Another Son
Well-Known Member
Richard Carpenter: Also featured in this album are Help which was slated to be our second single. Others I feel are particularly strong are “Baby It’s You” & “Reason To Believe”
Source:
Carpenters: Close To You album, 1970, Karen Carpenter, Richard Carpenter
This makes me realise that Richard himself was probably involved in selecting tracks for early international compilation albums. When I was young, I always assumed that local record companies had made the choice of songs.
'Great Hits of The Carpenters', released in Australia in early 1972 to tie in with Carpenters' tour, (when they had only five bona fide hits), included some of these tracks that Richard named as strong, (and they were):- 'Help' and 'Baby It's You', (as well as 'I'll Never Fall in Love Again' and 'Eve', the best from 'Ticket to Ride'). Of course, with less than twelve personal hits to fill the record, the idea was probably to make sure that all the 'filler' tracks had been hits for other artists, which all those other tracks named had, (apart from 'Eve', of course). The album reached the Top 10, just missing the Top 5, from memory. 'Hurting Each Other' then became a Top 5 around the time of the tour.
When 'The Singles' was released internationally, it was not released in Australia, because half the songs had been on 'Great Hits of The Carpenters' eighteen months before. Instead, 'Great Hits of The Carpenters Vol 2 1969 to 1973' was released, once again, with songs from 'Close to You' that Richard has named as strengths. It included 'Reason to Believe', for one. 'Top of The World' had been a massive Number One smash the year before and its 'B' side, 'Love is Surrender', was included on 'Great Hits of The Carpenters Vol 2'. (I don't know if this 'B' side was ever played on the radio. If so, I never heard it). Also included was 'I Kept On Loving You', ( which was the original 'A' side of 'Close to You', I think), and the song from 'Carpenters' that was later thrashed as a TV station theme, (not Carpenters' version, though), 'Let Me Be The One'.
This second compilation was not as successful as the first but still reached the Top 20, from memory. It's actually the first album that I ever owned - an all-time favourite.