To Telepath Messages

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On October 8, 1977 The Carpenters entered the Billboard Hot 100 charts with their whacked out cover of Klaatu's "Calling Occupants of Interplanetary Craft". Although it begins with the sounds of radio DJ taking a request from an alien caller, the songs is performed with a great deal of earnestness and 160 musicians. Star Wars had been the #1 movie of the year and Close Encounters of a Third Kind would hit movie theaters in a month so a song supposedly written for "World Contact Day" couldn't have been timed better. It topped the Irish charts and went top 10 in the U.K. and Canada while stalling at US#62.

Here's what Richard Carpenter said about the song;

"I heard this song on Canadian group Klaatu's debut album and couldn't resist recording it. (Lyrics such as these don't come along every day!) Peter Knight penned the creative orchestration to my arrangement. In addition to the guitar work, (longstanding Carpenters guitarist) Tony Peluso reprises his role as a befuddled D.J. This performance must be fairly convincing for following its release, we received numerous letters wanting to know when in fact, World Contact Day was scheduled."