⭐ Official Review [Single]: 15. "PLEASE MR. POSTMAN"/"THIS MASQUERADE" (1646-S)

Which side is your favorite?

  • Side A: "Please Mr. Postman"

    Votes: 30 46.2%

  • Side B: "This Masquerade"

    Votes: 35 53.8%
  • Total voters
    65
I'll add that I'm puzzled about this too. I've seen nothing disrespectful here in any way. My post wasn't too complementary about "This Masquerade", but all I said was that the melody wasn't too memorable to me away from the record.

I also know that words on an internet message board can be taken a lot of ways that weren't intended. I hope that @ars nova would at least contact one of the moderators to pinpoint where the anger lies.
 
I still love, love, love this song (in particular, here, the best opening vocals, the bells/chimes at 50 and 53sec, castanets, background vocals going 'higher' at 2:46):
 
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Postman, one of Karen's finest recordings as drummer (of course, I did not know that back when it was released as a single).
Too bad Only Yesterday topped out at only #4 USA, as I love Jim Gordon's drumming. In that instance, Only Yesterday,
I prefer the longer album cut over the single (of course, I loved that single and so the LP version made it that much better).
It is with Only Yesterday that Richard Carpenter made me realize how great his arranging skills were (since I had not realized before
then that he was arranging the songs !). My pick for Richard's finest arrangement goes to We've Only Just Begun.
 
Maybe it’s just my personal psychological pivot(?) in the last two years or so generally (I wouldn’t mind being more detailed - everyone’s aching to know - but I truthfully have no idea right now how to word what’s been happening), but my feelings toward their novelty songs like this has turned more sour. Or not just their novelty songs but the material that’s underdeveloped or beneath their gifts. Like, I’ve been finding less enjoyment in what I would some years ago still consider lesser tracks. More discerning/pessimistic/critical considering we know how glorious their highs could be. I’ve been like this with other music and media too as of late.

With Postman it’s a technically a great piece of ear candy and sugary fun, but it’s a waste of their abilities. We could’ve gotten something much more substantial in its place. Even Richard is still (rightfully) bitter that it’s number one song on the countdown and not something like YOM (which has its critics but most would agree has a greater depth and sophistication).

Maybe what I’m saying is that with broader life perspectives and being on the edge of change and a newer decade of age we become more aware of our mortality. In 1974 no one had a clue that Karen would be dead nine years later, but our 20/20 hindsight has a certain kind of person thinking of how much we wanted more artistic highs from the material she was given. They had no clue she was inching towards death but you still feel bitter that there wasn’t always a consistent output during a time when there truly could’ve been. To put it less abstractly, I suppose I’m finding it harder (or now stopping) to force myself to love and embrace songs that I never truly connected with for whatever reason. I’m finding a more truthful-than-ever bond with the material that really speaks to me right now with a more matured worldview, whether it be because of one musical element (lead vocal, arrangement, lyrics) or all combined.

It’s an even richer gift when songs we once loved have only deepened (and appropriately darkened in a realistic way) with age, and perhaps we see them from a new angle of the human condition, in part thanks to the intelligent, enigmatic, shape-shifting translucency of Karen’s voice and how that voice has only ripened with our present modernity. Heard This Masquerade last night for the first time in a bit and it’s always been perfection but it hits differently than ever before. I think what both their music and vocals reveal can be summed up quite well in this quote from a review of LGB:

“…In death, this misunderstood and mistreated icon’s ghostly and exquisitely human voice will never be silenced. It rings out for perpetuity, forever pushing toward that curious threshold where agony becomes ecstasy, and bottomless pain becomes a strange form of joy.”
——
Some other relevant Karen quotes from a podcast of a few fans discussing pop divas a year or so ago have stuck with me, too:

“She’s ethereal, there’s an overview perspective on her music, that she’s almost viewing it from on top, and telling us secret truths.”
••
“What is going on beyond singing here? There’s a hidden knowledge and also an empathy for seemingly everyone that I feel like goes unreciprocated...”
••
“She loves us, she loves humanity, and yet she is not truly loved. If she had been things would have gone differently.”
 
