Made in America. A profitable Album ?

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adam

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Hi
Reading the ray coleman biography on the Carpenters on page 289 it says Made in America was a very profitable album for both A and m and the Carpenters how can this be as i thought the Album was a commercial disapointment in sales and chart postions even though it did make UK no 12.It also says Made in America was a remarkbly powerful album but im not sure i agree.Thoughts anyone?
 
Adam, an excellent question !
That comment in the Coleman Biography (page 289) has always cried out (to me) for verification and/or documentation.
Certainly, given the advent of cd's, the album became profitable later on. (So, by 1994--at the time of the Biography, it probably was profitable.)
But, speaking strictly in terms of 1981 to 1983, I wonder what the sales/statistics are regarding this album.
One source, which I am inclined to dismiss (because it, too, does not present back-up source material for documentation)
states that the album experienced an unprecedented amount of returns from record retailers.
And, Coleman does not use such glowing terms for Passage,("...failed to sell well in the USA..", pp.230-231).
A direct comparison of the descriptions pertaining to the two albums, Passage and Made in America, as presented in
the Coleman Biography states that the latter album was not only "very profitable", "an artistic renaissance", "mature,
ambitious, arrangements", "remarkably powerful" (pp.285-290), but that the former had merely "two creative sparks".
Of course, one could ,now, state the case that every Carpenters album is very profitable.
 
I've been re-reading the Ray Coleman biography recently and, the highly one-sided treatment of the solo album aside, the glowing comments about Made in America are one of its oddest features. Coleman describes it as 'a remarkably powerful album, it's lyrics of often searing self-examination showing the maturing of a brother and sister whose personal and professional journey was entering a new phase'. I'd be delighted to know what 'self-examination' there is in tracks like 'Those Good Old Dreams, 'When You've Got What it Takes', 'Want You Back in My Life Again', 'Touch Me When We're Dancing' and 'Beechwood 4-5789' - nothing even remotely approaching 'searing'! I also don' see much sign of 'maturing' in terms of the sound, just the mining of an increasingly exhausted musical vein.

My guess is that Coleman felt obliged to puff up Made in America because it was one of Richard's favourites. He's not above ego massaging elsewhere in the book either, as he describes Time as having 'sold moderately well', although this might of course be a typo when in fact he meant 'sold very poorly'(!).

From what I understand, Made in America was one of if not the (the only other candidate being Christmas Portrait) most expensive Carpenters album to record, a fact borne out by the sheer number of tracks recorded for it, far more than any other album. To have been very profitable, it would have had to have sold well on release to cover these costs. Mr J and I have argued over the album's sales figures more than once in the past, but essentially it failed to go gold in the US at the time of release and still hasn't been certified even now, so it's either still below the 500,000 threshold or literally only just above it. My guess is that its sales back in 1981-2 would have been in the region of 250,000-300,000, so this can hardly have been enough to have comfortably offset its recording and promotion costs - remember, Karen and Richard promoted this much harder than they'd done for a while and visited Europe and South America to push it.

Even in the UK, while it made #12, Made in America didn't hang around on the charts for very long, so wasn't a huge seller there. By contrast, Voice of the Heart made #6 a couple of years later and spent several weeks longer in the Top 40. So I don't think its international sales were that high either.

So, personally I'd dismiss Coleman's comments on the success of Made in America as inaccurate and presumably deliberately so in order to please Richard. He gives no supporting evidence for this assertion and all the other evidence points to it having fallen well short of expectations. I imagine it was felt necessary, after tearing the solo album apart, for Coleman to have praised Made in America so as to say 'see, they made the right decision after all' and hoping that no one would double-check this against any other evidence to see if this was in fact true.
 
I have to say that to my learned ear...blah blah and so on...MIA does depict on several tracks further refined technique with overdubs. The ending "everyday" in When You've Got the closing of Back In My Life the "go my own way" of Somebody's Been Lyin to name a few. This hyper o-dub style sounds born in the MMM sessions in the beloved "medley" ala Bacharach. Studio engineering stuff like how many trax used 24 maybe with MIA vs the earlier 16 and such. Chris May can speak better here and clarify my point. Anyway compared to TICKETS backgrounds and their edgy garage sound MIA is a contrast. After having waited years for MIA I instantly noticed this productions feature. In terms of production I can see where one might call this best. However HORIZON is my platinum standard measure. Where MIA suffers is the usage of a Carpette, the inclusion of '78s I Believe You, The gloomy Wedding Song. Seems like filler and expectations following a sabbatical of that magnitude left room for further creativity. Kinda how RC eaked by with TIME. Do a couple numbers (which I love love btw) and the rest to guests. Remarkable how Karen in ill health and deflated ego solo wise could croak a note for anything CarpenterS. What a hold those bastards had over that vulnerable tortured soul.

