Tales Of Mystery And Imagination Bethlehem PA

Tales Of Mystery And Imagination

The Alan Parsons Project

Polygram Records, 1976

REVIEW BY: Duke Egbert

ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED: 02/10/2000

Approaching this CD always makes me wonder if I'm to be burnedat the stake for heresy. It's pretty commonly known I'm a huge fanof the work of composer/producer Alan Parsons, and of course thisis the CD that is generally considered to be his greatest work.It's one of the thirty or so CDs that are de riguer for any fan ofprogressive rock to own. It's the only Alan Parsons CD you canstill get at the Columbia Record Club, for gods' sake.

But you know what? It's not the best thing he ever did, byfar.

Tales Of Mystery And Imagination is ambitious, daring, andaudacious for its time. A cycle of music based on the work ofAmerican author Edgar Allan Poe, it includes a sixteen-minute suiteof classical music, spoken introductions by Orson Welles (thisreview is based on the 1987 re-release of the album, which restoredsome tasty guitar licks by Ian Bairnson and the Welles spokenpieces), and some brilliant choral work.

Of course, it also has the Parsons production touch, which meansunlike most progressive rock 'masterpieces' you can actually listento it without slogging through mud. The sound is astonishinglycrisp for a 1976 recording -- as Parsons himself put it in theliner notes to the 1987 version, "it is interesting to note that Tales was originally recorded without the use of such nowcommonplace items as digital reverberators and delays, drummachines, or computer assisted mixing". Given those standards, thestingingly clear sound is even more astonishing.