Carole King's "Way over Yonder"

Last night I listened to Carole King's Tapestry, and I think I discovered a Biblical allusion in "Way over Yonder" that I hadn't noticed before.  The lines "Maybe tomorrow I'll find my way / To the land where the honey runs in rivers each day" seem to reference the Promised Land.  In Exodus 3:8, God tells Moses, "I have come down to deliver them [the people of Israel] out of the hand of the Egyptians and to bring them up out of that land to a good and broad land, a land flowing with milk and honey."

For what it's worth, I'd previously noticed the "coat of many colors" in "Tapestry," which has some resemblance (at least nominally) to Joseph's robe in Genesis 37:3.

The Drifters' "Some Kind of Wonderful"

I listened to a compilation album of the Drifters this morning, including King and Goffin’s “Some Kind of Wonderful.”  As soon as the introduction started, it reminded me of Colin Blunstone’s “Wonderful” from his Journey album.  The beginning of “Some Kind of Wonderful” is almost an a capella singing of wonderful, which is the same as the very end of Colin Blunstone’s “Wonderful.”

Wonderful is a fairly common word, especially considering that most pop songs are love songs, and a capella singing isn’t too uncommon, but I do think there’s some connection between these two songs.  Blunstone’s “Wonderful” was written by Rod Argent and Chris White, and all three were in the Zombies to-gether.  In 1964, the Zombies played a Murray the K show where the Drifters were also billed.  In the liner notes to Zombie Heaven, Paul Atkinson (the Zombies’ guitarist) recalls, “We hung out in Ben E King and the Drifters’ dressing room, and we’d play poker and sing and play guitar.”

I wouldn’t say that that’s absolute proof of direct influence, but I do think it’s more than just a coincidence.