Heads & Tales by Harry Chapin

Heads & Tales, Harry Chapin's first album, came out on Elektra in 1972, with Jac Holzman producing, and it's the record that introduced a folk-rock songwriter who liked to take his time. It carried his first hit, "Taxi", and both the single and the album stayed on the charts for more than six months, each selling over a million copies.

The songs unspool at their own pace, and Chapin sings them with a conversational ache that makes you lean closer. Early LP pressings had a clever gimmick, too: a front cover with a square hole cut out of it, framing a photo of Chapin printed on the enclosed poster and lyric sheet, giving the sleeve a three-dimensional look.

Written with AI assistance from RockLists chart data, MusicBrainz and Wikipedia.