🎤 Interview Richard Carpenter Interview 2014

ALERT! ALARM! Read no further for another re-hash is about to grind.

Got the retirement. I'm looking forward to the day when I can put all things "work-associated" behind me as well. My work hasn't been the labor of love I understand CarpenterS to have been. Too bad for me. Not complaining, just never got a handle on the "do what you love and love whatcha do thing." All said, where money, profit and all that jazz is concerned seems reportedly that little fanfare was given to Karen's $400,000 debit. I wonder what $400 thou would equate to in todays dollars and cents? I'm NO mathematician so maybe one of you guys who read beyond the ALERT thing can supply the approximate figure. Point is that maybe it's not a financial thing with Mr. Carpenter but rather as Chris May implies RC has resigned to the quiet, reclusive life of a 70's superstar. All these years and conversations spanning ad nauseam I've fancied that like Norma Desmond (of SUNSET BOULEVARD movie fame) Richard sits eager and ready to launch the comeback to the millions of fans who've never forgiven him for abandoning the music or in Norma's case the "screen." But just like the Chris-An Ordinary Fool , I long for the mountain of quality TV shots and spots to reach a viddy issue. Maybe maybe not ho-hum. Just "an old fashioned wish" as so eloquently related in the post directly above.

Jeff
 
Thanks Gary for letting us see that cool article from 1985, it really takes you back in time. The Memorial Foundation Letter is also very nice...I've never seen that one.
 
For those who say we need to let Richard have his own life, and move on I just have to ask....how busy has Richard Carpenter been since 1983? He has raised a beautiful family, first and foremost. That has taken the bulk of the time since 1983, and rightly so. On the work front Richard has remixed and completed Carpenters songs which we are all grateful for. I don't think professionally he has been THAT busy and I mean musically. His solo career did not pan out so his legacy is Carpenters. As lifelong fans, OF COURSE many of us want to hear every little thing that Karen sang. And Richard has the keys to the vault. And just to keep things on track :) this post would not be complete without wishing for Karen's solo unfinished tracks being polished up and released. Yep I said it.
 
aaflyer98 said:
For those who say we need to let Richard have his own life, and move on I just have to ask....how busy has Richard Carpenter been since 1983? He has raised a beautiful family, first and foremost. That has taken the bulk of the time since 1983, and rightly so. On the work front Richard has remixed and completed Carpenters songs which we are all grateful for. I don't think professionally he has been THAT busy and I mean musically. His solo career did not pan out so his legacy is Carpenters. As lifelong fans, OF COURSE many of us want to hear every little thing that Karen sang. And Richard has the keys to the vault. And just to keep things on track :) this post would not be complete without wishing for Karen's solo unfinished tracks being polished up and released. Yep I said it.
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Raising a family was the last thing Richard did,not the first.Richard didn't have a family in 1983.

Richard was extremely busy in the 1980's.From early 1983 to late 1989,Richard worked on three new albums-as well as the double "Yesterday Once More" anthology.He also recorded his solo album-which took two years time(from start to finish) and worked on the TV movie.To sum it up,he produced five albums and a TV movie in six years-that sounds pretty busy to me!

Richard spent all of the 1990's working on compilations and boxed sets for US and international releases-as well as the remixes that were used for those sets.Richard spent 1998 remastering the entire catalog.In 1999-Richard was doing production for "As Time Goes By".

Finally,in the 2000's to the present,Richard has been preoccupied with his large family-and enjoying every minute of it.

As far as wishing for Karen's solo outtakes,it will never happen.Be thankful that they're even available on youtube.
 
mr J. said:
To sum it up,he produced five albums and a TV movie in six years-that sounds pretty busy to me!
Click to expand...

Add to that his production of artists like Akiko, Scott Grimes and Veronique Beliveau and it comes to 8 albums, plus he had the house he currently lives in built to spec - I'd agree, he's been more than busy :)
 
mr J. said:
Raising a family was the last thing Richard did,not the first.Richard didn't have a family in 1983.

Richard was extremely busy in the 1980's.From early 1983 to late 1989,Richard worked on three new albums-as well as the double "Yesterday Once More" anthology.He also recorded his solo album-which took two years time(from start to finish) and worked on the TV movie.To sum it up,he produced five albums and a TV movie in six years-that sounds pretty busy to me!

Richard spent all of the 1990's working on compilations and boxed sets for US and international releases-as well as the remixes that were used for those sets.Richard spent 1998 remastering the entire catalog.In 1999-Richard was doing production for "As Time Goes By".