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Jarred said:
Maybe it’s just my personal psychological pivot(?) in the last two years or so generally (I wouldn’t mind being more detailed - everyone’s aching to know - but I truthfully have no idea right now how to word what’s been happening), but my feelings toward their novelty songs like this has turned more sour. Or not just their novelty songs but the material that’s underdeveloped or beneath their gifts. Like, I’ve been finding less enjoyment in what I would some years ago still consider lesser tracks. More discerning/pessimistic/critical considering we know how glorious their highs could be. I’ve been like this with other music and media too as of late.

With Postman it’s a technically a great piece of ear candy and sugary fun, but it’s a waste of their abilities. We could’ve gotten something much more substantial in its place. Even Richard is still (rightfully) bitter that it’s number one song on the countdown and not something like YOM (which has its critics but most would agree has a greater depth and sophistication).

Maybe what I’m saying is that with broader life perspectives and being on the edge of change and a newer decade of age we become more aware of our mortality. In 1974 no one had a clue that Karen would be dead nine years later, but our 20/20 hindsight has a certain kind of person thinking of how much we wanted more artistic highs from the material she was given. They had no clue she was inching towards death but you still feel bitter that there wasn’t always a consistent output during a time when there truly could’ve been. To put it less abstractly, I suppose I’m finding it harder (or now stopping) to force myself to love and embrace songs that I never truly connected with for whatever reason. I’m finding a more truthful-than-ever bond with the material that really speaks to me right now with a more matured worldview, whether it be because of one musical element (lead vocal, arrangement, lyrics) or all combined.

It’s an even richer gift when songs we once loved have only deepened (and appropriately darkened in a realistic way) with age, and perhaps we see them from a new angle of the human condition, in part thanks to the intelligent, enigmatic, shape-shifting translucency of Karen’s voice and how that voice has only ripened with our present modernity. Heard This Masquerade last night for the first time in a bit and it’s always been perfection but it hits differently than ever before. I think what both their music and vocals reveal can be summed up quite well in this quote from a review of LGB:

“…In death, this misunderstood and mistreated icon’s ghostly and exquisitely human voice will never be silenced. It rings out for perpetuity, forever pushing toward that curious threshold where agony becomes ecstasy, and bottomless pain becomes a strange form of joy.”
——
Some other relevant Karen quotes from a podcast of a few fans discussing pop divas a year or so ago have stuck with me, too:

“She’s ethereal, there’s an overview perspective on her music, that she’s almost viewing it from on top, and telling us secret truths.”
••
“What is going on beyond singing here? There’s a hidden knowledge and also an empathy for seemingly everyone that I feel like goes unreciprocated...”
••
“She loves us, she loves humanity, and yet she is not truly loved. If she had been things would have gone differently.”
Click to expand...
I truly get what you're saying, and I respect your opinion. One of the reasons I love Postman is it kept the public guessing. The lighthearted songs helped balance out the more more serious image. They needed both fun and deep songs to stay on the charts, and it provided the variety. Long term, Postman may not have done them any favors because it was another oldie, though.
 
Mark-T said:
I truly get what you're saying, and I respect your opinion. One of the reasons I love Postman is it kept the public guessing. The lighthearted songs helped balance out the more more serious image. They needed both fun and deep songs to stay on the charts, and it provided the variety. Long term, Postman may not have done them any favors because it was another oldie, though.
Click to expand...
But that’s the thing, at the time they didn’t have a serious image. They were seen as lightweight and insubstantial to those weren’t touched by the music. I understand their compulsion to dominate the charts, but I wish they didn’t crave that instant kind of validation and relied on it solely through albums that represented them at their best. It’s like they they were considered fluff by so many but then record Postman and film a silly video. They knew in 1981 their image still haunted them and they record an album full of airbrushed, stillborn tracks and use that ridiculous album cover.

