Tales Of Mystery And Imagination Prog Immortalised by Homer Simpson as ‘some sort of hovercraft’, The Alan Parsons Project created classic prog albums even while defying the conventions of what constituted a band in the first place. As an in-house engineer at Abbey Road Studios, ’ place in prog history was assured when he worked on ’s . With credits that included ’ , Parsons was right at the forefront of what could be accomplished in the recording studio; and his expertise was much in demand in the 70s when he worked with Paul McCartney, The Hollies and Cockney Rebel, to name just three.
Not content with just being an engineer and producer, Parsons teamed up with songwriter Eric Woolfson to form the Project and provide a platform for their musical ideas. Joined by a host of guest musicians, the duo released their debut album, , in 1976, inspired by the writings of Edgar Allan Poe. It impressed Clive Davis sufficiently to sign them to Arista Records for their follow up, , which took its name and concept from the science fiction writings of Isaac Asimov.
“I wasn’t familiar with his work – it was really Eric that instigated the thing,” says Parsons about the inspiration behind the album. “I certainly was a science fiction fan – I used to read short stories quite a bit; although I wasn’t really much of a reader; never was, probably never will be. I read cover to cover once the idea came up and I thought it was great.
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