⭐ Official Review [Single]: 9. "IT'S GOING TO TAKE SOME TIME"/"FLAT BAROQUE" (1351-S)

Which side is your favorite?

  • Side A: "IT'S GOING TO TAKE SOME TIME"

    Votes: 58 92.1%
  • Side B: "FLAT BAROQUE"

    Votes: 5 7.9%

  • Total voters
    63
Glad to bring something 'new' to the table! :) Thanks for the You Tube post of 'Flat Baroque', too, Harry. Great stuff! I must say after 44 years, I NEVER made the joke connection with the two words in the title. Lordy. :wink:
 
I just listened to my 45 of Flat Baroque tonight as well as reading along to Chris's notes and sure enough this is a dedicated single mix. The opening piano notes come in predominantly to the left. I went to all my CD's with this track and Harry is right, this single mix 45 is not on the new The Complete Singles nor is it on the Japan Singles Box Set, in fact all of the ones I played from CD of this track the opening piano notes are predominantly centered.

I knew I was hearing something back in 2003 but I was all new to getting back into a turntable and collecting 45's that I couldn't pin point what was different but I knew something was. It's cool when you stumble back upon something like this.

I will be really curious what TJL says regarding why this single mix was not used on the new collection, very interesting. In fact what a great question to ask Richard about (why has this single mix never surfaced again on any collections) is the original single master lost?
 
I forgot to thank A&M Retro again for bringing this up it wasn't until his last post here that it dawned on me about this 45 single. I really didn't visit the single of Flat Baroque often so it was easily missed and forgotten.
 
Is the only thing different the direction of the stereo signals, yet the recording the same? I only listened on my iPhone and it sounded as I remember it from the A Song For You LP as far as the piece goes. Guess I need to take things out and compare so I am not confused. Flat Baroque is best for me on Live at the Palladium as it opens the concert. With Baroque being my favorite period in music history, I have always liked this tune. Which brings me to back to why I always enjoy the Carpenters. They showcase music of every type and style which helps take the listener to different places, while doing it in good taste and good musicianship, which, in turn, can lead to the attraction and development of new musicians. It is the base I stood on as a teenager as I defended the Carpenters and their musical influence. There are few who can claim this!
 
The differences are subtle but noticeable on a good stereo setup or headphones.
 
Is the only thing different the direction of the stereo signals, yet the recording the same? I only listened on my iPhone and it sounded as I remember it from the A Song For You LP as far as the piece goes. Guess I need to take things out and compare so I am not confused. Flat Baroque is best for me on Live at the Palladium as it opens the concert. With Baroque being my favorite period in music history, I have always liked this tune. Which brings me to back to why I always enjoy the Carpenters. They showcase music of every type and style which helps take the listener to different places, while doing it in good taste and good musicianship, which, in turn, can lead to the attraction and development of new musicians. It is the base I stood on as a teenager as I defended the Carpenters and their musical influence. There are few who can claim this!

Correct. Same instrumental content, just mixed differently.
 
One other piece of evidence concerning the relative position of IGTTST in the context of Carpenters' singles is its performance in our "20 Songs" poll. It is one of only two Top-20 hits that have failed to receive even a single vote in any personal "Top 20" list. (BTW, we are up to 14 ballots now, and I encourage any and all who've not yet participated in that poll to do so--that thread is titled "Carpenters in 20 Songs.")

To my ears, IGTTST is a pleasant piece of work but it lacks most of the spark that we'd heard in the C's earlier material. It seems workmanlike rather than inspired, and perhaps it was more of a hedged bet than a daring (and "on the money") outside-the-box projection--as had been the case with "Only Just Begun," "Superstar," and "Hurting Each Other."
 
While revisiting--and comparing with--
Flat Baroque,
as performed on the Live At The Palladium LP,
is it me, or is the song played far too fast in 1976 ?
I assume that it was purposeful for the Concert, but....
I had not known the song could get more distasteful to me !
 
