Well, I agree with many of the nominations and disagreee with a few others. I won't belabor the obvious (e.g., I don't like "Having My Baby," "Green Berets" or "MacArthur Park" any more than the rest of you), but here are a couple of thoughts:

What's so terrible about James Taylor's r&r covers? Of course, I'd rather listen to (for exaample) Marvin Gaye sing the original "How Sweet It Is (to be loved by you," but JT does a nice job covering it, and his rendition is probably closer to how I would deliver the song.

More to the point, the chords available for this song in a James Taylor Songbook are far superior to anything I could figure out for myself and to anything available on the internet. They are definitely identical, or very close, to the original Motown arrangement. So, I am glad James Taylor recorded the song because that was the ciritical first step of a process that resulted in my access to a good arrangement for a song I want to perform! (I won't necessarily be imitating JT's blue-eyed-sould vocals, not directly; but I do recognize that my interpretation of Marvin's work won't be perfect, and if I prove, despite my best effforts, to be no better than James Taylor ~ well, there's no shame in that.)

Also:

I'm finding that, as I age, I can now enjoy certain songs that were popular during my youth but that I didn't like at the time (or, at least, wouldn't admit to liking).

During the mid-1960s, I was very much a folk-music snob, and was starting to snobishly reject even some of the more pop/commercial areas of "folk" in favor of an exclusive embrace of hard-core blues, and maybe a bit of other non-blues stuff if old and authentic enough. Up through the later 60s, I came to really enjoy and champion, first, electric Chicago-style blues and, eventually, folk-rock and psychedelia as well as Memphis and Detroit soul (and, I suppose, Philly soul as well). But most of the unavoidable top-40 pop music that formed the inescapable aural "wallpaper" of my life in those years was stuff I flat-out rejected.

Nowadays, when I hear some of those records, whether on a "classic rock" radio station or in the soundtrack of a movie, etc., I really like them. Part of the appeal, certainly, is simple association with memories of my youth, but I often find that, having shed some of my prejudices, I can appreciate the singing, arrangements, musicianship, production, etc.

Examples: "I Fought the Law (and the law won)," "Secret Agent Man," "Build Me Up Buttercup." There must be other (and undoubtedly better exmaples, but that's all I can think of right now...