Jeff
 
I have to agree with everybody about Coleman's glowing review of MIA. His observations were obviously in deference to R.C., as were his unfavorable comments about the solo record. While it was nice to see something so positive written about MIA, it really doesn't ring true. It's not classic Carpenters by any stretch, but it does have its moments.

I felt pretty cheated when 'I Believe You' was included, as well, after so LONG (four years!) waiting for a regular, non-seasonal release. But Karens' vocals shine on that tune, and they're buried on the rest of the album. I'd love to know exactly why.
 
"MIA" is Carpenters' only real recorded disaster, IMHO. The public had largely moved on by the time of its release. It only had one top-20 hit and then nothing. In my insignificant opinion, it is their very worst for many reasons and it deserved its fate. I'd be very surprised if, given all that was obviously spent on the production (the kitchen sink costs,) it turned a profit in the short term. Over time, I'm sure it likely has however (thank you, Japan.)

Ed
 
Yeah. I take the comments on Made In America's profitability in the Coleman book with a grain of salt. I think the intention was to give the reader the impression that things were starting to turn around for the duo (especially with the success of "Touch Me...") and then tragedy struck. Embellishment of the truth for the benefit of the overall story happens in a lot of biographies for various reasons. Karen dying shortly after a hugely successful comeback album has a much more tragic ring to it (and leaves the reader with a "what if?") than Karen dying shortly after the release of a commercial flop and their lowest charting album in over a decade.

I still think Made In America is much better than Passage. That is their worst album in my opinion. I do love many of the tracks on it individually, but it's an incohesive mess as a collective album.
 
adam said:
Hi
Reading the ray coleman biography on the Carpenters on page 289 it says Made in America was a very profitable album for both A and m and the Carpenters how can this be as i thought the Album was a commercial disapointment in sales and chart postions even though it did make UK no 12.It also says Made in America was a remarkbly powerful album but im not sure i agree.Thoughts anyone?
Click to expand...
We've been over this topic several times in the past few years.

Made In America was a decent-selling album.It didn't match the blockbuster success of (most of) the 70's albums-but it still did fairly well.

I believe the album only sold about 250,000 copies the year of it's release-but within ten years cumulative sales jumped to nearly 500,000 copies.And,as I've said before,sales are sales-whether instant or cumulative.Some albums are an instant success and some albums are successful over time.

The term "very-profitable album", as described in Coleman's bio,might be stretching the truth a little bit.But,we could argue that in contrast to several other A&M albums released in 1981(by veteran artists) that didn't sell half as well-Made In America did OK.
 
GaryAlan said:
Adam, an excellent question !
That comment in the Coleman Biography (page 289) has always cried out (to me) for verification and/or documentation.
Certainly, given the advent of cd's, the album became profitable later on. (So, by 1994--at the time of the Biography, it probably was profitable.)
But, speaking strictly in terms of 1981 to 1983, I wonder what the sales/statistics are regarding this album.
One source, which I am inclined to dismiss (because it, too, does not present back-up source material for documentation)
states that the album experienced an unprecedented amount of returns from record retailers.
And, Coleman does not use such glowing terms for Passage,("...failed to sell well in the USA..", pp.230-231).
A direct comparison of the descriptions pertaining to the two albums, Passage and Made in America, as presented in
the Coleman Biography states that the latter album was not only "very profitable", "an artistic renaissance", "mature,
ambitious, arrangements", "remarkably powerful" (pp.285-290), but that the former had merely "two creative sparks".
Of course, one could ,now, state the case that every Carpenters album is very profitable.
Click to expand...
The statement about Made In America experiencing an unprecented amount of returns from record stores is erroneous.

Made In America was a steady-seller until the early 90's.If the album was getting large returns from retailers in the early 80's,it would've been out-of-print by 1985 or 1986.And,it wouldn't have received a CD release in 1986 if it wasn't selling well up to that point.
 
mr J. said:
We've been over this topic several times in the past few years.

