Tryin' to Get the Feeling Again

This song was written and originally recorded by David Pomeranz on his 1976 album It's In Everyone Of Us. He told Songfacts the story: "We had a bit of a tumultuous time. My first wife and I had some ups and downs, which is what the song kind of speaks about. I kind of pulled from that experience. I also pulled from other times I'd had where I'd be kind of hot in love with somebody and then one day the fear would be gone, and I would never understand. I've come to understand what that's all about since, but there was a time that it was a mystery to me, how I could be in love and then not be. Which is kind of funny."

Regarding how the song was written David Pomeranz explained to Songfacts: "The music came first. There's a line with the title, 'That up/down, trying to get the feeling again.' I think it was something that came organically, and I sort of... tried to get the feeling again. I didn't understand what the song meant, and I had to sort of work backwards and discover what the lyrics were going to say, but that often happens, where I'll just have a title, and not know really, fully what the song's about until I kind of delve into it. I wrote it in San Francisco. I remember sitting out on a rooftop writing that. It took a little less than a year, but it was something I just couldn't get right. The beginning of the song has verses in it which are the initial kind of set-up to the song. So the, 'Doctor, my woman is coming back home late today,' that thing, I was working on that for several months, the body of the song, and I just couldn't get that opening verse right. I wrote several versions, one Barry recorded, one the Carpenters recorded, and one I recorded on Arista. And they were all different verses, which is really funny. It was those maybe five lines that I had worked on for four to six months, I just couldn't get it right. Funny."

Several artists recorded this before Manilow, including Gene Pitney and Lonnie Youngblood. Says Pomeranz: "It was actually written for the Carpenters. I had heard that they were looking for a song. And they never recorded it, or so I thought. Then Barry put his record out, and it was as big of a hit as it was, and then cautiously, they released an album of the Carpenters' called Interpretations in 1995, and on it was a version of 'Tryin' To Get The Feeling' that Karen had recorded, which was a complete surprise to everybody. So it was recorded several times, but Barry's was the big, big hit."