By 1981 was the Carpenters recording career in terminal decline?

[toeknee4bz]

I agree. And no offense, but Voice Of The Heart would have been a commercial stiff if she were still around. Having said that, I really could see them reinventing their approach. I don't know if they'd go into jazz, but something more jazz/pop/Bossa (like song4u mentions above, similar to the Matt Bianco lineup) with more modern instrumentation may have kept them relevant, even if not on the charts. The standards idea is somewhat good, but these days it has been done by every other pop/rock artist whose career is taking a nosedive. Way too many standards albums out there. And duets as well--Sinatra wore out that idea with the ill-conceived Duets and Duets II albums.

I agree wholeheartedly on VOICE OF THE HEART. But then again, if Karen had lived, I think it would've been finished somewhat differently. (You can pretty well imagine the differences)... This kinda makes me wonder what the TIME album would've sounded like in 1987 with Karen singing on it. Without her, it was of course a commercial sales disaster. Richard is a great background singer, but his lead vocal was just too soft for the late 80s. But if Karen's similarly soft voice had been on those same arrangements, songs with a slightly more funky beat, like "Say Yeah" and "Who Do You Love" may have had a chance at cracking the top 40... if for no other reason than the fact that everybody was used to HER vocals over Richard.

 

[toeknee4bz]

So true. Unfortunately I think Richard substituted the chorale sound and orchestration because, during his addiction years, as was brought out in the Coleman book, he was unable to perform as he used to. I think it was Richard who lost his edge - he really had been brilliant at choosing material and arranging in those earlier years. And I think Karen knew he had lost his edge. I loved the overdubbing sound they had and really missed hearing it. Their voices blended so beautifully. I never liked the chorale sound that was substituted, and at the time I wondered why Richard didn't seem to sing any more. When I listen to Carpenters songs now it's almost all early material, or the previously unreleased songs. After he recovered he seemed ready to return and it makes me wonder if he would have regained his abilities eventually. MIA doesn't make it sound like it. But his solo album TIME was more of a sampling of different 80's sounding tunes - like he was trying to find himself. Unfortunately, R w/o K didn't fly.

My sentiments exactly.

 

[Jamesj75]

I agree wholeheartedly on VOICE OF THE HEART. But then again, if Karen had lived, I think it would've been finished somewhat differently. (You can pretty well imagine the differences)... This kinda makes me wonder what the TIME album would've sounded like in 1987 with Karen singing on it. Without her, it was of course a commercial sales disaster. Richard is a great background singer, but his lead vocal was just too soft for the late 80s. But if Karen's similarly soft voice had been on those same arrangements, songs with a slightly more funky beat, like "Say Yeah" and "Who Do You Love" may have had a chance at cracking the top 40... if for no other reason than the fact that everybody was used to HER vocals over Richard.

I really like your hypothetical regarding the use of Karen's voice as the lead in Richard's solo album. I agree wholeheartedly. Like other Carpenters' completists, I was compelled to buy Richard's solo CDs, lamenting the fact that it wasn't Karen singing. I still basically enjoyed his solo recordings. I felt that the image problem discussed ad nauseam at this website really doomed in with radio and the public. Yet, I feel that a song, such as "Say Yeah" was very strong and danceable, with catchy hook that, in a perfect world, should have been a hit.

Ah, but as you say, hearing Karen's voice on these tunes, would have made for an even greater sound...

 

[Harry]

I really like your hypothetical regarding the use of Karen's voice as the lead in Richard's solo album. I agree wholeheartedly.

I don't know if anyone's ever done this - I never thought of it until this thread.

Suppose we took a song from TIME, say "When Time Was All We Had" with all of its sumptuous harmonies and speeded the pitch up. With the sibling similarity in voices, would it sound a little bit like Karen? Well, you be the judge.



