The Carpenters

"Rainy Days and Mondays" and "Superstar" are two of the worthiest hits from the 1970s, and each shows the Carpenters' knack for painting dark clouds into blue suburban skies. The other tracks on the album are just as good, such as the trippy "Druscilla Penny" and the Merv-worthy Bacharach melody.

The Carpenters make good singles. "Close to You" was Bacharach and David music at its
best. Karen Carpenter's lead vocal bordered on soulfulness, while the arrangement was
exceptionally sharp middle-of-the-road (MOR) music. The record sold well over two million
copies in the United States alone. The follow-ups, included on Carpenters, have been
phenomenally successful too, if not quite the equal of the initial hit aesthetically... More >