The Turn Of A Friendly Card Arkansas

The Turn Of A Friendly Card

The Alan Parsons Project

Arista Records, 1980

REVIEW BY: Jeff Clutterbuck

ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED: 09/17/2006

To be honest, I’m not quite sure why the Alan Parsons Project doesn’t get more play around Casa De Clutterbuck.

Whenever one of their songs or albums gets played, I marvel at the production and their overall strength, since they had perfected a progressive pop sound that converted prog-rock bands like Genesis and Yes couldn't quite reach in the 1980s. Now, fellow reviewer Duke Egbert is probably going to strangle me in my sleep for simplifying the matter thusly, but it’s the truth.

Maybe it was the eye-pleasing album cover of Card which I love, or the album’s theme of gambling -- which to my knowledge really has not been covered much in popular music -- but something about the record called to me. So when I had the opportunity to pick up the vinyl for a few bucks at the local used bookstore, I couldn’t pass it up.

Ok, so maybe The Turn Of A Friendly Card is a weak concept album. After giving it multiple spins, I got the sense that Parsons and Woolfson were forcing the matter. Hell, the entire first side could have placed on any other non-concept album and the songs would have worked. That being said, the first four numbers are rather good.