Strength Of A Woman - Another "Stand By Your Man?"

[Johnny Angel]

I was listening to this song this morning and a thought occurred to me: As far as I know, this is the only Carpenters song written by women (Phyllis Brown and Juanita Curiel) for a female singer... It's an interesting song, because of the lyrics - sort of like "Stand By Your Man" for an 80's audience. Karen never sang such lyrics before...

Sometimes it takes the strength of a woman
To understand the weakness of her man
It's gonna the strength of this woman
To keep fighting for the loving of her man

And darling, when you been satisfied
And it isn't new to you no more
Think of me,
I'll be here alone
Waiting for you to find
your way back home

I suspect that after hearing the songs she sang on her solo album that Richard felt it was time to let her sing more "grown-up" lyrics...

What are your thoughts?

 

[Mark-T]

I loved this song from the first time I heard it.
Classic Carpenters arrangement and styling- and a "soft" vocal by Karen. Just great. Very Superstarish.

 

[goodjeans]

I wish that this had been a single instead of "Those Good Old Dreams". It almost borders on R and B and I love it also. One of the few tracks on "Made In America" that I felt were going in the 'right' direction. I am not sure that Karen would have allowed the deadbeat in real life, but the song was mature and albumwise they were probably thinking there's always TOMorrow.

 

[Harry]

The big roblem I had with the sound of the recording was the use of "The Carpettes". Though Rich and Karen both provided some of the backing vocals, the sound of the other voices in the "Carpettes" (Carolyn Dennis, Stephanie Spruill and Maxine Waters Williard) altered the sound of the recording. It was a continuation of a trend that started on HORIZON and IMHO marred the later albums.

For some reason, I don't care for anyone else doing backing or even singing with Carpenters. I'm not a big fan of the Pete Cetera duet on the solo album, and even the Karen/Ella medley, though historically interesting, leaves me a bit cold.

The Carpenters established a sound on their early albums that really grabbed me and I didn't care for it when they backed away from it.

Other than that, "Strength Of A Woman" is a pretty decent track.

Harry

 

[Rumbahbah]

While its lyric is certainly interesting and different from what the Carpenters had tackled before I’ve always thought “Strength of a Woman” was one of the weakest tracks on Made in America – the intro and the verses are quite nice but the chorus is horrible, chiefly as a result of the overblown backing vocals, and it suffers from the same problem as several other tracks on Made in America: it feels too safe and obviously “Adult Contemporary” in style. The sentiment in the song isn’t very forward-thinking for the early 1980s and I don’t think it would have done any better than “Those Good Old Dreams” or “Beechwood” if released as a single.

 

[Rick-An Ordinary Fool]

Of course this is just my opinion but I have always felt that Richard tried to make MIA somewhat like a new avenue for Karen, this album came after Karen recorded her solo album, obviously Karen enjoyed using her higher vocals on her solo album and I always thought it was funny how most of MIA again uses Karen higher vocals...was this to appease Karen by Richard?

I agree this track is a weak point on the whole album, I also don't like those backing vocals

I think that if you compare this album to the rest of the Carpenters albums, it strayed from where they originated, yeah they were looking for a new direction I guess. But from coming from the prior album into MIA it wasn't a step up regarding the album as a whole. There are a few great tracks I really like but an album as a whole not so great.

 

[Mark-T]

I don't think it strayed far enough, actually.
I mean, c'mon- Beechwood- so juvenile for them at their ages at this point- and so out of sych with the times. Not they I wanted them to sing "More, More, More" but they were obviously looking backward at what made their earlier albums popular and trying so hard for a hit.

 

[Rick-An Ordinary Fool]

Well Beechwood is really just a fluff song, I can't believe there was not another song that could have taken it's place. The video is cute but it's like the oldies, been there done that, with Now and Then.

With MIA, there are some worthy tracks, Touch Me When We're Dancing and Want You Back in my Life, (but were they big enough for a strong comeback?) there are several other tracks I like on the album. But Beechwood and Strength of a Woman are pretty weak. A comeback album?