I did the above by speeding up the pitch by 2.5 semitones and placing it with a static picture of Karen singing to help fool the brain. It's purely for our own amusement here - I've not made it public on YouTube, just because. It feels a little eerie to me, and somehow wrong. But I had to at least share it here with fans.

Harry

 

[newvillefan]

The lead vocal sounds soooo like her in the opening lines...goes to show how sibling vocals are alike!

 

[Jamesj75]

I don't know if anyone's ever done this - I never thought of it until this thread.

Suppose we took a song from TIME, say "When Time Was All We Had" with all of its sumptuous harmonies and speeded the pitch up. With the sibling similarity in voices, would it sound a little bit like Karen? Well, you be the judge.

I did the above by speeding up the pitch by 2.5 semitones and placing it with a static picture of Karen singing to help fool the brain. It's purely for our own amusement here - I've not made it public on YouTube, just because. It feels a little eerie to me, and somehow wrong. But I had to at least share it here with fans.

Harry

Thanks for posting this, Harry! It's definitely an interesting experiment. As Stephen says, the similarity in the sibling vocals is astounding.

 

[toeknee4bz]

I think the Carpenters had a few things going against them. First off, the thing that everybody loved about them, their MUSIC, was against the tide and more in the soft rock vein. This was their greatest strength and their strongest weakness, in my opinion. The same reasons they became popular would later turn around and knock them down. The album and single picture sleeves, early on maybe up until 1974 only hurt their image more. Then we have the CHOICE of singles pulled from the albums. Probably "Sing" cemented their image. A huge hit, but a career mistake. The Carpenters recorded so many GREAT songs on each album, yet were always trying for the trendy pop singles. "There's A Kind Of Hush", "Please Mr. Postman" were frilly throw away pop compared to some of the other songs Karen and Richard recorded at the time. And "Goofus"? Cute for an album cut, but not a single. So I believe these singles in particular are what turned radio all the way off. The singles from Passage and Made In America could have had a better chance if their image hadn't been cemented by then. No matter how great the songs were, their entire image needed an overhaul. Quite frankly, the only thing I think could have done that would have been Karen's solo project, with the more riskier songs included on her album.

I agree. Unfortunately, as much as I hate to say it, A&M was just as much to blame for keeping R&C in the same old mold at the time of Karen's solo lp. A&M execs were right beside Richard in the panning of her album, and what did they do? Went back into the studio and recorded MADE IN AMERICA. Not a bad lp by any stretch, but with "Touch Me When We're Dancing" being the only real hit off of the album... not exactly promising for 80s longevity.
Many artists and groups face that stale point in their career(s) where they need a change, or sometimes to completely reinvent themselves. Carpenters could've overcome this had they brought Phil Ramone in to produce MADE IN AMERICA... of course, egos would've been forced to step aside.
As for Karen's solo lp: Granted the disco material may or may not have fared any better. But "If I Had You", "Making Love In The Afternoon" and even the discofied "My Body Keeps Changing My Mind" should've at least been given a shot as singles. After all, we've heard far worse (re: "singles that shouldn't have been" thread). What a waste it was to just shelve the entire album. And as Richard said in the liner notes on Karen's release in 1996, time changes one's perspective. In essence, hindsight is 20/20.

 

[Mark-T]

The solo album is a much stronger collection than MIA.

 

[Rick-An Ordinary Fool]

Ok Harry that was really weird. I listened for 1 min and had to turn it off. Yet in that first min I do hear similarities. I'm wondering now if this thread has not come full circle and is in "terminal decline"


Wow alot of Karen solo discussions going on....I have always wondered why there was virtually no promotion of her album when it was released by A&M. I know if the artist is no longer with us makes it pretty tough to promote it but at the same time couldn't there have been other ways A&M and Phil Ramone could have promoted it to the public. I can still remember going to the record store to see it there not expecting it, what a suprise, it was so different yet I liked it then as much as I do now. I also wonder why it has never been re-mastered after all these years, bringing it to a whole new level of sound.