Monday, October 29, 2012

Carpenters "Offering" album covers

Many big thanks go to Irene for offering these photos to Karen Carpenter Avenue and Karen Carpenter Magazine. Your generosity is much appreciated.


Released on October 9, 1969, "Offering" is the name of Carpenters' debut album. The album did not chart and sold only 18,000 copies. However there was one semi-hit single with the release of a ballad version of the Beatles' "Ticket To Ride" which reached #54 on the Billboard singles chart and remained on the chart for 12 weeks.

 Original album cover "Offering" 1969

The following are outtakes from the "Offering" photo shoot in 1969.
(Thank you again Irene for contributing these photos)

This set of photos show Karen and Richard in a rustic atmosphere. Suburban Southern California, the dusty fallen leaves, the stained cement. It's down very earthy.





After the success of the mega-hit "Close To You" A&M Records repackaged "Offering" with a new album cover and renamed it "Ticket To Ride". The reissued album has gone on to sell over 400,000 (in the US). Mint copies of the original "Offering" vinyl album are valued at $1,000 +.


Carpenters  - Ticket To Ride (1970)
The original 1969 recording of "Ticket To Ride".
In 1973 Carpenters rerecorded the song for inclusion on their mega-hit compilation "The Singles 1969-1973".

Carpenters - All I Can Do (1969)
(Rick Henry's favorite tune from the album)

4 comments:

  1. Love those Offering pics. Thanks for posting!

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  2. Thanks for sharing the "Offering" album cover out take photos! Never saw them before

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  3. I LOVE "All I Can Do", but think "Eve", "All Of My Life" were stand out tracks. "Someday" is pretty but Karen's voice was still growing, even Karen didn't like her vocals on "Someday" & "Ticket". "Offering"/"Ticket" to me, is so different from the other albums. By the time the "Tan" album was released, they had cemented their sound. I was playing the Hamlet version of "Ticket" one day & a friend was dumbfounded that it was Carpenters. Because he felt it was a folk album!

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  4. any idea of the exact stair location

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