that. but i also think it does not mean destroy the wilderness

because it is an important part, and you are going to want to have a place to go, and your kids and your grandkids are going to want to have a place to go, so i see it is part of my responsibility with the problems going on in the city right now, but to take care of the wilderness for future generations, we have to. we have to. tavis: after every single song, he takes his microphone. he sticks it under his arm, and he applauds the audience. every tony bennett song. i come back to this because we were talking about gratitude a while ago. what is your sense of your fan base over the years? i have seen you countless times, and you have a die-hard loyal fan base over all of these years.

with you and j.t., you are not kids anymore. you are chronologically gifted, is that ok? >> 70. tavis: all of these years, that is not the easiest thing to do, some talk about your fan base. >> it has increased in terms of my contemporaries, but i see people in their 50's, 40's, 30's, and i see teenagers, and that is remarkable. i pinch myself about that and about having so many people who love the music that i have written or co-written. and it is kind of a pinch me moment, because really all i do is do the work that i do, and i go wild. -- while. -- wow.

and the tony bennett story, we do what we do, but when we touch people and reach out and make that connection to people, it is a completion of a circle, and we know that there may be an us without an audience, but there is a much better us with the audience. they feed us and nourish us, and just like the wilderness nourishes us, across generations, and gratitude. tavis: the love you have given is boundless, and it is always good to have you on this program. to have a light that is so rich and so full that you cannot scratch the tip of it in a 30- minute conversation. "a natural woman" which is written by the one and only carole king, and there is some new music out also, called "the

legendary demo." >> and available in vinyl. tavis: i love this. >> i love you, too. and thank you for your work. i really appreciate it. tavis: that is our show for tonight. you can get more on the itunes app store. thanks for watching, and as always, keep the faith. there can be no denying one of us is changing, or maybe we just stop trying and it is too late, baby, it is too late ♪ at pbs.org. tavis: join me next time for a

conversation. that is next time. we will see you then. >> every community has a martin luther king boulevard. it's the cornerstone we all know. it's not just a street or boulevard, but a place where walmart stands together with your community to make every day better. >> and by contributions to your pbs station from viewers like you. thank you. >> be more. pbs. >> be more. pbs.