Karen Carpenter has been DEAD TO ME 40 years today

Rainy Days and Mondays. I have warm childhood memories of being in a laundromat and my mom playing that song on the jukebox.

Karen Carpenter is the first celebrity death I can remember. I was 6 years old and my parents and their friends were all shocked, I remember them sitting around the dining room table and talking about it.

I've always loved this tribute that Petula Clark did for Karen.

I wonder what her last meal was?

If Mama Cass had only shared her ham sandwich with Karen Carpenter they'd both be alive today 🤔

R4 A Big Mac with fries, Rose.

Karen being taken away so young is a depressing thought.

It's just as depressing as imagining being stuck in a laundromat like r1 described, also being forced to listed to the other customers' sad music selections

How do we feel about Belinda covering Superstar?

I was in 2nd grade when this happened and I remember some adults laughing about Karen Carpenter and canned cat food. I asked my mom what it meant and she claimed not to know. I remember morning DJs also mention canned cat food and Karen Carpenter. I've asked people what the fuck that was about, but nobody knows. Dataloungers, anyone know?

So, she’s been dead longer then she was alive.

Why do old people pronounce it like this?

Rain-ee dees and Mon-dees al-weeys geet me dee-own

Fuck, that's how most of the DL'ers must pronounce it since you are all clearly 90.

Love this one. Take me back to the early 80s, fake wood paneling, Dorothy Hamil hairdos and smoking sections.

She got real ugly. It was her time to go.

I love all of Karen’s songs, and “Goodbye to Love” and “Solitaire” are up there for me.

However, I’d like to post something upbeat: “My Body Keeps Changing my Mind” from Karen’s disco days, her solo album in 1979. Great song & dance and Karen even plays drums for a bit.

Beautiful voice.

More naked Karen.

I've heard rumors about her relationship with Olivia Newton John. Can anyone enlighten us?

[quote]being in a laundromat and my mom playing that song on the jukebox.

Your laundromat had a jukebox?! Dayum…you fancy.

When I was a kid, the only noise you heard in my laundromat were the gunshots outside.

R4 - I believe Karen’s last meal was her favorite, shrimp salad at Bob’s Big Boy. She ate there with her parents — everyone thought she was over the hump and recovering. She awoke before her parents that last morning, started a pot of coffee, went back upstairs to get dressed and collapsed.

Karen was abusing syrup of ipecac, which induces vomiting in the case of someone being poisoned, and is never meant to be used for any other purpose. Regular use can destroy the heart muscle.

I think it’s funny Karen recorded a solo album and it wasn’t released because the label and her managers thought the music was too wild and crazy.

Her solo album wasn't good at all except for a couple of songs. The material wasn't suited for her and she was singing in a higher register.

R22 & R22 - All great points — just the fact that she recorded it seemed to really, really upset Richard, who was the main voice in shelving it… until she’d been dead a few years… then suddenly he changed his mind. How altruistic of him.

Richard knew he was nothing without Karen, she was the star and the one people came to see.

Ugly woman

Even though she was hard to see from a lot of angles, r24.

Karen's autopsy says the mother found her in the kitchen, not the bedroom closet. Paragraph 10 at the link.

But most of all, R21 she was singing about SEX!

They're bumping pussies in heaven, R17

R27 - thank you for linking that. I had always heard she was nude, and half in/half out of the bedroom closet (when she stayed at her parents’ Downey home she reportedly slept in what had been Richard’s bedroom).

I also had never heard about all of the injection marks on her body, and never read the autopsy report before. Wow.

Eat To The Beat

The injection marks were from the EMTs and medical staff at the hospital.

I’m an unabashed Karen and Carpenters apologist. I still stand by the claim that Horizon is an efficient/economic beautiful album from beginning to end - what a great 35 minutes!

R30 Of course that cunt of a mother would have kept Richard’s room as a complete shrine to him and never changed a thing, the day Karen left they probably stripped her room and made it into a sewing room. I’m surprised she allowed Karen to sleep there and not made her stay on the couch so none of Richard’s many musical honors were disturbed by her presence.

Her body made her the Patron Saint of Elite Gymnasts everywhere.

Horizon is one of my all time favorite albums, r33! Richard may have been an asshole and his arrangements could be hit or miss, but I thought Horizon knocked it out of the park.

From what I've read, everything was for Richard, whom the family anointed as a "genius", and their mother and Richard subverted Karen's independence in every aspect of her life. Their father was the passive parent and stood by. Not a fan, but I wonder what she might have done if she had been "allowed". Her anorexia seems to have been an attempt to exert some control.

I was the original Mrs. Patsy Ramsey, formerly of Boulder, CO!

Agnes Carpenter was a fire-breathing cunt. She adored Richard, made no attempt to hide that he was her favorite child and could do no wrong. She was always critical and dismissive of Karen. A lot of Karen's problems came from her relationship with Agnes.

She was a fantastic drummer

R40 — she was a fantastic drummer! She never wanted to step out from behind the kit. I wonder if her life would’ve been radically different had she not.

The Carpenters are too schmaltzy for me, but Karen herself was a pure talent and had a compelling story. I love the disturbing Todd Haynes stop motion short film he did about her.

Mr. Guder.

I still get a kick out of the Carpenters and I'm 49! That whole easy listening, yacht rock type of thing is my guilty pleasure.

Karen Carpenter was very talented.

Who?

Who was more beautiful in their prime, Agnes or Karen?

I still listen to Rainy Days and Mondays. What a beautiful voice she had.

Ouch Belinda!!!

That old fucking hag Agnes was a true CUNT!

Did Richard marry their first cousin because he couldn't marry Karen?

I wouldn’t think so R49. She doesn’t look anything like Karen. She’s no blood relation to Richard or Karen as she was adopted at birth, but nonetheless Karen was freaked out when she learned of the relationship.

Richard was always a creepy little shit to me. Never liked him, he always had a sneaky, guilty look.

A beautiful girl. But a little on the porky side.

Great voice, terrible material. She was close to Olivia Newton-John (well as close as she ever got to anyone) and also had a friendship with Dionne Warwick.

Carpenters had some great songs. The downbeat songs were the best.

,,,,,,

Ol’ Agnes is serving some Ellen Ripley at r45.

Did she bump pussys with Dionne snd Liv?

An underrated song by them.

I was in college when she died. This ‘nice’ girl said ‘she had a good voice but it’s too bad her songs were so faggy.’

She had a tragic life but she also seemed quite strange.

Elevator music.