Alan Parsons Project - I Robot

The second of former Beatles/Pink Floyd engineer Parsons' long string of prog-rock concept albums was also his commercial breakthrough, spawning an unlikely but catchy hit in "I Wouldn't Want to Be Like You." In addition to that tune are other Project faves such as "Breakdown," "Don't Let It Show," and "Day After Day (The Show Must Go On." The ambitiously elaborate 1977 album--according to the liner notes, a meditation on "the rise of the machine and the decline of man"--boasts the sonic wizardry and immaculate musicianship that would become the Project's trademark through the '80s, and features an array of guest vocalists, including Hollies frontman Allan Clarke and Cockney Rebel leader Steve Harley. --Scott Schinder Amazon.com essential recording

Alan Parsons Project - Science Fiction Rock

Alan Parsons was best known as the producer / engineer on Pink Floyd's magnum opus "Dark Side Of The Moon". He had also worked on albums by The Beatles and Al Stewart. Along with his songwriting partner Eric Wolfson Parson's formed the Alan Parsons project in 1977 releasing their first album "Tales Of Mystery And Imagination" an adaptation of the works of Edgar Allan Poe. The "Project" had mostly stable cast of musicians with a revolving roster of vocalists. "I Robot" was a concept album about "the rise of the machine and the decline of man" (from the liner notes). This is great stuff and probably one of the band's best albums. It was also the disc that brought them to a level of commercial success with the single "I Wouldn't Want To Be Like You". The album flows together with instrumental and vocal tracks filled with electronics and keyboards that were state of the art at the time. The album really is similar to Pink Floyd in spots especially on the excellent "Show Must Go On". As I have seen others mention this would make a great soundtrack for a science fiction film. Sonically the album still sounds fantastic. The version I have has not been remastered yet it sounds incredible on a good stereo system. The album may sound a bit dated today, but it remains one of my favorite discs of the 70's. December 5, 2007

A Still Relevant Classic

Yes, still relevant after all these years and well worth adding to your CD collection to replace that dusty LP. If you are too young to know what an LP is, then you should buy this disk to find out what good music is about. Alan Parsons is a giant in the music industry (albeit mostly as producer), and this is unquestionably the Project's finest hour. March 7, 2007

A Milestone For Seventies Rock...

Alan Parsons' claim to fame is probably a tossup between producing Pink Floyd's Dark Side Of The Moon, one of rock music's defining albums, and his own impressive catalog under the somewhat deceptive title of Alan Parsons Project (this was more than a bunch of session buddies getting together). Among the Project albums, I Robot is arguably the most original and fully realized. With an all star cast of talent, it couldn't help but be successful and stands as one of the more if not most significant rock albums of the late seventies. Every song is insidiously memorable and the album as a whole flows beautifully from beginning to end. Parsons followed this formula on subsequent albums with mixed results. For better or worse, they tended toward predictability even if they were still immensely enjoyable (The Turn of a Friendly Card and Eye in the Sky are excellent albums), but I Robot had the advantage of taking everyone by surprise as did Pink Floyd's masterpiece. On that level it's hard to separate the two. If you own one of them, chances are you own the other. If not, you should. November 10, 2006

Vintage Alan Parsons. Still hits the spot

I had this on vinyl (it's still in the basement) and decided that the Alan Parsons Greatest Hits CD just didn't have every thing I wanted to hear. At this stage in my life, "Wouldn't Want to be like You" is an anthem toward corporate greed. Whether Alan Parsons intended it that way or not is superficial to me. Good clean recording. I'm probably going to go after all the other APP cds now. This was the god (thats God with a little g ) of studio groups in the late 70's to the 80's. The only reason I give it 4 instead of 5 is that, like so many others that made the transition from vinyl, it's just to darned short a recording. Oh well... November 5, 2006

What about the DVD audio ???

Ok, the question is: since this is only a STEREO DVD audio, would you need to upgrade, if you own the CD already?.
The answer is YES, for TWO reasons.
1) We haven't been favored with a REMASTERED version of the Parsons catalog (with the exception of the first record, 'Tales of mystery and imagination'). The GREATEST HITS package did improved the songs through remastering, but the individual CD's, like this one, are still as they were first released almost 20 years ago. So little attention has been put on them by the record company, that it was really a miracle that these records were released as CD's at all.
2) Even the remastered version wouldn't compete with the final product contained in this DVD Audio. Since it's a DVD, it's meant to bring a higher quality of sound than the CD could ever possible deliver.
This DVD is double sided. One side plays on DVD AUDIO players, the other on normal DVD players. If you don't know the difference, it's just that originally, the DVD AUDIO was designed as a special product to be played by specific players that could read a higher standard of audio, just like Super Audio CD's are designed to be played by special players.
To hear the quality of this DVD (or any other DVD audio available) at its best, you'd need a DVD AUDIO player. You'd notice that the improvement is amazing. The sound is clearer. The treble is polished, the bass and drums enhanced (David Patton must be very happy that his bass is more distinguishable here). The overall effect is a sharper and fuller sound that you won't ever be able to get from a CD.
If you own a conventional DVD player, the effect will be of a lesser quality, but still a great improvement over the conventional CD sound.
Both sides present PCM stereo sound (not encoded Dolby Digital) which ensures a purer, unaltered sound. For those for whom these numbers mean something, the DVD Audio side is PCM 24/192 sampling, the other side is PCM 24/96.
That it's not multi channel might be a put down for some, but I guess that would be only for those who haven't had a chance to ever hear how a stereo DVD sounds. Whatever, it's what's available now, until something better comes out, if ever.
Unlike other DVD Audio's available, the format of this one is very simple, not including videos or special materials, just a screen showing the song that it's being played.
The booklet includes the lyrics and original information of the album, spread in 8 colored pages, more faithful to the original LP album art. As simple as it is, it's more presentable than the one page booklet that originally accompanied the CD.
NOTE: in this DVD AUDIO format, "Turn of a friendly card" and "Eye in the sky" were also issued.

2007 UPDATE: This year we saw the release of most of the Alan Parsons remastered catalog on CD, It's been a great improvement over the original publications, with very neat and informative booklets, inclusion of extra tracks (mostly demo and alternate versions) and polished sound. But just in case you are wondering, the sound is still bound by the limits of CD. As I said before, there's no way you will get the same quality than from a DVD Audio. June 9, 2006

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