The Turn of a Friendly Card (1980)
Though both
Eve and
I Robot had explored related themes this was really the first proper concept album from the Alan Parsons Project, based around one of humanity's vices, gambling. All right: their debut,
Tales of Mystery and Imagination, was a concept based on the stories of Edgar Allan Poe, but that was all instrumental, so this is the first chance they got to explore common ideas through the medium of actual songs, rather than just musical passages. The title track is an epic sixteen-minute piece, broken into five sections, and easily the longest APP song ever. The album was also the first to feature Eric Woolfson on vocals, and is far from my favourite APP album, but far from the worst either. Its strength, or weakness, lies in the title track: after all, if you don't like it then that's really about a third of the album you're not going to want to listen to, and while it's good in my opinion it's perhaps not as good as it could have been. The rest of the album is a kind of hit-and-miss affair, with some very good tracks and some, well, not so good ones, as we shall see.
"May Be a Price to Pay" starts us off with synthesised trumpets and a somewhat ominous-sounding fanfare before it comes to life on the back of David Paton's instantly recognisable bassline and swirling keys from Eric Woolfson, uptempo percussion from Stuart Elliot. The vocal is taken by Elmer Gantry, AKA Dave Terry. He has a strong rock style voice, and it is of course and always has been a feature of the Alan Parsons Project that they utilise different vocalists on each album, almost on every track. There's a nice orchestral section which flows into a smooth keyboard line with attendant piano, almost edging into semi-jazz territory for a moment, then the main melody reasserts itself. Of course the guitar work of Ian Bairnson is as always flawless, if not quite as pronounced as expected. A busy keyboard line brings in "Games People Play" with a somewhat more funky feel to it, and the vocal taken by Lenny Zakatek, one of my least favourite APP vocalists, though here he does a decent job. I've just always found him very harsh in style compared to Woolfson, Blunstone or Miles.
The song concerns the desperate need to fill up the time now that the family have grown and moved on, and can be taken I suppose as both a reference to sexual games or to gambling, with the line
"Games people play/ In the middle of the night", though with the theme being centred around the latter one would have to assume the song is about that. Great solo this time from Bairnson as he's allowed to do what he does best, then we drift into the standout of the album, as mentioned the first vocal performance from Eric Woolfson, though it would of course not be the last. "Time" is the ballad on the album, and like the river about which Woolfson sings, it flows along gently on a breezy synth passage and rippling piano. The difference in the vocal from Woolfson and the one from Zakatek is the difference between night and day. Woolfson breathes the song, almost an exhalation, soft, gentle, caressing, and he has the perfect voice to take the album's laidback slow ballad. Again beautiful orchestration accompanies him, supplied by the Orchestra of the Munich Chamber Opera, and really adds an extra touch of class to an already classy song. When Woolfson goes up a register it's just like hearing a male angel sing, and the almost ELO-like violins and cellos just make it perfect. The backing vocal from Parsons himself, singing a separate lyric, adds the final sheen to the last verse.
As "Time" fades down and slips away like the memories of a dying dream, it's rather unfortunate that the mellifluous tones of Woolfson are followed by a return for Zakatek, in the comparatively substandard "I Don't Want to Go Home", which despite its interesting solo piano intro turns into a relatively basic rock song. Although it retains the basic motifs of the APP I just find it quite disappointing, which is not to say that it's a bad song, but it can't hold a candle to "Time" or even "May Be a Price to Pay". Again it's got an element of funk in it, particularly in Bairnson's guitar work, with some nice trumpeting synth. That takes us to the first instrumental, and the APP are known for a few. This more or less introduces us to the title track, and opens with a whistling keyboard intro like something out of an Ennio Moricone western before breaking into a melody which has by now become synonymous with the APP, the bass of Paton joining with the smooth percussion of Elliot and the sparkling keyswork of Woolfson and Parsons, a little sound like fingers clicking and then a sort of saxophone line coming in. As instrumentals go, it's pretty cool.
Sixteen minutes and twenty-four seconds of the title track then closes the album, and you either love this or hate it. It's split into five sections, the first of which is called "The Turn of a Friendly Card Part One" and features Chris Rainbow on vocals, as indeed does most of the piece apart from one section. Opening on a medieval little piano piece it brings in flute and some sparse bass before Rainbow's voice sings the vocal, sounding rather pleasantly like Woolfson, in fact I used to think it was him. He cries
"The game never ends/ When your whole world depends/ On the turn of a friendly card", a theme which will recur later in the song. Nice little laidback acoustic guitar line from Bairnson then a gong sounds and we hear the sounds of a crowd as we move into "Snake Eyes", and things get a little more intense. A big, thick, marching bassline and slow, thumping, almost heartbeat percussion brings in a sharp, swaggering guitar line from Ian Bairnson, the song changing from slow ballad into a more sleazy, shuffle style.
Another fine little guitar solo from Bairnson, more punchy this time, with a descending synth to take us into "The Ace of Swords" which is the instrumental in the piece, played on what sounds like a lyre or lute, and with soft keyboard accompanying it, revisiting the theme from the first movement but then adding in some harder, faster material as the percussion ramps up and the keys get a bit more intense. The trumpeting fanfare makes a return and once it gets going this piece is mostly keyboard-driven with some orchestration helping out. Violins, violas, cellos and harps help to heighten the sense of anticipation and urgency and desperation as the gambler's addiction begins to take him over and he can see no way out. Indeed, eventually he decides there is "Nothing Left to Lose" and this brings us to the fourth section as Eric Woolfson takes the vocal, accompanied by Bairnson. The tempo slows a little; it's not a ballad but it's certainly not a rocker, almost acoustic in ways.
Some nice backing vocals here too, and a ticking bassline that keeps the rhythm going as celtic style keys enter, with something like uileann pipes or somesuch, perhaps an accordion sound there too. Bit of reggae thrown in there before the tempo kicks up again and the melody from "Snake Eyes" comes back in. The final part of the piece is "The Turn of a Friendly Card Part Two", and basically returns to the melody and lyric of the first part, with lush orchestration and Chris Rainbow back on vocals, reprising his role from the opening part, and giving it all he has on the final lyrics. Most of this is instrumental though, with the final two minutes a showcase for Bairnson, Woolfson and the orchestra, fading out magnificently.
TRACK LISTING
1. May Be a Price to Pay
2. Games People Play
3. Time
4. I Don't Wanna Go Home
5. The Gold Bug
6. The Turn of a Friendly Card
(i) The Turn of a Friendly Card Part One
(ii) Snake Eyes
(iii) The Ace of Swords
(iv) Nothing Left to Lose
(v) The Turn of a Friendly Card Part Two
An album with a sixteen-minute track was never going to set the charts alight, and though the APP had their hits it really wasn't till after this album, with their most memorable and successful coming from the
Eye in the Sky album, released two years later. But lack of hit singles didn't keep Parsons down and with the Project he went on to record another six albums before embarking on a solo career under his own name, but basically Alan Parsons Project albums in all but name, with the conspicuous absence of Eric Woolfson, after the two founders had fallen out. Woolfson passed away in 2009.
An ambitious album,
The Turn of a Friendly Card realises its lofty goals more often than it does not, but there are points on the album where it's almost degenerating from high concept into basic rock and I think this is where it lets the listener down. This should have been a fluid, linked piece of music from start to finish and though the title track mostly accomplishes this, it is some of the preceding tracks that prevent this album from gaining a place it might otherwise have deserved within the hierarchy of the Alan Parsons Project's releases.
Rating: 7/10