Finally,in the 2000's to the present,Richard has been preoccupied with his large family-and enjoying every minute of it.

As far as wishing for Karen's solo outtakes,it will never happen.Be thankful that they're even available on youtube.
Click to expand...

Not to mention every interview he's ever done!
 
newvillefan said:
Superb interview Chris! Came home dying to hear this and kudos to you for having secured it, the way you interact with him sounds so warm and he's totally engaged with your interviewing style :popcorn:

If I may, my impressions...

Amazed at his recollection of the preparation of 'Only Yesterday' for SACD ... "Something's missing right here. Right here there should be 'a thing'!". His memory about each individual track and each little corner of the recording, especially in surround sound, is AMAZING!

He gives an emphatic "No...nope!" to the release of vault material, yet in recent years, he'd been open to releasing some vault stuff (what about Karen's outtake 'Something's Missing' and especially the tracks from 'Made In America' that he seemed to value as releasable?). I wish you'd had the opportunity to challenge him on that point. My overwhelming feeling is that he's now resolutely 'retired' (the recent thread on here about him being all but retired springs to mind). Definitely sounds like he's given up on any more new releases for that reason and feels happy with the legacy he's left behind. Sad, but true.

Finally, one observation is that his speaking voice sounds terrible, raspy and as if he has cold but I know from other fans, this is how he now sounds and has done for a few years, that did shock me and can't imagine we'll hear any more singing vocals from him :sad:

In summary, this was an amazing interview and at least brings his activities right up to date for all those who hang on his every word.

Thanks again Chris :righton:
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Regarding Richard's voice (rasp, etc.) - from other reading I understand that he smokes. That could be the reason for the vocal decline. And he is getting old - 67 in 2014. Sad but true. Karen would have been 64 on March 2, 2014. Unbelievable.
 
Another thing exercising Richard's mind ever since the money started flooding in has been the management of what would be a not inconsiderable estate.

Richard appears to be the level-headed, analytical type suited to investment management (remember how keen and matter-of-fact in the early days he and Karen were about their apartment and shopping centre investments?). My personal opinion is that I feel he would have very much enjoyed the business of allocating his capital. They both had a healthy respect for money, especially coming from a family of honest battlers.

Taking into account the compounding effect of all the cash flowing into the Carpenter coffers over what is now 5 decades, I wouldn't be at all surprised if the total has grown to an 8-figure sum.

Even if one were a passive investor with accountants and advisors doing a lot of the heavy lifting, getting to that point still takes away a lot of one's time!
 
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ullalume said:
Sorry Chris. . .can't quite get my head around this fire stuff. . . .so, he finished "All My Life" the 1980 outtake for the As Time Goes By album in '99. Has that gone forever now, or because he must have transferred it to a digital medium to finish it up, is it still out there? And stuff that hasn't been touched but existed, like 1974's "Try to Win a Friend". Has that gone too, since it was never transferred. Or was it transferred. God, this interview opened up more questions than it answered. . . then again, maybe that's what good interviews are supposed to do.

And fancy Burt being the one that wanted them dropped (attempting to eliminate the competition perhaps?).

Good Job Chris,

Neil

P.S. Ultimately, all the above questions are academic, since this interview shows that even if he had a dozen songs in his desk drawer he's NEVER RELEASE ANYTHING MORE. I think that's a good thing to hear from him, since I know to just appreciate what I've got (and let's face it, the man spent almost 2 decades releasing stuff from the vaults). Frankly, when he does pass on to greener pastures, I think I'd want the stuff buried with him, coz you just know whatever money-hungry shister released it would screw up the legacy with its presentation.
Click to expand...

That "money-hungry shister" might well be Richard's wife or children, who, when offered money by a recording company for "any" recording with Karen's voice on it, be it demo, outtake, etc., will release it. Will it be the quality we have experienced with previous Carpenters recordings? Probably not. But we who love their work, will buy it because it will slightly enlarge what we know and appreciate about their talent and gifts.
 
wideawakeat4am said:
Great interview!

I'm still confused about the fire and what it destroyed and what is left though.

Although I can see Richard's reasons for not wanting to release whatever he has left if he does not seem them as up to scratch, at the same time he could throw us a bone or two. He could re-release the solo album with a couple of bonus tracks from the previously unreleased stuff for example.