I’ve talked before about the depth I find in their recording of CTY but their other number ones were featherweight ditties with no gravity. You don’t need artistic weight to top the charts, but you need it to secure a respected legacy which is what they did want. I’ve read from so many people who aren’t fans that they can’t stand many of the arrangements but can’t resist that voice. Their loss, right? But it’s also the duo’s for not reading the signs (along the way) and keeping a steady integrity once they sold the “fun” stuff. For all of Richard’s staunch control over Karen and their professional identity he seemingly didn’t know how to navigate nearly as well as he thought he was/could, likely resulting in additional turmoil between the two of them.

The two Top of the World versions are a good example; the original being a more reflective piece (musically and vocally) with its low key interpretation of the subject and the single being a sunny, overly polished cream puff that doesn’t suggest their greatness is at any peak. Which is significant given how popular it became. I can’t remember if I wrote it here or to someone else, but in Randy’s discography book Justin Bond opined that it was the turn towards a full on kitsch image (continuing with novelty songs/album concepts and embarrassing tv specials and the like) that at the end of the day destroyed their legacy and musical credibility in ways that carry on today.
 
Postman is a song that I do not weigh against the ballads--for example, Solitaire.
I take Postman for that one moment in time--when Carpenters ruled the charts in America, when I still remember that song being all over the radio--
now, already in 1974 they were covering too many covers (and even 1975's Solitaire is a cover).
But, it's a great piece of ear candy and I wouldn't trade the memories I have of that song hitting the top in USA.
I was only 12 then, but I knew at the time --what a HIT !
 
I bring up my broader criticisms in this thread because this 45 is a prime example of the literal two sides of their output, and how the A-side’s levity was represnetige of an image and style that would and has too often overshadowed the sophistication they were capable of as heard on the b-side. But again, I’m hearing and viewing this as someone born nineteen years after this 45 was selling like hot cakes.
 
It was also the era of remakes. Most everyone was doing a hit from the 50’s and 60’s at the time. It was almost a guarantee to get airplay and sales, if catchy and done well. Donny Osmond and Linda Rondstadt made their careers in doing oldie remakes. Carpenters had a ton too. Fortunately they only released a handful as singles. The only mediocre one is Beechwood. The others I really love. Ticket, Postman, Hush are all fun to sing along to, and make the day a bit better when I hear them. Isn’t Please Mr. Post Man their biggest hit around the world? They nailed it, I think.
 
A snapshot of Carpenters in Year 1974, Billboard Magazine:
December 28, 1974 Top Pop Singles: Carpenters #39 Top of the World.
Top Singles Artists: #28 Carpenters (2 charted singles in 1974).
Top Pop Singles Duos, Groups: #10 Carpenters.
Top Pop Producers: #47 Richard and Karen Carpenter.
Top Pop Albums: #23 The Singles 1969-1973.
Top Pop Album Artists: #29 Carpenters.
Top Pop Album Duos, Groups: #17 Carpenters.
Top Easy Listening Singles: #27 I Won't Last A Day Without You.
Top EL Artists: #13 Carpenters.

Source:
 
Let me try to clarify my thoughts a bit. I think their image was lightweight, and they were dismissed, but their music was often viewed as melancholy, heavy, and overdramatic. The Singles 1969-1973 and the liner notes ("you hum these songs in the same vein as Smoke Gets in Your Eyes') presented them as old school, out of date. So, for me, that's one reason why I love Postman. It showed a different side of them. Besides it is just so well done.

After Goodbye to Love, releasing Sing did them no favors with regards to their image. Any credibility they had with critics was instantly thrown out.
 
Mark-T said:
Let me try to clarify my thoughts a bit. I think their image was lightweight, and they were dismissed, but their music was often viewed as melancholy, heavy, and overdramatic. The Singles 1969-1973 and the liner notes ("you hum these songs in the same vein as Smoke Gets in Your Eyes') presented them as old school, out of date. So, for me, that's one reason why I love Postman. It showed a different side of them. Besides it is just so well done.

