⭐ Official Review [Album]: "HORIZON" (SP-4530)

HOW WOULD YOU RATE THIS ALBUM?

  • ***** (BEST)

    Votes: 51 49.0%
  • ****

    Votes: 36 34.6%
  • ***

    Votes: 13 12.5%
  • **

    Votes: 2 1.9%
  • *

    Votes: 2 1.9%

  • Total voters
    104
WOW, I can't believe I missed this one, it appears A&M placed 2 different ads for Please Mr. Postman in Billboard (one I posted above) and now this one issued in Dec 21, 1974 well ahead of the album Horizon ever being issued. I like this one!!!!
Check out the promo verbiage...."Special Delivery First Class on A&M Records From CARPENTERS

Billboard%20Please%20Mr%20Postman%20Special%20Delivery%20Dec%2021%201974.png~original
Karen looks as awesome as she sounded on Horizon!
 
Here are a few more ads from Horizon there poor copies as I couldn't find them in Billboard online but at least we know they exist....if anyone has better copies of these please post them up for references.

The Solitaire looks really cool, wish it was a better copy.

Solitaire%20Promo.jpg~original


Promotion ad for the album Horizon
Horizon%20LP%20Ad.jpg~original
 
Question about the singles on this album: Carpenters released “Please Mr. Postman” in the fall/winter of 1974, and it peaked in early 1975. The follow-up single, “Only Yesterday,” was released in March of 1975, reaching its peak chart position in late May, just as Horizon was being prepared for release in early June, but for some (strange?) reason, the next single, “Solitaire,” wasn’t released until July. Does anybody have any information on why the duo didn’t release a new single concurrent with the album’s release? My assumption is that it would have bolstered interest in the album, no? I’m guessing my ignorance of how the music business works / worked back then figures in to my head scratching, here, but it seems counter-intuitive from my novice perspective. Thanks in advance for any insight.
 
I don't have any special insight into this situation, but I seem to recall there being lots of delays with the recording and production of Horizon. Richard and Karen both expressed frustration with how things were going in the "A&M Compendium, 1975" article in Randy Schmidt's book, Yesterday Once More: The Carpenters Reader. So I'm wondering if those delays in the album release might had wreaked havoc with the scheduling of single releases?
 
I don't have any special insight into this situation, but I seem to recall there being lots of delays with the recording and production of Horizon. Richard and Karen both expressed frustration with how things were going in the "A&M Compendium, 1975" article in Randy Schmidt's book, Yesterday Once More: The Carpenters Reader. So I'm wondering if those delays in the album release might had wreaked havoc with the scheduling of single releases?
Interesting and helpful notes. So if this was the scenario, it wouldn’t have been the plan, per se, but just how things played out. That scenario makes more sense to me. Many thanks, byline!
 
Some quotes pertaining to Horizon:
Yesterday Once More,Carpenters Reader
, 2012:
Page 158,
( Melody Maker Interview 1975)
Richard: "She never liked Solitaire at all."
And yet another interview in Randy's Yesterday Once More reader contradicts that somewhat. It's the 1976 Charlie Tuna interview, in which Karen came to the radio station on her own. Charlie Tuna asked her about "Solitaire," saying he'd heard she wasn't "that enamored" with it. Karen replied: I think I heard that the first time in England. I do stand corrected. I think the versions that I had heard didn't knock me out. I do like the song. It's not my favorite, but it's a beautiful song and Richard produced the hell out of it. He really did. I like doing it, but there are others that I am more fond of. I think my favorite today is "I Need to Be in Love." That really upsets me when I hear it.
 
The Singles 1969-1973 took all of three weeks to complete (The Newsletters #30, October 1973),
Now & Then, as John Bettis says was put together in a flash, as Richard
"...didn't have the time to listen to 500 demos a year." (Coleman, page 139).
The Billboard Supplement (November 1973) says average time to complete an album three months.
Horizon, how many months in the making--six months ? (Richard, " 85% done " Late March interview for 1975 A&M Compendium) ?
Karen comments that Richard was in the worst shape she had ever seen him in during the Horizon sessions.
Coleman comments that Karen began her decline in 1975 (Page 181).
Still, how does one account for :
"...first studio album in two years." (as quoted from above advertisement).
They added Roger Young to Engineering (Compendium), Karen was Associate Producer,
I simply wonder if Jack Daugherty might have been a little more productive than is otherwise recognized.

It is strange that the first four Albums, with Daugherty, were (apparently) finished faster.
Correct me if I am completely off the mark.
 
I didn't realize that The Singles 69-73 did so well in England, #1 for 16 straight weeks and still going....I wonder why it did so well in England? Does anyone from the UK remember The Singles 69-73 doing this well as an album back then? That's terrific.

I'm digging these ads...between these promo ads and their 45 single sleeves, they would make an awesome collectors booklet. Some of these promo ads obviously were about 11 x 14 but they sure would look great too as a poster.

I know David's site has a lot of the single 45 picture sleeves posted but I always thought it would be cool to have a site like our resource for higher quality scans of all the U.S. Carpenters 45 rpm picture sleeves front and back. It doesn't appear we will ever get a U.S. collectors single box set so preserving those 45 picture sleeves would be great idea.
 
Still, how does one account for :
"...first studio album in two years." (as quoted from above advertisement).

Horizon was released in 1975 and the last studio album before that was Now And Then in 1973. They wouldn't have classed The Singles as an original studio album since it was a hits package, even though a little bit of work was done to spruce some of the tracks up.
 