Made In America was a decent-selling album.It didn't match the blockbuster success of (most of) the 70's albums-but it still did fairly well.

I believe the album only sold about 250,000 copies the year of it's release-but within ten years cumulative sales jumped to nearly 500,000 copies.And,as I've said before,sales are sales-whether instant or cumulative.Some albums are an instant success and some albums are successful over time.

The term "very-profitable album", as described in Coleman's bio,might be stretching the truth a little bit.But,we could argue that in contrast to several other A&M albums released in 1981(by veteran artists) that didn't sell half as well-Made In America did OK.
Click to expand...

This is what I have trouble believing. Back catalogue sales didn't really start to boom until the mid-1990s, so stores wouldn't hold much if any back catalogue stock, particularly not of albums like Made in America that hadn't sold well at the time of release. The only way such albums would sell copies is if customers ordered them into the store. The idea that Made in America could have been selling an average of 25,000 copies a year during the 1980s by such means, when the Carpenters' profile and critical standing were both pretty low, when it only contained one moderate-sized hit and presumably was hardly remembered by the general public, is frankly implausible. I should think hardly any of their studio albums were selling such numbers in the 1980s, let alone this one.

We'll probably have to agree to disagree on this Mr J, but I follow Occam's razor with Made in America: the reason why it's never been certified gold is because it hasn't sold enough copies, or certainly hadn't by 1998 when the last big batch of Carpenters' back catalogue albums were re-certified. It might have squeaked past the post by now (2014), but it's still one of their three worst-selling albums from the 1969-1983 period.

Moreover, given A&M's seemingly rather bizarre idea of what constituted a strong album in the early 1980s, I'd bet Herb and Jerry expected it to sell far more copies at the time of release than whatever it has done cumulatively in 30-odd years.
 
No doubt, this is driving over old terrain; but, yes, newer members do appreciate, and are able to contribute their own research on
topics such as this. And, as time passes, more documentary evidence may come to light on this, or any other, topic.

From my own personal experience, I started collected all of the Carpenters albums beginning in the 1980's, and I will say: it was tough finding them.
Record outlets do not (did not) "store" multiple copies on their shelves of the back catalog of the artists--they would never have had the space.
At least, in my circumstance, between 1980 and 1985, locating copies of all of the Carpenters recordings was very difficult. The albums
that had sold well were already in peoples' homes, albums that did not sell well were simply not stocked.
Seems to me that, at the inception of the "cd revolution", the record companies were willing to press cd copies of every vinyl album by
their best selling artists. Obviously, A&M would have created a cd copy of every Carpenters vinyl album,regardless of previous sales. They just would
not press the same number of cd's for the poor vinyl sellers. I dare say, it would be a poor business decision to make the same number of cd's
of "Made in America" as "A Song For You". So, in order to "keep" MIA in circulation, it would not have to have the same sales goals as the other
cd's. You can not have the same sales expectations of each Carpenters album, and then press the same amount of each album to sell. That makes no sense.
So, in order to turn a profit on sales of MIA cd's, keep expectations in line, and then only press "so many copies" for sale.
What constitutes a steady seller? You can not tell me that each Carpenters album was the same "steady seller", at the same level of sales: inconceivable.
"Ticket to Ride", also, came out on cd: you can not convince me that A&M would have pressed the same number for sale as, say, Horizon.

Fan Club Newsletter,July 1984: Singles 1969-1973 and Voice of the Heart, now available on cd.
Fan Club Newsletter,February 1986: Horizon, was remastered for cd release. Others will follow.(Close to you, Song for You, Now and Then,
and Christmas Portrait)
June 30,1986: Made in America, now on cd; followed by Ticket To Ride , Kind of Hush, Carpenters, Passage.
Entire domestic Carpenters catalog available on cd ,as of the last newsletter in January 1989.

At #12 in the UK, MIA sold 60,000 copies.
In the USA, at #52, what would we be inclined to come up with for sales? Where is that number? How to verify the number?
In the UK, Carpenters soundscan sales 1987-2004 are between 2.38 and 4.5 Million (2.38M is verified,total for those years).

