James Taylor emerged in the late 1960s, a protege of Paul McCartney, and became a global superstar. He hit the charts with Fire and Rain, You've Got a Friend, Carolina on my Mind, and Handy Man. His career was given a further boost by his high profile marriage to singer Carly Simon and he retains a huge cult following world-wide which, on his last visit to the UK in 2000, sold out the Albert Hall. This biography explores Taylor's Scottish ancestry and family history of shipbuilders and pioneering American settlers. It pulls no punches regarding Taylor's heroin addiction, the failure of his marriage to Carly Simon or the numerous disputes with Warner Brothers, his record label for the most prolific part of his career.