After Goodbye to Love, releasing Sing did them no favors with regards to their image. Any credibility they had with critics was instantly thrown out.
Click to expand...
I understand that, I guess I just wish they didn’t give into the temptation to lighten that image the way they did. It is rather fascinating to think that their image in their heyday was seen as fluffy even as their music was largely so meticulous and serious. Both pushing against each other.

The slightly lower charting of GTL (a great #7) scared Richard who, again, seemingly believed to think his work could only be validated and respected through top 5 singles, leading him to insist on putting out the ultra safe Sing. 1973 brought a #2 and #3 singles and gave him a sigh of relief to be closer to #1 again, but was also, as we now know, the beginning of the end for their huge popularity/classic sound.
 
The entire story of how Carpenters ended up with the insubstantial image they never really shook, involves a lot more than the music choices. That's talked about in numerous interviews and books (including the most recent one).

But certainly the music choices DID have an impact. For me, Sing is that singular moment where any critics left that may have been struggling to think of Carpenters as a serious act, gave up. To those who were already thrashing Carpenters, the song just served as icing on their negative cake.

Please Mr. Postman came long after their image was irreversible. It is, for me, a fun, light-hearted song I always enjoy when I hear it. It's also one of the few (thinking of another forum thread here) songs where I cannot really hear a whiff of the "melancholy" (not a complaint; that melancholy is intrinsic to my love of their music, overall) that seems to permeate so many of their songs. That in itself makes this song - to -me - stand out as different and worthy of their catalog.
 
I don't think the song Sing
hurt Barbra Streisand's career at all, reaching #28 Easy Listening, #94 Bbd Hot 100, in 1972.
I could be wrong, but I do not think Carpenters' release of the song Sing--in and of itself-- had anything to do with
whether or not critics cared for the duo. These are the same critics who probably didn't care for 1970s We've Only Just Begun.
Thank heavens we got Please Mr. Postman when we did, as it gave the duo a shot in the arm at that point in time.
By the way, I believe the song, Sing, generally, is held in rather high regard these days (Joe Raposo).
 
GaryAlan said:
I don't think the song Sing
hurt Barbra Streisand's career at all, reaching #28 Easy Listening, #94 Bbd Hot 100, in 1972.
I could be wrong, but I do not think Carpenters' release of the song Sing--in and of itself-- had anything to do with
whether or not critics cared for the duo. These are the same critics who probably didn't care for 1970s We've Only Just Begun.
Thank heavens we got Please Mr. Postman when we did, as it gave the duo a shot in the arm at that point in time.
By the way, I believe the song, Sing, generally, is held in rather high regard these days (Joe Raposo).
Click to expand...

I certainly agree that from a music-sales perspective it was a nice shot in the arm for Carpenters. As for Barbra Streisand, I think she's apples to Carpenters oranges; not a good musical career comparison.

I'll take your word that Sing is held in high regard these days. I guess I should make clear that I personally like Sing; I was just commenting on what impact I believe it had on their career, back then.
 
^^Me too, I personally like the song Sing !
Of course, I mention Barbra Streisand, myself feeling that if she felt the song was worthy of recording and releasing,
how bad could it be.
 
It appears that Carpenters desire for big hits was bigger than their desire to try to course-correct their image problem, at least at this point in time with "Sing".

"Postman", for those who weren't around at the time, was a tailor-made hit for them. When you understand the flow of the rock'n'roll era, it comes into better focus. The 50s played out as they did, and the 60s played out as they did, with new records and new sounds one after the other. Occasionally a top radio station would dig up an old record if it fit what they were doing, but largely, it was mostly new and recent stuff that played on the radio. Karen and Richard listened to all of that - it's what they grew up with. And when the 70s rolled around, and top stations on both AM and the newer FM band began looking back to those "golden oldies" days and formatted whole stations around that sound.

So Rich and Karen dug up a record like "Please Mr. Postman", an old Marvelettes hit, and gave it their "Carpenters" treatment - and it played really well on the 70s radio of the times, where even current stations were digging up some oldies that sounded good on their station.
 
GaryAlan said:
I still love, love, love this song (in particular, here, the best opening vocals, the bells/chimes at 50 and 53sec, castanets, background vocals going 'higher' at 2:46):
Click to expand...