Yep. Faster. We'd talked before about how in live shows, a performer often gets that adrenaline pumping and goes into hyperdrive and the songs come out extremely fast. Also, with the constant performing and rehearsing comes a familiarity with a piece that allows a bit of showmanship as to how fast it can be performed. These factors often affected songs that were fast to begin with, like "Mr. Guder", the "Bacharach Medley" and "Flat Baroque".

Harry
 
Yep. Faster. We'd talked before about how in live shows, a performer often gets that adrenaline pumping and goes into hyperdrive and the songs come out extremely fast. Also, with the constant performing and rehearsing comes a familiarity with a piece that allows a bit of showmanship as to how fast it can be performed. These factors often affected songs that were fast to begin with, like "Mr. Guder", the "Bacharach Medley" and "Flat Baroque".

Harry

And to add to that, it's very common when producing a "live" show to intentionally speed up certain tunes that were otherwise recorded at a slower tempo in order to keep the momentum going and retain audience interest. Many slower songs got this treatment in their shows (i.e. Close To You, Only Yesterday, Top Of The World etc).
 
Thanks, all !

And, again, revisiting (yet) another version of
Flat Baroque,
I do note that the 1:48 version off of the (I believe)
Your Navy Presents
is really great !!
I love it.

But, unfortunately I have not warmed up to the 45-Single (1:48) version,
or the Palladium (1:33) version.
 
While revisiting--and comparing with--
Flat Baroque,
as performed on the Live At The Palladium LP,
is it me, or is the song played far too fast in 1976 ?
I assume that it was purposeful for the Concert, but....
I had not known the song could get more distasteful to me !

It is much faster but I love that version of it and it just comes to life when the lead guitar comes in. Great tune to play live.
 
Again--with Flat Baroque--
In my previous post I mentioned liking the version as on (so I believed)
1970's Your Navy Presents.
I sought that out on YouTube and realized the version I have on my computer
file is an earlier version....it (the earlier) being my favorite. (Mine might be the RCA 1967 cut).
Now, I still believe that this song, being composed in 1966 (Treasures Liner Notes)
has no business appearing on a 1972 Single (or, Album for that matter, in 1972),
not to mention being performed in 1976 concerts ! (It's 10 years old by 1976).
My belief is that the duo should have been doing more recent material--on the records
and, especially, in the concerts. ( I believing it was Karen's vocals that compelled one to a concert.)
Just my two cents.
 
The title track of a "A Song For You" should have been the second single instead of "It's Going To Take Some Time". A much stronger song with a message that would have resonated like many of their hits. It is far less Adult Contemporary and that vocal take is pristine. Richard has said the song was too long but a great edit could have been easily achieved. I think it would have been assured a Top 3 position and helped the chart position of the "A Song For You" album which stopped at No. 4, lower than expected given the Tan Album sales.
 
The title track of a "A Song For You" should have been the second single instead of "It's Going To Take Some Time". A much stronger song with a message that would have resonated like many of their hits. It is far less Adult Contemporary and that vocal take is pristine. Richard has said the song was too long but a great edit could have been easily achieved. I think it would have been assured a Top 3 position and helped the chart position of the "A Song For You" album which stopped at No. 4, lower than expected given the Tan Album sales.

It's a deceptively difficult song to edit, the only way you could do it is to cut in at the line "You came out in front and I was hiding" and splice it back where Karen comes in with that line a second time. The drawback is that it cuts out the entire sax solo and brings the song down to about 2m30s, effectively ruining it. This is what they did for the performance of the song on The Bob Hope Special in 1972. A shame, because it would have been perfect as a single and no doubt would have scored them another top 5 hit.

 
Some have said that it wouldn't have worked as a single because it didn't have a real hook that a single needs. I can understand that yet the song is such a gem that I think it would have charted high on its merits of being a perfectly crafted Carpenters song.
 
One song that I'm surprised didn't get an A-side release was "Crystal Lullaby". It's almost a duet between the two, and every time that I hear it, I'm reminded of "The Tin Soldier" and an old stage adaptation I saw on CBC years ago.
 
One song that I'm surprised didn't get an A-side release was "Crystal Lullaby". It's almost a duet between the two, and every time that I hear it, I'm reminded of "The Tin Soldier" and an old stage adaptation I saw on CBC years ago.

