Tales Of Mystery And Imagination

The Alan Parsons Project was initially just that: a project built for a one-off album recorded for Charisma Records. Parsons, of course, had gained a considerable education at EMI Studios in the late 60s and early 70s, working on such classic albums as The Beatles’ Abbey Road and Pink Floyd’s The Dark Side Of The Moon, even earning a few Grammy Award nominations along the way; and by now, had already lent his appreciable production and engineering skills to many artists, including Pilot, Ambrosia and Al Stewart. Based on the writings of Edgar Allan Poe, Tales Of Mystery And Imagination emerged from Parsons’s partnership with composer and singer Eric Woolfson. The album features a bevy of guests and orchestration from Andrew Powell. “The Raven,” driven by its signature bass line and vocoder vocal, was a minor hit single in the US at No. 80, while “The Tell-Tale Heart” features Arthur Brown’s distinctive vocal—always a treat on any album. The second side contains the “The Fall of the House of Usher” suite: a large scale symphonic instrumental that presents the question, “Is this rock?” The album resides in a musical space between pop and progressive rock that, like Supertramp or Electric Light Orchestra before it, offers a commercial blueprint many progressive artists would follow for the balance of the decade. The album was also a commercial success, rising to the lower reaches of the Top 40 on both sides of the Atlantic. From here, the Project signed to Arista Records and set off to MOR land (predicted here by the closer “To One in Paradise”). Continuing well into the 80s, they racked up a string of Top 20 releases along the way, beginning with the following year’s I Robot.