It was interesting to hear his views on bootleg CDs and so on. I would have thought that this would prove there is a demand still. Rather than not wanting to think about it, maybe he should get in on the action and make sure more official releases are out there.

There are a lot of things he could do. He just doesn't want to do them and I guess we just have to accept that. Sadly :sad:
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The sad fact about the recording industry is that it is run like General Motors.
They strictly look at return on investment.
From their view, it is not worth the cost to release a product that will only sell a few hundred thousand copies.
They would rather release a Justin Bieber CD and sell 20 million copies of garbage.
The truth is, one reason there are bootleg CDs is because the big recording corporations refuse to release low volume material that they hold the copyright to.

Richard may well have some stuff in the vault that he would like to fix up and release (our "bone"), but he cannot get a distribution contract with a major label for a collection of outtakes, etc.
His best bet would be to mix the material he has and release it privately on iTunes, or Amazon or his website.
Or find an indie company that will pay him enough to make it worth while.
 
mr J. said:
It's interesting how almost every topic on the forum seems to revert back to Karen's solo album.

A couple of points people need to remember here:

Karen's album did get a decent amount of promotion.There was plenty of media attention given to the album-articles in Billboard,Rolling Stone,New York Times,etc. Everybody knew the album was out. And,I should emphasize that record buyers make it their business to know about when their favorite artists have a new album out.Speaking for myself,I used to visit a record store at least once a month to keep tabs on new releases & reissues.

By the time Karen's album did come out,more than half of it had already appeared on previous albums.In all likelihood,Richard probably included "My Body" and "Still Crazy" on the (From The Top) boxed set as a sales push-figuring people would buy the boxed set just to get those two solo tracks.Yet,that strategy didn't work-the boxed set didn't sell well. I think the bottom line is -Richard included the best solo tracks on "Lovelines" in 1989.Most people were aware of & accepted that fact-and they didn't focus any further attention on the solo album.
Click to expand...

In contravention to your points, mr J...
Karen's solo album was only finally released a full 16 years after it was recorded.
It was DOA by that time.
The music industry/audience had moved on and changed.
The momentum that the Carpenters had for their audience had begun to fade.
What was relevant, musically, in 1980, was less-so in 1996.
Yes, Richard had released a few of the tracks, but they were not on HER album.
If he and A&M had released that album a month after she died, it would have sold 10 million copies.
 
Old Fan45 said:
The sad fact about the recording industry is that it is run like General Motors.
They strictly look at return on investment.
From their view, it is not worth the cost to release a product that will only sell a few hundred thousand copies.
They would rather release a Justin Bieber CD and sell 20 million copies of garbage.
The truth is, one reason there are bootleg CDs is because the big recording corporations refuse to release low volume material that they hold the copyright to.

Richard may well have some stuff in the vault that he would like to fix up and release (our "bone"), but he cannot get a distribution contract with a major label for a collection of outtakes, etc.
His best bet would be to mix the material he has and release it privately on iTunes, or Amazon or his website.
Or find an indie company that will pay him enough to make it worth while.
Click to expand...
Some of your statements aren't quite accurate.Record labels reissue catalog titles all the time-they don't require them to sell a million copies.If a label anticipates a title will sell 10,000 copies a year,they'll reissue it.

Richard doesn't have anything in the vaults that he wants to "fix up and release".The remaining outtakes are either not worthy of release or Richard doesn't like them.If he did have another album to put together-A&M/Universal would issue it as a catalog title.Any Carpenters recording would have to be released through A&M/UMG.
 
Old Fan45 said:
In contravention to your points, mr J...
Karen's solo album was only finally released a full 16 years after it was recorded.
It was DOA by that time.
The music industry/audience had moved on and changed.
The momentum that the Carpenters had for their audience had begun to fade.
What was relevant, musically, in 1980, was less-so in 1996.
Yes, Richard had released a few of the tracks, but they were not on HER album.
If he and A&M had released that album a month after she died, it would have sold 10 million copies.
Click to expand...
Where did you get the idea that Karen's audience had moved on and changed?To the contrary,K&R's catalog was selling extremely well in 1996-and that was a major factor in the decision to finally release Karen's solo album. And,just eighteen months later,"Love Songs" was released and sold 500,000 within six months.

Karen's album was issued as a catalog title.A&M only expected it to sell a minimal amount of copies.

