Fire and Rain

Warner Bros. released it in August 1970 as the second single from Sweet Baby James. It reached number three on the Hot 100 and number two in Canada, his first top ten hit. Taylor said on VH1 Storytellers that the song was about several episodes of his early career. The line addressed to Suzanne concerns Suzanne Schnerr, a childhood friend who died by suicide while he was in London recording his first album. Friends at home kept the news from him, and he found out six months later, he told NPR in 2005.

He described three parts: Schnerr, his struggle with drug addiction and depression, and coming to grips with fame, where the flying machines of the lyric recall the Flying Machine, the band. It was not a plane crash, as was long rumored. Taylor finished writing it while in rehab. Carole King plays piano on the recording, Russ Kunkel uses brushes, and Bobby West plays double bass in place of a bass guitar. According to Taylor, King wrote You've Got a Friend in answer to the line about not finding a friend.

Afterlife

R. B. Greaves and Johnny Rivers both released singles of it in 1970 before Taylor's own, reaching 82 and 94 on the Hot 100. Marcia Hines had a number 17 hit with it in Australia in 1975. The recording entered the Grammy Hall of Fame in 1998, and Rolling Stone ranked it 227 in 2011 and 146 in 2021. In "Deep Space Homer" on The Simpsons, Taylor changes the line about flying machines in pieces to flying machines "flying safely through the air."

At Edinburgh Castle in July 2026, the Guardian reported, he sang the last line as "Thought I'd see you just one more time, Suzanne," a small change from the recorded lyric.