Carly Simon’s Anticipation was one of those records that floated through a lot of homes in the 1970s, including mine. Simon, Carole King, Simon & Garfunkel, Neil Diamond, and Édith Piaf were all in rotation when I was a kid, which might explain a few things. I needed a lot of therapy, and it should shock absolutely no one that I had moved on to Rush, AC/DC, The Who, and Led Zeppelin before I was 12.
But Simon’s music stuck around for a reason. Anticipation, her second album, is not loud or theatrical in the usual rock sense. It does not need to be. The record works because Simon sounds completely invested in the material, and because the arrangements give her enough room to sound vulnerable, direct, and occasionally rather pointed. The title track became the obvious calling card, but the album is more than one familiar song that spent decades attached to ketchup bottles and AM radio memories.
Mobile Fidelity has now given Anticipation its first 180g 45RPM 2LP release, strictly limited to 3,000 numbered copies and priced at $59.95. The mastering chain is listed as 1/4-inch, 15 IPS Dolby A analog master to DSD 256, then to analog console and lathe. That will make the AAA crowd grumble into their inner sleeves, but the final result is what matters once the stylus hits the groove.
Pressed at Fidelity Record Pressing in California and packaged in a Stoughton gatefold jacket, this edition is aimed squarely at listeners who already care about quieter surfaces, wider groove spacing, and what 45RPM can do for vocal presence, transient clarity, and instrumental separation. Simon’s voice benefits from the extra space, especially when the arrangements pull back and leave her exposed in the center of the mix.
The album’s acoustic guitars, restrained orchestration, backing vocals, and rhythm section come through with a cleaner sense of placement than one might expect from a record that can easily be treated as soft 1970s singer-songwriter wallpaper. That would be a mistake. Andy Newmark’s drumming gives the music shape without pushing it into harder territory, and the low end has enough discipline to keep the songs from drifting.
The title track still works because it captures that anxious little window before a relationship either starts moving forward or collapses into awkward silence. Simon reportedly wrote it quickly while waiting for Cat Stevens to pick her up, and that detail matters because the song feels exactly like that moment: impatient, excited, slightly terrified, and trying to look composed. We have all been there. Some of us just did not turn it into a hit single.
“Legend in Your Own Time” has a warmer, more relaxed pull, while her reading of Kris Kristofferson’s “I’ve Got to Have You” leans into desire without turning into melodrama. “Julie Through the Glass,” “Three Days,” “Share the End,” and “Summer’s Coming Around Again” show the album’s range without breaking its mood. Simon was still close to her folk roots here, but the writing already points toward a more confident and commercially powerful artist.
At $59.95, this Mobile Fidelity release is not an impulse buy, and it has been a while since I spent that much on any single album, let alone a MoFi title. But this one earns it. The heavyweight gatefold jacket feels substantial, the anti-static MoFi sleeves are exactly the kind of detail more premium reissues should include, and both records arrived immaculate. No scuffs, no debris, no off-center nonsense requiring a fight with the spindle hole.
Carly Simon could lean a little schmaltzy at times, but she could also sell the hell out of a song, and Anticipation proves that from the first side forward. The 45RPM format gives her voice and the acoustic arrangements more space, and the sonics are strong enough to make the emotional directness of the record feel less like polite 1970s singer-songwriter wallpaper and more like a woman planting her flag.
For Carly Simon fans, 1970s singer-songwriter collectors, and listeners who want Anticipation in a more revealing vinyl edition, this 2LP set is absolutely worth the money. It does not reinvent the album. It lets the record breathe, and with Simon in this kind of form, that is more than enough.
Where to buy: $59.99 at MoFi
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Warren B.
May 31, 2026 at 8:56 pm
I’m somewhat older than you so I remember when this was released. But I don’t remember her becoming that popular yet. She needed a few more albums to really make it happen.
I find MoFi’s transparency now to be quite interesting as someone who got burned more than once.
The price doesn’t put me off when you consider that it’s two 45 RPM records and the sonic quality is there.
She was with Cat Stevens? Never knew that.