Some people have a hard time accepting the plain fact that many of Karen's fans weren't happy with the overall style of the solo album,and the sexually suggestive material-and they didn't buy it.And,as I've said before,KC and rock aren't a good mix.
 
mr J. said:
Raising a family was the last thing Richard did,not the first.Richard didn't have a family in 1983.

Richard was extremely busy in the 1980's.From early 1983 to late 1989,Richard worked on three new albums-as well as the double "Yesterday Once More" anthology.He also recorded his solo album-which took two years time(from start to finish) and worked on the TV movie.To sum it up,he produced five albums and a TV movie in six years-that sounds pretty busy to me!

Richard spent all of the 1990's working on compilations and boxed sets for US and international releases-as well as the remixes that were used for those sets.Richard spent 1998 remastering the entire catalog.In 1999-Richard was doing production for "As Time Goes By".

Finally,in the 2000's to the present,Richard has been preoccupied with his large family-and enjoying every minute of it.
Click to expand...

Sadly, I do recall Richard being fairly active in Anorexia Nervosa research & studies, (even funding) concurrently after Karen's death, as well...

The career had simply come and gone at a very healthy time (save for a few unfortunate circumstances) and that was largely when the recording industry was thriving, and growing was a legion of very loyal & faithful fans, not to mention an appreciative audience, plus much to offer in in-depth enjoyment, in the way of printed media and TV...

What gives the best insight of this is the Interview being discussed here, as well as the fruitful and well-reaped & harvested career...

So there is no future, in a good sense of the word, only a very fortunate & prosperous past that lives on to this day!

" Whatever is what is 'the last', be glad we have!" (quote borrowed from Ira Gitler, in Wes Montgomery's Road Song)


-- Dave
 
Karen's album was a musical and personal stab at independence. It worked extremely well. So what if it wasn't a '10'? It certainly deserved to be heard in 1980, and would have done great! There's only one song on the whole album that could be called 'rock'. It might not have worked 100%, but it showed Karen had serious kahunas for trying something DIFFERENT, and I'm so thankful we have it to enjoy forever. She is definitely looking down and enjoying its posthumous success! It meant the world to her, and it means the world to her true fans.
 
mr J. said:
Some people have a hard time accepting the plain fact that many of Karen's fans weren't happy with the overall style of the solo album,and the sexually suggestive material-and they didn't buy it.And,as I've said before,KC and rock aren't a good mix.
Click to expand...

This is so far from the truth (of course in my personal opinion)....I have never heard of Karen's fans being unhappy with the style of the album and certainly not the suggestive material...I think you are mixing up A&M, Richard and all of their people's opinions of the album to the Karen fans who wanted and liked the album. This is what I believe. :agree: :)
 
Indeed, from 1970 until, say the early 2000s, the Carpenters back catalog and compilations sold heartily throughout the world.
Thank heaven that the time was ripe for Karen and Richard to reap the benefits of 8 Tracks, Reel to Reels ,cassettes, 45s, LPs,
VHS tape, then on to laser disc, cd's, cd box sets, and now perhaps digital downloads.
Factor in TV variety shows, documentaries around the world, and Tribute shows, even,
and it is indeed fortunate, if not fortuitous, that we were blessed with Carpenters in our Lifetime.
Their Legacy will survive.
 
Chris-An Ordinary Fool said:
This is so far from the truth (of course in my personal opinion)....I have never heard of Karen's fans being unhappy with the style of the album and certainly not the suggestive material...I think you are mixing up A&M, Richard and all of their people's opinions of the album to the Karen fans who wanted and liked the album. This is what I believe. :agree: :)
Click to expand...

Well, count me in as one of those fans. I thought the material well beneath someone of her talent. I, as probably everyone at A&M at the time, was expecting something of great "depth," emotion, and timelessness that only she could deliver...and well, honestly, we got sex and disco. I completley understand, and to a point agree with, the "stab at independence" and "growing" as an artist arguement; howver, this seemed more a dated commercial effort (to maker her "relevant" in the late 70's) hardly worthy of one of the greatest voices in the lexicon of American music. Short sighted on Phil's part, in my humble minority opinion.
 
Such fascinating views regarding the solo effort.
I will confess, when placed alongside Horizon or Song For You, the solo effort pales.
When placed alongside Made In America, the solo effort is a step in the right direction.
Be that as it may, with a voice like Karen's, a once in a lifetime voice, that solo LP should have been riveting.
It has some good material, but, does it have great material?
Hard for me to say, at this juncture.
But, for now, anything with Karen's vocals would fit the bill for me.
 
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