Karen Carpenter was one half of the
brother-and-sister ’70s soft-rock duo the Carpenters. Their best-known song is
probably “Top of the World.” Carpenter herself is probably best-known for
starving herself to death. Musicians with songs about her include Young Fresh
Fellows, Sonic Youth, and Dave Alvin.
According to author Karen Tongson, the Carpenters are more than just “popular”
in the Philippines:
Karen Carpenter matters to Filipinos and
Filipino Americans like me, whose movements through the megalopolis of Manila,
to and from the Philippines’ rural provinces, and eventually to distant places
for overseas labor, are scored to Karen’s voice: one redolent of tears, even
when she sings about unbridled joy.
Why Karen Carpenter Matters weaves Carpenter’s life as an American musician
(and, for a time, superstar) with Tongson’s life as the child of Filipino
musicians. It also features music criticism and cultural criticism.
Tongson is an excellent biographer and an eye-opening music critic, though
while I understand why she connected
strongly with the Carpenters’ music, I came away unconvinced that she explained
the Philippines’
connection to it. As an example of her task, she addresses journalists’
attempts to explain why so many Latinos love Morrissey, which love can probably
be explained by Morrissey’s sounding like the cantantes his Latino fans grew up hearing (consider that the next
time you hear “There Is a Light That Never Goes Out”)—maybe Carpenter’s voice
triggered a similar kind of memory?
In the chapter titled “Queer Horizon,” the word “Queer” refers to gender.
Tongson explores the weird contemporaneous perception of Carpenter as a
“tomboy”—no one I know would call her that—and it’s in this chapter that
Tongson most closely examines Carpenter’s anorexia and death.
Why Karen Carpenter Matters is a short
book, part of the University
of Texas Press’ Music
Matters series (reminiscent of the 33 1/3 series in which each book is devoted
to a single album). –Jim Woster (University
of Texas Press,
UTexasPress.org)