A Timeline:
as gleaned from Carpenters Fan Club Newsletters:
#22 February 1973: "Karen and Richard working on Now & Then, scheduled for April release."
#23 March 1973: "... February spent recording new album..."
#24 April 1973: "...Now & Then scheduled for release." (Released: May 9, 1973)
#30 October 1973: "..Past three weeks putting together The Singles 1969-1973."
#35 March 1974: "..devoted to recording a new single..."
#29 October 1974: "Plans are tentative to guest on Perry Como Christmas Special.."
#43 June 1975: ".. After months of taping 12-14 hours a day, the new album is complete..( Released: June 6,1975)
The 1975 A&M Compendium interview was done .."on a late March evening...",
Richard Carpenter: " Horizon 85% complete.
We're spending a lot more time...in every last thing that has to do with the album. We'll have it done by May 8th. ").
 
I didn't realize that The Singles 69-73 did so well in England, #1 for 16 straight weeks and still going....I wonder why it did so well in England? Does anyone from the UK remember The Singles 69-73 doing this well as an album back then? That's terrific.

Every lunchtime I would come from school and just before 1pm every Tuesday on BBC Radio 1, they would have an album count down based on the 20 best selling albums. During the period that the "The Singles 1969-1973" was at number one, a different track from the album was played, but it remained at number one for so long, they had to start repeating tracks that had already been played . It was an amazing achievement, something that took the music business by surprise. Although the singles didn't all reach high chart positions in the UK, when A&M packaged them as an album, it just sold like mad.
 
I didn't realize that The Singles 69-73 did so well in England, #1 for 16 straight weeks and still going....I wonder why it did so well in England? Does anyone from the UK remember The Singles 69-73 doing this well as an album back then? That's terrific.

I'm digging these ads...between these promo ads and their 45 single sleeves, they would make an awesome collectors booklet. Some of these promo ads obviously were about 11 x 14 but they sure would look great too as a poster.

I know David's site has a lot of the single 45 picture sleeves posted but I always thought it would be cool to have a site like our resource for higher quality scans of all the U.S. Carpenters 45 rpm picture sleeves front and back. It doesn't appear we will ever get a U.S. collectors single box set so preserving those 45 picture sleeves would be great idea.

Here's the details of the Singles domination of the top spot in the UK, courtesy of officialcharts.com. (keep in mind, my US chums, that over here we do day/month/year). And when the album wasn't No1, it was No 2 during the below period.

02/02/1974 THE SINGLES 1969-1973 CARPENTERS 4weeks
02/03/1974 OLD NEW BORROWED AND BLUE SLADE 1week
09/03/1974 THE SINGLES 1969-1973 CARPENTERS 11weeks
25/05/1974 JOURNEY TO THE CENTRE OF THE EARTH RICK WAKEMAN 1week
01/06/1974 THE SINGLES 1969-1973 CARPENTERS 1week
08/06/1974 DIAMOND DOGS DAVID BOWIE 4weeks
06/07/1974 THE SINGLES 1969-1973 CARPENTERS 1week
13/07/1974 CARIBOU ELTON JOHN 2weeks

My Mum was never one to follow the "hit parade" but it was the saturation of this album that turned her on to the Carpenters, and in effect, 18 years later, turned me on. . . . therefore, thank God.

It was the 6th biggest selling album of the DECADE over here.

Oh, and just to swerve this back on topic, Horizon was No1 in UK for 5 weeks and was the 4th biggest seller of '75 ( Singles still managed to be the tenth biggest seller of '75. . .not bad for something released 2 years earlier)

Laters

Neil
 
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Late March 1975,
Richard Carpenter:
" I got into this thing where I wanted every song to be strong enough to be a single.
We'eve already got two on Horizon. Solitaire is a single, Desperado is a single,
Goodbye and I Love You is a single, and I think Happy--which we didn't think was
until it was finished--is strong enough to be a single.
What I'm getting at is that there is six or seven songs that could be singles.
They aren't going to be, but that makes for a d... good album."
(direct quote: A&M Compendium 1975)
 
The Carpenters, An Appraisal...by Tom Nolan, notes that:
John Bettis (as of 1975) considers
Caught Between Goodbye and I Love You
as their (he and Richard) best-ever composition.
 
September 13, 1975
Billboard Charts
#8 Please Mister Postman....Brazil
#37 Solitaire...UK
#6 Horizon LP...UK
#10 The Singles 1969-1973...UK
#14 Solitaire.... USA Best Sellers Rock Singles
#13 Horizon.... USA Best Sellers Rock LPs
#36 Hamlet Label LP Ticket To Ride ...UK (previous week)
 
Addenda to above Billboard Charts,
June 14, 1975
Japan: Only Yesterday #13

Perhaps if Horizon had been released a few months
earlier, it would have gone top five in the USA?
And, Only Yesterday, really up to Number One ? Number Four, so close !
Did the Sedaka bad-press have a negative impact chart-wise?
Was the disco scene entrenched by then?
Oh well, I really love this album.
 
Addenda to above Billboard Charts,
June 14, 1975
Japan: Only Yesterday #13

Perhaps if Horizon had been released a few months
earlier, it would have gone top five in the USA?
And, Only Yesterday, really up to Number One ? Number Four, so close !
Did the Sedaka bad-press have a negative impact chart-wise?
Was the disco scene entrenched by then?
Oh well, I really love this album.
...I agree with everything stated above. I would like to add that...as "Only Yesterday" had hit the Top Ten, A&M could have provided the 4.10 version, including the immaculate resolve which perhaps could have propelled this amazing track to the #1 position.
(My favorite song of all time/ I met Karen when this track was #4 but I digress)
 
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