The Alan Parsons Project I ROBOT Cooking Vinyl 180 gram Half-Speed Mastered MINT

$

35

The Alan Parsons Project I ROBOT 180 gram Half-Speed Mastered MINT

Label:

Cooking Vinyl – COOKLP841

Format:

Vinyl, LP, Album, Limited Edition, Half-Speed Mastered, Stereo, Gatefold, 180 gram

Country:

UK, Europe & US

Released:

2022

Genre:

Rock

Style:

Prog Rock, Symphonic Rock, Art Rock
Tracklist: A1 I Robot Written-By – Parsons*, Woolfson* 6:06 A2 I Wouldn't Want To Be Like You Written-By – Parsons*, Woolfson* 3:19 A3 Some Other Time Written-By – Parsons*, Woolfson* 4:05 A4 Breakdown Written-By – Parsons*, Woolfson* 3:50 A5 Don't Let It Show Written-By – Parsons*, Woolfson* 4:21 B1 The Voice Written-By – Parsons*, Woolfson* 5:21 B2 Nucleus Written-By – Parsons*, Woolfson* 3:35 B3 Day After Day (The Show Must Go On) Written-By – Parsons*, Woolfson* 3:43 B4 Total Eclipse Written-By – Powell* 3:05 B5 Genesis Ch.1, V.32 Written-By – Parsons*, Woolfson* 3:37

• Recorded At – Abbey Road Studios
• Mixed At – Abbey Road Studios
• Half-Speed Mastered At – Abbey Road Studios
• Lacquer Cut At – Abbey Road Studios
• Manufactured By – Cooking Vinyl

• Arranged By, Conductor – Andrew Powell
• Backing Vocals – Hilary Western, John Perry (7), Smokey Parsons, Stuart Calver, Tony Rivers
• Bass, Guitar, Backing Vocals – David Paton
• Chorus – The New Philharmonia Chorus*, The English Chorale
• Cimbalom, Kantele – John Leach
• Drums, Percussion, Backing Vocals – Stuart Tosh
• Executive-Producer, Keyboards, Synthesizer, Vocoder, Backing Vocals – Eric Woolfson
• Guitar, Backing Vocals – Ian Bairnson
• Guitar, Keyboards, Synthesizer, Vocoder, Backing Vocals – Alan Parsons
• Keyboards – Duncan Mackay
• Steel Guitar – B. J. Cole*
• Vocals – Allan Clarke, Dave Townsend, Jack Harris, Jaki Whitren, Lenny Zakatek, Peter Straker, Steve Harley
• Half-Speed Mastered By – Miles Showell

- Limited Edition 180gm heavyweight vinyl LP
- Featuring a half speed remaster by Miles Showell at Abbey Road Studios

© The Alan Parsons Project 2022

• Matrix / Label (Side A): COOKLP-841
• Matrix / Label (Side B): COOKLP-841
• Matrix / Runout (Side A): MILES.ABBEYROAD1/2SPEED.ROOM30 243180E1 1239381
• Matrix / Runout (Side B): MILES.ABBEYROAD1/2SPEED.ROOM30 243180E2 1234635

     Alan Parsons delivered a detailed blueprint for his Project on their 1975 debut, Tales of Mystery and Imagination, but it was on its 1977 follow-up, I Robot, that the outfit reached its true potential. Borrowing not just its title but concept from Isaac Asimov's classic sci-fi Robot trilogy, this album explores many of the philosophies regarding artificial intelligence -- will it overtake man, what does it mean to be man, what responsibilities do mechanical beings have to their creators, and so on and so forth -- with enough knotty intelligence to make it a seminal text of late-'70s geeks, and while it is also true that appreciating I Robot does require a love of either sci-fi or art rock, it is also true that sci-fi art rock never came any better than this. Compare it to Jeff Wayne's War of the Worlds, released just a year after this and demonstrating some clear influence from Parsons: that flirts voraciously with camp, but this, for all of its pomp and circumstance, for all of its overblown arrangements, this is music that's played deadly serious. Even when the vocal choirs pile up at the end of "Breakdown" or when the Project delves into some tight, glossy white funk on "The Voice," complete with punctuations from robotic voices and whining slide guitars, there isn't much sense of fun, but there is a sense of mystery and a sense of drama that can be very absorbing if you're prepared to give yourself over to it. The most fascinating thing about the album is that the music is restless, shifting from mood to mood within the course of a song, but unlike some art pop there is attention paid to hooks -- most notably, of course, on the hit "I Wouldn't Want to Be Like You," a tense, paranoid neo-disco rocker that was the APP's breakthrough. It's also the closest thing to a concise pop song here -- other tunes have plenty of hooks, but they change their tempo and feel quickly, which is what makes this an art rock album instead of a pop album. And while that may not snare in listeners who love the hit (they should turn to Eye in the Sky instead, the Project's one true pop album), that sense of melody when married to the artistic restlessness and geeky sensibility makes for a unique, compelling album and the one record that truly captures mind and spirit of the Alan Parsons Project. Allmusic