“Karen, she was gifted, and so she could not only sing beautifully whil...” — Richard Carpenter Quote

Karen, she was gifted, and so she could not only sing beautifully while playing the drums, she did it all. So that's four things going on just with the drums, you know? Both feet and both hands, and then on top of it she was singing.

Our demo was played for any number of different A&R men at different labels and it was turned down.

So many writers hated us because we represented mainstream America. Forget the music, they just didn't like the idea of us.

Karen had been a little overweight as a teenager - she loved tacos and chili. But we never teased her - to us, she wasn't that fat. When she was 17, she went on the Stillman Diet with a doctor's guidance, and she lost between 20 and 25 pounds.

I went to department stores, and there was nothing that I really loved. All the shoes were too complicated, too crazy, too ridiculous, too extreme. The platforms were so high; the shoes were so ugly, covered in crystals and feathers and crap. I just thought, 'Maybe somebody wants a beautifully simple, sexy shoe that they can actually walk in.'

This will be our reply to violence: to make music more intensely, more beautifully, more devotedly than ever before.

I think Bridge Over Troubled Water was a very good song. Artie sang it beautifully. The Boxer was a really nice record. But I don't think I've written any great songs.

In fact, looking at the darkest sides of the United States has only made me appreciate the things that we do right, the things that we do beautifully. We are, for all of our mistakes and all of our crimes, a remarkable place.