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13 of 13 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
The First Carpenter Album Makes Its Debut in 1969, August 5, 2005
"Ticket To Ride" takes its name from the hit song single, "Ticket To Ride", released by the Carpenters in 1969. It would become the Carpenters first hit single (peaking at #56 onteh charts), and opened the door for the duo of Karen and Richard Carpenter to begin their string of hits that would span the decade of the 1970's. "Ticket To Ride" is Richard Carpenter's soft-ballad adaptation of the Beatle's hit of the same name. When the Beatles broke up in 1969, the Carpenters' "Ticket To Ride" hit the airwaves and was a hit, for it was a sad ballad and Beatles'fans mourning the loss of their favorite group related to the mournful interpretation of the song.
The distinctive "Carpenter sound", that of multi-layered harmonic vocals, is first heard on this album in several songs, including "Ticket To Ride", "Your Wonderful Parade", "All of My Life", and "What's The Use". Karen's voice is not yet "perfect" in her emotional content interpretation of the songs, as she is just a young 19 years old. An example of this is the song "Someday", which Karen interprets with a "wailing" timbre to her voice, admittedly not her best interpretation of the song. Karen reinterpreted this song in the 1980 TV special "Music, Music, Music", and her vocal is the definitive interpretation and performance, one of which she was very proud of. It is interesting to hear the early "primitive" Carpenter sound and Karen's voice, as the true Carpenter sound would fully emerge in the next album, "Close To You".
Although it is their first work, this Carpenter album is one that is pleasing, though inferior to their subsequent recordings. If you are a fan of the Carpenters, you will want to have this album as many of the songs are not included on their later greatest hits albums. I particularly liked "Get Together", the slow love ballad, "All of My Life", the lively "Don't Be Afraid", and the youthful "What's The Use".
I give this album 4-stars, as it is not of the quality of their later albums. It probably deserves just three stars, but how can I give any album with Karen Carpenter's exquisite voice just three stars?! That would be a sacrilege to my favorite singer of all-time!
Jim "Konedog" Koenig
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13 of 13 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
What....is....that.....incredible.....sound??????, November 1, 2003
It's the year 2003. I'm a 43 year old music lover. I've heard every amazing artist from The Beatles to Whitney Houston to Celine Dion to Michael Jackson and back again. But I've never heard ____anything____ that sounds like this. I was shocked at the polished, fully realized sound in this first effort. Even having been a Carpenters fan since 1973, and having played the grooves off the record in my turmoiled adolescent years, I still got gigantic goosebumps all over my body when I dug out "Ticket To Ride" yesterday and listened to "Invocation" for the first time in a while. From the first note to the last I was electrified. And this is in 2003. In 1969??? The impact of this recording is incalculable.
Oddly, I love pop style choral music but can't stand traditional choral music. You remember the "beautiful music" radio stations that played elevator style music from the "Whats'is'name singers." I hated that stuff. Bing Crosby singing "White Christmas" and in the middle comes a section sung by choir, but it's the old style choral sound...I hate that stuff. But pop choir in the style of Carpenters, Osmonds, or Bee Gees...that's different and I really love it.
The first track of this record is a classical sounding, acapella tune done in a choral style. But I've never heard anything, before or since, that sounds like this choir. It's beautiful and ethereal and moving all at once.
I personally love Richard's voice and think his is the "salt" that makes the Carpenters sound work. I like to hear him sing lead and some of his leads are my favorite Carpenters tracks, e.g. "Saturday." On this record he sings lead more than on later records and that's a plus for me.
Karen's sound is 98% of what it became, which is surprising at this early stage. Even so, it's just ever so slightly green and young, which for a Carpenters fan just increases the charm.
Not surprisingly for the late 60s, The Beatles were a major influence on Richard. It may be impossible to outdo The Beatles on any rearrangement of one of their tunes but Richard puts forth a good effort here with the title track. He completely throws away the Beatles' arrangement and turns the rocking tune into a slow and mournful ballad, spicing it up and dropping in the fully realized Carpenters signature sound on the chorous. Being more distanced from the Beatles by now, for me this tune has aged well. I'm more able to accept the alternate arrangement and appreciate it for its own merits. While overall the song suffers from the inevitable comparison with the Beatles' version, Karen's vocal performance on this track benefits from it and is stunning. Since the Beatles' version is a rocking, hard driving tune, it's a little low on tormented emotion. Karen, in contrast, wrings out every last ounce of torment possible from the painful lyrics, delivering a masterful performance. Clever, unique, couragous, and excellent.
Despite all its ground breaking excellence, it's surprising that the Carpenters were able to make inroads on the popular music scene with this church inspired offering. Titling the record "Offering" and opening and closing the record with tracks "Invocation" and "Benediction," took a lot of guts in the hippie era when rebellion against the establishment, any establishment, long hair, drugs, free love, etc, was the current style. What a refreshing break it must have been for many to rest from all the psychedelia and acid rock and instead hear something positive and "good." While that may go in and out of style and the Carpenters career may have sufferred from that in the long run, to have the vision to put this out shows that Richard was not just a musical leader, but a social one as well, and unlike the Beatles he is leading us in a positive direction. Some may not appreciate that, but I do. Thank you Richard.
LB
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7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Nice Taste of "Yet to Come", November 7, 1999
By A Customer
Hard to believe that the teenage Karen and 24ish Richard were so professional sounding in their early years. Richard's arrangements complement the heartfelt vocals of his sister, who plays drums like nobody's business throughout the album. Ironically, the two hit songs they cover, the Beatles' "Ticket to Ride" and the Youngbloods' "Get Together," are less effective than the Bettis/Carpenter collaborations, some of which should have been released by A&M as potential singles, especially "Someday" and "Eve," two of the most smouldering vocals Karen ever recorded in her brief life.Listening to compliations and hits packages of the Carpeneters is okay; however, the listener is advised to hear each original album, track by track, to really get the importance of the duo's legacy. Richard put so much into the intricate continuity of the tracks on each album--songs fade into each other, keys change subtly yet perfectly, especially at the codas of certain songs, and occasional witty tunes pepper each album to break up the pace of the more serious love songs. I attended a Carpenters concert in the late 1970s, and they put on a complete show, complete with costume changes, orchestra, and even cars and motorcycles onstage, rather than a predictable recital of their hits--no one could take their eyes off them for those two hours (and I wasn't even 10 years old). The only part of this album that will make you cringe is the original "flower" cover photo, which recently has been wisely replaced with a more neutral shot of the two on a sailboat . . . it doesn't make much sense, given the album's title, but as Charlie Parker said, Let the music do the talking!
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