Made in America [Import]

Carpenters | Format: Audio CD

Product Details

• Audio CD (February 17, 1998)
• Format: Import
• Label: Msi/Sound Product
• ASIN: B000006ECH
• Also Available in: Audio CD
• Average Customer Review: 3.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,663,708 in Music (See Top 100 in Music)

Track Listings

1. Those Good Ol' Dreams

2. Strength Of A Woman

3. Back In My Life Again(Want You)

4. You've Got What It Takes

5. Somebody's Been Lyin'

6. I Believe You

7. Touch Me When Were Dancing

8. When It's Gone(It's Just Gone)

9. Beechwood

10. Because We Are In Love

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars "America"- Pristine Vocals and Smooth Arrangements, September 29, 1998

By 

mark ([e-mail]) (Denver, Colorado) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Made in America (Audio CD)

By the time this album was released, it had been years since Karen and Richard had a bonafide hit. They tried hard to remedy that- and suceeded, for the most part. The first radio single "Touch Me When We're Dancing" shimmers. It represents the best of the duo: warm, tender vocals; understated arrangement and lyrics of yearning for love. A wiser, more mature Karen emerges on "Strength of A Woman", but she lets her wandering man come home. The forgotten single of 1978, "I Believe You" shows the power behind the voice. The heartbreaking lyrics and sensational arrangement make for an instant classic. The only misstep on the album is a limp remake of "Beechwood 4-5789", an obvious attempt to remake the success of "Please Mr. Postman". Karen was no longer sweet sixteen, but a woman of 31, and overall this collection shows why she was the best of her generation, and of those before or after.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Karen's voice at its sweetest and most expressionistic., May 28, 1998

By A Customer

This review is from: Made in America (Audio CD)

I have been a Carpenter's fan since I first saw Karen wearing a yellow dress and singing "Rainy Days and Mondays". I have listened to, and purchased everything I could get my hands on that remotely had anything to do with her voice and talent. The "Made In America" album is Karen's voice at its finest. It is at the same time the sweetest and most expressionistic of any other albums that do not have her sounding melencholy. It, to me, is profoundly ironic that the album that I feel most exemplifies the optimism that she and Richard portrayed was in fact the last album to be released before her death. The optimism and sweetness of her voice have no better memorial than this album and its orchestration.

1 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars skip it, September 22, 1998

By A Customer

This review is from: Made in America (Audio CD)

Karen was the finest pop singer of the 70's - but this album was released in 1981 as her self-confidence was ebbing (shelved solo album, bad marriage, worsening anorexia), and for once she was unable to overcome Richard's treacly arrangements. The material is possibly the lamest they recorded. (Only "I Believe You," recorded in '78, and "Beechwood 4-5789," ruined by a painfully cute arrangement, rise to Karen's standards.) The airbrushed cover is a sad but apt indication of what lies within. Hard to say what was the bigger crime: that Karen's solo album was shelved in favor of this tripe, or that it was the last album that came out before she died.