Chapter Twelve
People often ask if I knew, when I was recording Tapestry, that it would become one of the biggest-selling albums in popular music, or that it would touch so many people.
How could I know that? I was simply doing what I’d always done—recording songs that I had written or cowritten. I was the musical half of the writing team through whom the songs had emerged. I wasn’t in the same league vocally as Aretha Franklin, Joni Mitchell, or Barbra Streisand (whom I considered “real singers”), but I knew how to convey the mood and emotion of a song with an honest, straight-from-the-heart interpretation. If quality of songs and integrity of presentation were factors in Tapestry’s success, so were the timing of its release, an extraordinary confluence of good luck, and the determination of Lou Adler to ensure that the album would be heard by as many people as possible.
Except for my publishing rights, which were owned by Screen Gems, Lou was directly involved with everything I did as a performing artist. He was my manager, record company, and producer. It was Lou who helped select the songs to record, Lou who chose Hank Cicalo to be our recording engineer, and Lou who made sure we got studio time at A&M. With the Carpenters recording in Studio A and Joni Mitchell recording Blue down the hall in Studio C with Henry Lewy engineering, Lou and I would be recording with Hank Cicalo in Studio B.
Seven blocks east, Peter and James were recording Mud Slide Slim and the Blue Horizon at Sunset Sound with Richard Orshoff at the control board. A constant stream of singers, musicians, friends, and family flowed in and out of the recording studios along Sunset Boulevard. At A&M we commuted down the hall. Sometimes we commuted between A&M and Sunset Sound. In New York I would have walked the seven blocks. Now that I was living in Los Angeles, where people thought nothing of driving half a block to buy a newspaper, I adopted a “when in Rome” policy. When I wasn’t working on my own album I drove to Sunset Sound to play as a sideman and sing background on James’s songs. Sometimes I rode over with Kootch, who was playing on both albums. Periodically James came over to A&M to play acoustic guitar and sing background on my record. Physical proximity to me and romantic proximity to James brought Joni’s beautiful voice to both James’s and my albums. Sometimes it seemed as if James and I were recording one massive album in two different studios.
Studio C had a reddish wood Steinway piano that everyone said was really special. One morning I was able to slip in and try that piano out. I couldn’t help but agree; there really was something extraordinary about it. It felt good to play, and its exceptional sound resonated with Lou and Hank as well. Unfortunately, the red Steinway also resonated with Joni and Henry Lewy, which led to Joni and me vying for time in Studio C to record basic tracks. Unknown to me at the time, Hank made several attempts to move the red Steinway into B, but Joni and Henry wouldn’t allow it.
When we learned that Studio C was available one night, we grabbed it. First Charlie and I arrived, then the rest of the rhythm section, then Lou. The band that night consisted of Charlie on electric bass, Joel O’Brien on drums, Danny on guitar, and me at the piano. All of us including Lou milled casually around the coffee machine discussing the relative merits of various Thai restaurants, the new speakers at the Whisky, and which jazz saxophonist currently reigned supreme. We felt no particular sense of urgency until the studio manager came in to inform Lou that we had Studio C for only three hours and then Joni was coming in.
We scrambled to our places in the studio and rehearsed “I Feel the Earth Move.” Hank made a few microphone adjustments and then we began recording. I usually sang during rehearsals but didn’t sing while we were recording a basic track so I could focus on the interplay between my piano and the other instruments. It took no more than three takes for us to get the rhythm track for “I Feel the Earth Move” that is still heard today on the Tapestry album. To suggest an earthquake, I concluded with a continuous cluster of notes on the piano cascading rapidly downward in pitch until the band and I ended the run together on a final C bass note. Later, while mixing, Lou made the executive decision to leave out my earthquake ending. He thought the last thing the public should hear was my voice singing the words “tumblin’ down.” Lou was right to leave the earthquake ending off the album, but in concert I still perform it as originally recorded.
After “I Feel the Earth Move,” Charlie switched to acoustic bass for “You’ve Got a Friend” and “(You Make Me Feel Like A) Natural Woman.” By keeping technical adjustments to a minimum on both tracks, Lou and Hank were able to capture on tape the close musical and personal connection between Charlie and me. We managed to complete three basic tracks before Joni arrived. Rather than putting us under pressure, the knowledge that we had limited time in Studio C had energized us, made us more efficient, and set a towering standard for the rest of the album.
After a few more sessions in B with the rhythm section we completed all the basic tracks and went on to overdubbing vocals, additional keyboards, and a string quartet. Now that we no longer needed Studio C, we were ready to take advantage of what Hank had said all along were the attributes of B. In 2010, Hank shared with me on the phone his recollections of the Tapestry sessions and A&M’s studios:
“We never worked on Tapestry in Studio A. The Carpenters had it locked up. I didn’t like A for you anyway. It was too big. We could never get that intimate feel. And C was too small. B was just the right size. All the great studios in town were the size of B.
“I liked that I could set a mood in B with the lights. And I always put the players where everyone could see each other. Your piano was in the middle of the room, with the drums where you could see them and the drummer could see you. I put everyone around you in a semicircle so everyone could see you because you conducted with your head. I always changed the control room lighting for the mood of the song, and I did the same with the lighting in the studio.”
I never knew any of that.