Carpenters: The Musical Legacy, by Mike Cidoni Lennox & Chris May with Richard Carpenter

If you were going to think of a perfect book for a chart nerd who is fond of the adult contemporary sounds of the Carpenters, particularly as a coffee table book that could be read by appreciative houseguests, this book would be close to it. Yet this book is divisive in ways that suggest some of the essential areas of divide among those who are interested in the musical history of the group. Among fans of the group, there is in general an appreciation of anything new that carries with it the approval of the act’s surviving member, Richard Carpenter, who was responsible for much of the song curation, music writing of the group’s original material, arranging, and production. The death of Karen Carpenter in the early 1980s as a result of a long and ultimately unsuccessful struggle against anorexia (discussed in this book) put an end to any new material being able to be recorded, and this meant that the fans of the group mainly have the music from the band’s relatively short and productive heyday to go back to. For the fans of the group, the involvement and approval of Richard Carpenter of this project is a sign that this book is to be enjoyed, and if you are a fan of the Carpenters and of their musical legacy as it can be measured through the charts, there is a lot to enjoy here.

While I greatly enjoyed this book as a chart nerd who happens to be a fan of the music of the Carpenters, both for Richard’s pristine production ear and for Karen’s voice of longing, not everyone who reads this book will be as pleased. There are those who do not appreciate Richard’s involvement, which requires a certain delicacy if it is to be maintained. Richard is known, understandably so, for being rather defensive about the portrayal of the group and the way that it has been savagely judged as being uncool in rather biting and cruel ways. This defensiveness shows in the work, just as surely as Richard’s obsession with chart success as being demonstrative of people being appreciative of the genuine musical gifts of the Carpenter siblings is visible in the pages of this book. There is also a tastefulness about this book, a certain restraint and avoidance in talking about unpleasant matters, that also pervades this book, which is something that comes along with a book having official approval. There are many people who are fans not of the Carpenters themselves as an act, so much as having salacious rumors and gossip spread about them, and such people will definitely be offended by this book’s classy approach, in the way that it gently refers to the effects of Karen’s marriage on the recording of one of their later albums without discussing how short and disastrous that marriage was, and in referring to Karen’s eating disorder only after mentioning the vast majority of the recording of the duo’s music, when it is necessary to understand the effects of Richard’s own addiction to Quaaludes and Karen’s eating disorder on the recording schedule of the group in the late 70’s and early 80’s. More salacious gossip than this is completely avoided altogether, which I appreciated but not everyone will.

In terms of its contents, this book has nearly 350 pages of material in large pages, full of soft out-of-focus photographs and plenty of chart retrospectives. The book is mostly organized in a chronological fashion, beginning with an introduction, author’s note, and a prologue about the group’s image problem, as well as a discussion of the childhood and musical beginnings of the Carpenters along with a somewhat long interview with Richard Carpenter (1). After this there is a discussion of the beginning of the group with an unsuccessful first “Offering” and a minor hit in a cover of “Ticket To Ride” (2). This is followed by a discussion of the early success of the group, its fondness for movie music, and the hits that kept the group on top of the charts or close to it for a period of several years from 1970-1974 (3). After this, there is a discussion of the group’s global success (4) as well as the new horizons the group sought to change up their sound a bit and stay fresh from 1975-1977 (5). After this there is a discussion of the Carpenters’ Christmas music (6), the recording of Made In America (7), and a retrospective of Karen Carpenter’s all-too-short life (8). The last chapter of the book examines Richard’s role as keeper of the group’s flame (9) along with a discussion of various compilations and posthumous albums. The book ends with reflections of the Rolling Stone articles on the group, a last discussion with Richard Carpenter, and an appendix which looks at the Carpenters in the studio, on the charts, on the screen, on the road, in awards, along with acknowledgements and photo credits.