25 Albums I Can't Live Without: #18

The Carpenters, "A Song for You"

The Carpenters served as the soundtrack of my childhood. Since my dad drove a truck and was gone a lot in my early years, my mom played a massive role in shaping my music tastes — and that included the Carpenters. When she got rid of all her old records (because she hasn’t had a record player in years), she saved her Carpenters records for me.

What’s crazy is that none of the albums she gave to me was “A Song for You.” I remember playing it and looking at the cover as a child, so I don’t know what happened to it. It’s a shame because “A Song for You” is their finest album.

Part of what makes this album resonate with me is that so many of my favorite Carpenters songs are here. It’s almost like a greatest hits album in my mind.

Bookended by Leon Russell’s tremendous title track and a reprise, there’s not a bad song on “A Song for You.” Richard and Karen Carpenter experiment with country on the chart-topping “Top of the World”:

Even when I was little, I remember the drama and the fascinating harmonies of “Hurting Each Other.”

The Carpenters interpreted songs by greats like Roger Nichols and Paul Williams…

…Carole King & Toni Stern…

…and Randy Edelman.

And, of course, Richard Carpenter and John Bettis’ songwriting is tremendous. The best moment on the album — and the duo’s best moment altogether in my opinion — is “Goodbye to Love.”

It’s a strong song despite somewhat maudlin lyrics, and Richard and Karen and their band are firing on all cylinders here. “Goodbye to Love” has one of the funniest stories in pop music history: some radio stations refused to play the song because guitarist Tony Peluso used a distorted “fuzz” tone on the solos. It might have prevented the song from charting higher than #7 on the Hot 100, which is a shame.

About those guitar solos: they’re tremendous, especially the one on the long ending that’s paired with Richard and Karen’s stacked harmonies. Perfection!

As a kid, I laughed at the Side One ending, “Intermission,” but as an adult, I appreciate those incredible multi-tracked harmonies.

Just as with every album, some songs are better than others, but Side One is particularly strong. On the whole album, the production is impeccable, and the vocals — both Karen’s beautiful leads and the impressive harmonies — are second to none.

Photo credit: Kathleen Ballard, Los Angeles Times, CC BY 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons