Sam Cooke's nephew, R. B. (Ronald Bertram) Greaves was first to release "Fire And Rain" (James Taylor) in 1970 as a single and watched as it dented the Top One Hundred at number eighty-two.

Also in 1970 James Taylor took his own "Fire And Rain" as produced by Peter Asher from the album "Sweet Baby James" to number three on Billboard . Carole King was on piano and vocals. The "Flying Machine" mentioned in the song, not to be confused with the British band, was a sixties group consisting of James, Danny Kortchmar, Joel O'Brien and Zachary Wiesner. When James went solo he was the first non U.K. act on Apple Records.