Whether or not I believe what is being claimed for MIA sales, is beside the point.
My belief does not matter.
What matters is proof.
And, I have searched for documentary,verifiable evidence for sales figures of MIA, and I am unable to locate such.
(I discounted the publication which claims USA 75,000 sold and 75,000 returned to vendors--as it is undocumented and not verifiable.)
Please, someone--anyone--help us locate and document the actual, verifiable, number of sales for "Made In America"!
That would make my day!
 
Rumbahbah said:
This is what I have trouble believing. Back catalogue sales didn't really start to boom until the mid-1990s, so stores wouldn't hold much if any back catalogue stock, particularly not of albums like Made in America that hadn't sold well at the time of release. The only way such albums would sell copies is if customers ordered them into the store. The idea that Made in America could have been selling an average of 25,000 copies a year during the 1980s by such means, when the Carpenters' profile and critical standing were both pretty low, when it only contained one moderate-sized hit and presumably was hardly remembered by the general public, is frankly implausible. I should think hardly any of their studio albums were selling such numbers in the 1980s, let alone this one.

We'll probably have to agree to disagree on this Mr J, but I follow Occam's razor with Made in America: the reason why it's never been certified gold is because it hasn't sold enough copies, or certainly hadn't by 1998 when the last big batch of Carpenters' back catalogue albums were re-certified. It might have squeaked past the post by now (2014), but it's still one of their three worst-selling albums from the 1969-1983 period.

Moreover, given A&M's seemingly rather bizarre idea of what constituted a strong album in the early 1980s, I'd bet Herb and Jerry expected it to sell far more copies at the time of release than whatever it has done cumulatively in 30-odd years.
Click to expand...
Your statement "back catalog sales didn't really start to boom until the mid-1990's" is erroneous. K&R's entire catalog sold extremely well throughout the 70's,80's and 90's.And,in fact,Polygram bought A&M in 1989 largely based on the profit-generating value of the Carpenters catalog.Some of the classic titles(Close To You,Horizon,Christmas Portrait) were easily selling 30,000+ copies a year in the CD era.

The statement "during the 1980's the Carpenters' profile and critical standing were pretty low" is also erroneous.Karen's death did more to increase their profile than any hit single ever did-and sales of K&R's catalog increased dramatically following Karen's death.The TV movie in early 1989 also provided another sales-spike in their catalog,with many titles selling 2-3 times the average.

Most record stores don't stock much back catalog due to lack of inventory space.But,I remember Tower Records in NY generally had two or three copies of every Carpenters album on hand in the 80's & 90's.And,I used to visit Tower at least once a month.
 
[QUOTE=".... "during the 1980's the Carpenters' profile and critical standing were pretty low" [/QUOTE]

When wasn't the "Carpenters’' profile and critical standing" pretty low? No one ever admitted liking them, yet they sold over 100 million albums.
Also, I used to visit Tower Records, too, in the early 80's and found, not only their entire catalogue available, also several "imports" to add to my collection.
 
Geographer said:
Also, I used to visit Tower Records, too, in the early 80's and found, not only their entire catalogue available, also several "imports" to add to my collection.
Click to expand...

I was about to add that: Tower was known for carrying an entire back-catalog, but I know that by the time the 1990s rolled around, economics caught up with them, and they slashed back catalogs from their stores. Prior to that, though, they were well known for back catalog. I can't think of any other store that did this, especially locally here in town.

BTW I have to agree with @ThaFunkyFakeTation that MIA wasn't such a great album--only two songs on that album appeal to me these days, and to be honest I can't remember anything else. Well...other than "I Believe You" which to me is.....naah, I'll be nice and not say anything about it. (To put it nicely, that track will never spin in this house ever again. :laugh: )

To me that album was a novelty when it came out, but it did not last long on my turntable. A few spins and I was grabbing Passage or A Song For You instead.
 
