Best Carpenters Single POLL POLL POLL

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Gonna have to go for Superstar since you made the interplanetary one a don't like carpenters damn you.

My mum has all the Carpenters albums. She played them all a lot when I was a kid.

― Brigadier Lethbridge-Pfunkboy, Sunday, 29 April 2007 01:05 (sixteen years ago) link

i just went for "goodbye to love" but there were four other heavyweight contenders.

xpost - the main one being "Superstar".

xxpost Ha!

― jed_, Sunday, 29 April 2007 01:06 (sixteen years ago) link

time and time again the chance for love has passed me by

― grebtesthit, Sunday, 29 April 2007 01:09 (sixteen years ago) link

;_;

― jed_, Sunday, 29 April 2007 01:10 (sixteen years ago) link

Rainy Days gets the vote because it's about being a depressed housewife rather than a depressed singer. More realistic. Well, not for Karen I guess.

She's not depressed in that song. See Todd Haynes' Superstar for further elucidation.

But "Rainy Days" gets the vote.

― Kevin John Bozelka, Sunday, 29 April 2007 01:13 (sixteen years ago) link

I had to vote for "Goodbye to Love", though I came near to picking "Close to You" for personal reasons.

― Arthur, Sunday, 29 April 2007 01:23 (sixteen years ago) link

"calling occupants" and i LOVE the carpenters!

― get bent, Sunday, 29 April 2007 02:00 (sixteen years ago) link

It's between "Rainy Days" and "Hurting Each Other" but "Goodbye to Love" would be next. Will anyone pick one of their happy songs?

― Sundar, Sunday, 29 April 2007 02:08 (sixteen years ago) link

What happy songs? (I'm not sure any of the "happy" ones ever really feel happy to me, at least not in a way remotely unalloyed with melancholy.)

― Rockist Scientist, Sunday, 29 April 2007 02:12 (sixteen years ago) link

Top of the World or Close to You???

― JN$OT, Monday, 30 April 2007 07:52 (sixteen years ago) link

Calling Occupants of Interplanetary Craft/"i don't like The Carpenters"

That's one awesome b-side!

― Mark G, Monday, 30 April 2007 11:35 (sixteen years ago) link

Superstar.

― xhuxk, Monday, 30 April 2007 12:12 (sixteen years ago) link

Nobody opting for Solitaire? The way Karen delivers that "every road that takes him, takes him down" line is so beautiful.

― Dan Peterson, Monday, 30 April 2007 13:59 (sixteen years ago) link

Wasn't a single in the UK. We got the Andy Williams version.

― Marcello Carlin, Monday, 30 April 2007 14:00 (sixteen years ago) link

Goodbye to love, for Tony Peluso's guitar

― whatever, Monday, 30 April 2007 15:23 (sixteen years ago) link

more votes please - closing tomorrow.

― jed_, Thursday, 3 May 2007 09:36 (sixteen years ago) link

It's difficult!

― Tom D., Thursday, 3 May 2007 09:37 (sixteen years ago) link

It's easy! Vote for Goodbye to Love; you know you want to.

or Superstar...or Rainy Days...or I Won't Last a Day...

It's difficult :-(

― Guilty_Boksen, Thursday, 3 May 2007 11:21 (sixteen years ago) link

"We've Only Just Begun" was both an A and a B side?

either way, gets my vote...really heavy piano...(surely must have had some influence on Italo-house)...

― henry s, Thursday, 3 May 2007 13:38 (sixteen years ago) link

I want to vote for ALL of these. Well, except 'Sing'.

― braveclub, Thursday, 3 May 2007 13:48 (sixteen years ago) link

I plumped for Yesterday Once More. It reminds me of my grandpa's funeral. (perhaps not the most compelling argument here for its being the best, but that is the way it is)

― Billy Pilgrim, Thursday, 3 May 2007 16:32 (sixteen years ago) link

Superstar, but this was hard.

― admrl, Thursday, 3 May 2007 16:33 (sixteen years ago) link

I've been on a big Carpenters' kick lately - Yesterday Once More for me

― Shakey Mo Collier, Thursday, 3 May 2007 16:34 (sixteen years ago) link

Superstar wins because of those ominous last 11 seconds.

― Matt Armstrong, Thursday, 3 May 2007 16:55 (sixteen years ago) link

And it won.

― Brigadier Lethbridge-Pfunkboy, Thursday, 3 May 2007 23:46 (sixteen years ago) link

good show!

― jed_, Thursday, 3 May 2007 23:51 (sixteen years ago) link

one year passes...

wtf 'only yesterday' got zero votes? That is an astonishingly great song.

― Frogman Henry, Thursday, 17 July 2008 11:02 (fifteen years ago) link

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oQmbHGwMcCo

― Frogman Henry, Thursday, 17 July 2008 11:15 (fifteen years ago) link

it amazes me how the same band can be responsible for that and the execrable 'ticket to ride'

― Frogman Henry, Thursday, 17 July 2008 11:17 (fifteen years ago) link

They did worse stuff than "Ticket to Ride"

― Tom D., Thursday, 17 July 2008 11:18 (fifteen years ago) link

they do a great version of ticket to ride!

― amateurist, Thursday, 17 July 2008 11:23 (fifteen years ago) link

It's certainly better than the 5th Dimension's version, now that really is shit!

― Tom D., Thursday, 17 July 2008 11:26 (fifteen years ago) link

The combination of Karen Carpenter's ductile, dispassionate contralto and Richard Carpenter's meticulous studio technique is admittedly more musical than the clatter of voices and silverware in a cafeteria, but it's just as impervious to criticism. That is, the duo's success is essentially statistical: I'll tell you that I very much like "We've Only Just Begun" and detest "Sing," but those aren't so much aesthetic judgments as points on a graph. C+

what does this mean? that he enjoys the melodies but doesn't find himself emotionally involved?

― amateurist, Thursday, 17 July 2008 11:32 (fifteen years ago) link

also:

http://youtube.com/watch?v=fsgj4xcxXyA

why is everyone squinting?

― amateurist, Thursday, 17 July 2008 11:32 (fifteen years ago) link

well i know. i just watched it gain and jesus, got to be nostalgia talking on your part. they suck the life out of that song. props for the video location tho.

― Frogman Henry, Thursday, 17 July 2008 11:42 (fifteen years ago) link

nostalgia for what? i first heard that version three years ago.

― amateurist, Thursday, 17 July 2008 18:47 (fifteen years ago) link

five years pass...

Went on a "Solitaire" jag today. Found out that the Neil Sedaka original from 1972 was recorded with 10cc as his backing band*, and that Karen Carpenter always hated this song, but recorded it anyway and Richard said/says it's one of her finest vocal takes.

*Listening to the whole 1972 Sedaka album right now and it's simultaneously CORNY and pretty great.

― Johnny Fever, Thursday, 7 November 2013 22:53 (ten years ago) link

welcome to my world.

you are officially old now.

advise : buy the 10cc boxset.

"corny but great" : rule of mid-life chaos.

― mark e, Thursday, 7 November 2013 23:06 (ten years ago) link

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