It just wasn't A-side material. It really does work better as an album cut, I think. It doesn't have the 'punch' of a single but is one of those smaller gems that people discover again when they go back and play the whole album. Carpenters understood that the albums will live forever so the technical "filler" material was never simply filler.
 
With Crystal Lullaby, I always wondered whether the Carpenters ever had a thought of putting out an album aimed at children.

I don't they ever thought of it, because they were sticking to creating albums and songs with wide, popular appeal into the late 70s. I really wish they did do one though, Karen's voice is so hypnotically magical that it would have suited a lullaby perfectly. Their adult fans would have eaten it up too back in the 70s.

The only mold breaking idea that I remember them discussing was a country album around 1978, but Jerry Moss said that it was best to stick with a pop album. Of course the man himself didn't even appreciate the pop albums they did make.
 
It's a deceptively difficult song to edit, the only way you could do it is to cut in at the line "You came out in front and I was hiding" and splice it back where Karen comes in with that line a second time. The drawback is that it cuts out the entire sax solo and brings the song down to about 2m30s, effectively ruining it. This is what they did for the performance of the song on The Bob Hope Special in 1972. A shame, because it would have been perfect as a single and no doubt would have scored them another top 5 hit.



And actually this edit is even sloppier, with the cut being at '...precious secrets', as you can hear a snare hit on '2' after "taught me", then all of a sudden you hear the jump to side stick in the last verse.
 
Nobody would get any argument from me about ASFY being a great song and an excellent performance by K&R, but it's just not "hit single" material. As stated above, it doesn't have a melodic hook, and it's too slow for mainstream radio. Trust me on this one: the sax solo, terrific as it is, would have had people tuning out in droves. The soft, cold opening would have also worked against it for radio play. The length wouldn't have been too much of an issue as singles were getting longer by this time (after all, the Beatles topped 7 minutes years earlier with "Hey Jude").

Now having said all of that, it IS possible they could have turned it into an FM hit. For those readers who aren't ancient, FM in those days was way more "freeform" and the format loved songs that were moody, or longer, or had interesting arrangements -- all of which ASFY has. The thing that would have worked against FM action happening, however, is the Carpenters' pesky image -- FM was all about "cool" acts, not necessarily singles acts, so they were either too white-bread or too mainstream for FM at that time

Bottom line, as great as "A Song For You" is, many songs just work better as album cuts and that's one of them.
 
Nobody would get any argument from me about ASFY being a great song and an excellent performance by K&R, but it's just not "hit single" material. As stated above, it doesn't have a melodic hook, and it's too slow for mainstream radio. Trust me on this one: the sax solo, terrific as it is, would have had people tuning out in droves. The soft, cold opening would have also worked against it for radio play. The length wouldn't have been too much of an issue as singles were getting longer by this time (after all, the Beatles topped 7 minutes years earlier with "Hey Jude").

Now having said all of that, it IS possible they could have turned it into an FM hit. For those readers who aren't ancient, FM in those days was way more "freeform" and the format loved songs that were moody, or longer, or had interesting arrangements -- all of which ASFY has. The thing that would have worked against FM action happening, however, is the Carpenters' pesky image -- FM was all about "cool" acts, not necessarily singles acts, so they were either too white-bread or too mainstream for FM at that time

Bottom line, as great as "A Song For You" is, many songs just work better as album cuts and that's one of them.

What exactly qualifies a music group/artist as a "singles act"? Is it that they had very well known high charting singles? As of course a major fan I don't think that the album cuts were 'filler' at all and were crafted with the same care that the singles received. Plus the albums sold incredibly well - people bought the LP's even when they already had the singles that would be on it.

And the deliemma with ASFY as a single also applies to This Masquerade; everyone always says that it too should have been a single release, but I fail to see how it would have done well on radio. Both are pure class and aural elegance but on AM radio the languid, steady movement of the music wouldn't have captivated listeners like Rainy Days or Superstar, despite all being spectacular songs. Even if "Masquerade" and ASFY were edited it still wouldn't have made much of a difference.
 
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