Recall, too, that MIA was the most expensive Carpenters album to do. (Fan Club Newsletter#75,June 1982)
Recall, Variety (1989,and reproduced in Randy's book,p.265 2nd ed'n.): Carpenters telepic boosts sales-
"...there's no telling how much we would have sold had we had the stuff on hand."
"...did little to boost Richard Carpenter's..Time.."
And, recall, Lovelines was not released until much later that year (of the TV Movie) and,thus, was not a part of the "sales boost".
And, in fans ask section: To what does Richard attribute the low chart listing of MIA? A: No top 5 single and less than
satisfactory promotion.
The assertion that: "..K&R back catalog sold extremely well .." seems to miss the point that I am underscoring--each album
did not move the same number of copies, nor was every album/cd stocked (at retail ) in the same quantities.
Saying some albums sold 2 or 3 times average, after the airing of the movie,provides no quantitative information as to what
the average number of sales is to begin with.
Mr. J: With all due respect, a quick calculation shows that your numbers do not add up. (4 albums times 30,000 is 120,000 per year, each
year, for the four albums you noted, and 1985-present (28 times 120,000) gives 3,360,000 sold.
Now, on your theory, and average sales alike for each Carpenters album we would arrive at roughly a minimum of
27 Million sold in the USA (and only in the cd era), the evidence does not support that number (24 Million is verifiable from RIAA, all eras ).
QED: Carpenters albums do not sell at the same clip each year, nor does each album maintain that clip. (e.g., recall The Singles 1969-1973
was certified at 7M copies in 1998 (25 years translates to 280,000 copies per year averaged out--that for their highest seller).
Scanning sales at the RIAA database simply does not translate to more than 533,000 copies per year, each year 1969-2014; and that is
an average sales number including all of the releases in the USA in that time frame.
"September 2,1989 LATimes:
A&M has annual sales of between $220 million and $300 million, according to analysts' estimates.
A&M currently has just one album in the top 100: "Surprise Attack" by the hard rock group Tora Tora Tora. However, the company has high hopes for a forthcoming release by Janet Jackson, whose last album, "Control," sold nearly 5 million copies in the United States.
Many in the industry expected that Alpert and Moss might wait until A&M climbed out of its current slump before selling the company.
And some sources close to the talks said Friday that Alpert and Moss may consider selling only a minority stake in their company.
Others say that if Jackson's album is released soon and sells well, Alpert and Moss may wait for a better offer."

(i.e., No mention of Carpenters revenue as the strong point in the sale of A&M to Polygram. )

Rumbahbah, you are correct (in my opinion):
Their profile and standing was at a low ebb (say,1982),
and I would heartily appeal to anyone to provide evidence to the contrary if that is incorrect.
 
GaryAlan said:
No doubt, this is driving over old terrain; but, yes, newer members do appreciate, and are able to contribute their own research on topics such as this. And, as time passes, more documentary evidence may come to light on this, or any other, topic.
Click to expand...

mstaft said:
I would think conversations like this one will come back up time and time again as newer members join the boards. It doesn't bother me one bit to readdress old topics if it keeps newer members informed on the specifics regarding our favorite duo and their recording activities.
Click to expand...

I have absolutely no issues with topics re-appearing from time to time, especially given the contributions that people like GaryAlan have made recently - some of the clippings, photos, news items and other articles that have appeared here are just amazing. This part of the forum seems to be a lot busier than it once was and I think that's a large part of the reason why, all the new stuff that keeps coming to the surface :)
 
mstaft said:
I'm sorry- I didn't mean to imply newcomers couldn't contribute. Not at all.
Click to expand...

I didn't take it that way. I was trying to say how great this forum has been lately since some of the newcomers brought us new info and links to things we have discussed many times. It's great! New things keep surfacing as time goes by. The highlight for me in the past couple of years was this clip. When this was posted, my inbox went NUTS! As a die-hard fan, I love that feeling :)

 
Thanks much for the above videos, Newvillefan.
Last two of those are new to me.
Although, I do still become quite emotional when viewing.
"The Voice", as Richard says.
A special soul, indeed.
 
I think the video of karen singing touch me when were dancing is when she is at her thinest.video is from october 1981
 
Great clips, newvillefan. Man, I would love to have that live version of "I Need To Be In Love" from the second one complete on CD. That is an absolutely amazing performance. Wow!!
 
newvillefan said:
I didn't take it that way. I was trying to say how great this forum has been lately since some of the newcomers brought us new info and links to things we have discussed many times. It's great! New things keep surfacing as time goes by. The highlight for me in the past couple of years was this clip. When this was posted, my inbox went NUTS! As a die-hard fan, I love that feeling :)

Click to expand...

Thanks for posting that! As much as it pains me to see her so ill, this video is much better than the one with the tiny people dancing. :wink: I remember the comments on the statues - particularly the David statue.

I do wonder if Karen would have regained her youthful appearance had she survived and fully recovered.

I too am enjoying the new members comments! Nice to know that their legacy won't die out.
 
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