At 2:26 there is a Karen backup vocal ooh that she sings on the Bryce Forsyth Show that is not heard on any other version but this and the single. This sounds like the single version.
 
I know I have mentioned this before but Postman is extra contagious. Karen’s voice has many shades on it thanks to Richards layering process. The arrangement is fun and I still can’t listen without it being repeated a few times before continuing to the next song. I loved this song the very first time I heard it. And being 13 at the time I had never heard of any other version until about a year later. The Beatles version is also fun and this version seems related to it more than the others. The Cowsills have a version online from the Ed Sullivan Show that sounds more like the Marvelettes..
 
Cashbox July 1980: Top Singles of Past Years
1975: #21 Carpenters Please Mr. Postman.
Here:

Revisiting the 1975 Fan Club Newsletters and I was struck by a fan question which came up at that time,
Did the Carpenters' usurp the Boone Family on Please Mr. Postman ?
Here is something from Cashbox 12/21/1974 (page 22):
"Pat's four daughters recently scored chart success with their version of the Marvelettes 1961 hit, "Please Mr. Postman."
"They sound like the Carpenters with soul." notes proud papa Pat (Boone).

Cashbox 11/16/1974:
The Boone Family, Please, Mr. Postman. "If it's possible to make a classic classic, this is it.
Destined for the top of the charts, this country -fresh rendition of one of R&B's greats proves that music knows no boundaries."


Cashbox 12/28/1974:
Cover Battles: "Cover battles, always a sign of healthy competition between labels, saw at least eight cover fights going on. "
Of those active participants were: Al Wilson /O.C. Smith ; Bo Donaldson And The Heywoods (ABC)/Paper Lace (Mercury);
ABBA (Atlantic)/Sweet Dreams (ABC);Garfunkel (Columbia)/Tim Moore (Asylum); Ron Dante (Arista)/Tim Moore (Asylum); Kevin Johnson (London)/Mac Davis (Columbia)/Terry Jacks (Arista); Boone Family (Motown)/Carpenters (A&M);
and Keith Moon (MCA)/ California Music (RCA).
Here:
 
GaryAlan said:
Cashbox July 1980: Top Singles of Past Years
1975: #21 Carpenters Please Mr. Postman.
Here:

Revisiting the 1975 Fan Club Newsletters and I was struck by a fan question which came up at that time,
Did the Carpenters' usurp the Boone Family on Please Mr. Postman ?
Here is something from Cashbox 12/21/1974 (page 22):
"Pat's four daughters recently scored chart success with their version of the Marvelettes 1961 hit, "Please Mr. Postman."
"They sound like the Carpenters with soul." notes proud papa Pat (Boone).

Cashbox 11/16/1974:
The Boone Family, Please, Mr. Postman. "If it's possible to make a classic classic, this is it.
Destined for the top of the charts, this country -fresh rendition of one of R&B's greats proves that music knows no boundaries."


Cashbox 12/28/1974:
Cover Battles: "Cover battles, always a sign of healthy competition between labels, saw at least eight cover fights going on. "
Of those active participants were: Al Wilson /O.C. Smith ; Bo Donaldson And The Heywoods (ABC)/Paper Lace (Mercury);
ABBA (Atlantic)/Sweet Dreams (ABC);Garfunkel (Columbia)/Tim Moore (Asylum); Ron Dante (Arista)/Tim Moore (Asylum); Kevin Johnson (London)/Mac Davis (Columbia)/Terry Jacks (Arista); Boone Family (Motown)/Carpenters (A&M);
and Keith Moon (MCA)/ California Music (RCA).
Here:
Click to expand...

Quit underlining words, I keep trying to click them thinking they are links :razz: Just kidding :wink:
 
So, I am dubious about something:
The Please Mr. Postman as heard on From The Top (the first pressing of the 4-cd set)
does not seem to me to be the same as can be heard on original the Horizon LP (or album cd) version of the song.
Am I under illusions that there is a difference ?
 
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