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BIZARRE: Alan parsons | Mind Blowing Facts

We explore the enigma of the Alan Parsons Project on the cover of the new issue of Prog, on sale now!

Plus Phil Collins, Supertramp, Popol Vuh, The Anchoress, Dave Greenslade, Dee Palmer, Phideaux, Sleeping Pulse, Plini, Jarboe, Ian Neal, Prince Of Failure and more...

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“The only way to keep it in time was to take a piece of tape with the sound on it and measure it with a ruler. You would take the exact length of tape and then splice the next exact length of tape to it”: How Pink Floyd made Money

How this unmistakable Dark Side of the Moon classic, which started life in a garden shed, works

MusicRadar

“I was obsessed with him at school – it didn’t help with the girls! Because of him I got my first guitar, so he’s got a lot to answer for”: The prog hero who links The Pineapple Thief’s Bruce Soord to Pink Floyd and The Beatles

Soord’s inspiration comes from a man who made his name in the studio before releasing a series of acclaimed concept records in his own right

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"It has never ceased to amaze me how much use that one tune gets." The story of Sirius, the dramatic prog anthem played at every World Cup game

The Alan Parsons Project's instrumental Sirius is one of the most famous pieces of music in sport – but its writers don't get the recognition they deserve

Louder

“I can visualise sitting at the lovely black Steinway piano. I was playing on it one day, and this song came to me”: How Paul McCartney created his greatest post-Beatles song

“He did the whole thing, start to finish, every instrument, everything, in a day”

MusicRadar

“Just the quirky 7/8 time reminds me of Roger. It’s not a song I would have written. It points itself at Roger”: The classic track from The Dark Side Of The Moon that gave Pink Floyd their first US hit

“We created a 4/4 progression for the guitar solo and made the poor saxophone player play in 7/4”

MusicRadar

"Highly listenable background music." The Alan Parsons Project bake up the ear candy on Eye In The Sky like punk, NWOBHM and new wave pop rock never happened

Alan Parsons' most commercially successful album bore fruit with the sports anthem Sirius and the hits Eye In The Sky and Old And Wise

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Debate: What was the best prog album of 1976?

Punk might have been on the rise but Rush, Genesis, Jon Anderson, Van der Graaf Generator, Kansas, Alan Parsons, Camel and Soft Machine released records that became all-time greats. But which one is your favourite – and why?

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"What a strange time we live in, when an imposter can write a tune, or have a toaster write it for him": People are pretending to be Alan Parsons and he's not happy about it

Alan Parsons is merely the latest victim of an artist impersonation scam

Louder

Cool new proggy sounds from The Ocean, Alex Henry Foster, The Hirsch Effekt and more in Prog's brand new Tracks Of The Week

Mega new prog to hear from Jaime, N2O, The Chemistry Set, Massimo Pieretti and more in this week's Tracks Of The Week

Louder

“If I’d put a live act together we’d have conquered the world. But it was a fear I had – what does a record producer do onstage? It was unfounded. We should have done it”: Studio veteran reveals big regret to a fan who’s now a big name himself

The Pink Floyd collaborator thought his career would last two years. But in the past five decades he’s had surprise hits, overreacted to a myth about tape, and made colleagues believe his ideas had been their own

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“There was a sense of humour. We were taken very seriously by the world at large, but there was always an edge of fun”: The grimness of Pink Floyd’s Wish You Were Here may have been overstated

1975 album remains a fan favourite – and despite their struggle to make it, the band insist the spirit of love shines through the grief and anger amid the theme of absence and their feelings about Syd Barrett

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"It's huge over most of the world. I hear it everywhere I go": How a Steve Harley song that dissed his bandmates became an all-time classic

Written as a dig at the band members who quit because Steve Harley wanted to do all the writing himself, Make Me Smile (Come Up And See Me) became a timeless hit

Louder

New reissue of The Alan Parsons Project's I Robot to be released in October

The Alan Parsons Project's I Robot is to be reissued on CD, vinyl and as a five-disc limited edition Super Deluxe box set

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"Adheres largely to the blueprint of its warmly received predecessor." Alan Parsons' From The New World

Former Project man releases his sixth studio album under his name alone

MusicRadar

“She opened her mouth, and out came that orgasmic sound we know and love”: How a feat of spontaneous creativity resulted in one of Pink Floyd’s most majestic moments

A gentle meditation on mortality was brought to passionate life thanks to one woman’s improvised vocal

MusicRadar

NAMM 2025: "The Alan Parsons Plugin Project" - PSP Audioware helps the legendary engineer to recreate the famous Wobbler effect that he used on Pink Floyd's The Dark Side Of The Moon

“It’s a much more controllable and deeper effect than any phaser I’ve ever heard,” says Parsons

Guitar World

“The first big gig for Starship was opening for Skynyrd in Florida in front of like 30,000 people. I had all these note-for-note solos, going, ‘God, I hope I nail these!’” Alastair Greene played sideman to rock greats –before he came back to the blues

The guitarist recalls the stress of his no rehearsal debut for Starship, learning lessons from Robin Trower and growing up with Seymour Duncan

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Guitar World

“Everyone knows Take My Breath Away, the chart-topping ballad from Top Gun. But there’s a good chance you haven’t heard this seven-minute anthem”: David Gilmour's 10 greatest guitar guest appearances, from folk legend Roy Harper to Paul McCartney

There are occasions when your track needs something. It could be more cowbell. Or it could be the services of David Gilmour. Over the years, the former Pink Floyd man has dropped magic on a number of guest spots, but these are his finest

Louder

Jon Anderson graces the cover of the new issue of Prog, which is on sale now!

Plus IQ, Alan Parsons Project, Leprous, Pure Reason Revolution, Meer, Dave Foster Band and loads more...

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"Meticulously unravelling the album's complexities": The Alan Parsons Project's Pyramid, decompiled and recompiled

Taking the pyramid to pieces

Guitar World

“Ian broke his wrist. We took him to the hospital and he got a cast put on. And we knew the session was coming up…” Up close with the 1974 Les Paul Custom that Ian Bairnson used to play the solo on Kate Bush’s Wuthering Heights – with his arm in a cast

When he tracked Wuthering Heights, Bairnson had a broken wrist, his arm in plaster, but as Pilot bandmate David Paton says, that wouldn't stop a man like him

MusicRadar

“There was half a bass note that got chopped. That was my fault. Nobody noticed, though. I think I got away with it!”: Alan Parsons on engineering the side 2 medley on The Beatles’ Abbey Road

“Every day I walked up those famous Abbey Road steps and opened the door felt like I was stepping into a magic kingdom," he tells us. "There really is something very special about that building”

Guitar World

“He had an incredibly clean technique, which was very, very rare. I’ve never found it in any other guitar player”: Alan Parsons on why late Project and Kate Bush guitarist Ian Bairnson was unlike any guitarist he’d ever encountered

Parsons played alongside Bairnson as part of the Alan Parsons Project, and witnessed the late session legend's flawless technique up close

Louder

“Nobody was more surprised than I was when we started doing it, and today it’s my main activity”: Perfect but unplanned timing sent the Alan Parsons Project touring galaxies far, far away with I Robot

When their second album arrived alongside Star Wars in 1977, the dream-come-true coincidence changed their career path

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