Since I'm dropping in double reviews on all these threads that I can, and since there are only two albums left to do here (I won't be featuring the solo Eric Woolfson material as I have never heard it) let's finish up this thread in terms of reviews, and we get going with the last album to be released under the actual Alan Parsons Project banner.
Gaudi (1987)
A triumphant end to a great career which, if not exactly littered with hit singles, did ensure over the decade or so of its existence that people would know the name Alan Parsons Project (though Homer seemed to believe it was some sort of hovercraft!),
Gaudi is not really what I would call a concept album, in much the same way as
2112 is not: side one is, side two is not. On this bookend to their career, the APP write about Antoni Gaudi (it's pronounced as in rowdy, not bawdy , in case you were wondering, though they confirm that on the album), the 15th century Spanish architect responsible for the unfinished cathedral,
La Sagrada Familia in Barcelona, and that's where we start, with the title track.
There's a slow, atmospheric, almost ambient introduction with church bells (appropriately) and a voiceover explaining about the cathedral in question before tinkly keyboard introduces John Miles as he takes us into the mind of the architect and back into fifteenth century Spain, when much of Europe was at war. It is, I think, a song about following your dreams and having faith, but knowing Parsons and Woolfson, that may not be it. About three minutes into it almost nine-minute run it explodes on powerful percussion and guitar as Miles delivers the lines with energy and aggression, almost in an operatic style. Then we get the familia(r) (sorry) APP motif as the song takes off. Great keys driving this, sort of almost like bells themselves, and fine orchestral arrangement.
What I've described before I think as the “Parsons March” is well in evidence here, and the song is their longest since the suite on
The Turn of a Friendly Card, and if you discount that as being a suite, which it is, then this is their longest ever song at eight and three quarter minutes. Some really expressive guitar from Ian Bairnson, effective vocals from the English Chorale Choir, the song slipping into a slower groove, returning basically to the original opening before rising again on the back of both powerful vocals and thundering percussion.
Sharp guitar and bass from new guy Laurie Cottle (yes, he's Richard's brother, brought in to replace the departed David Paton) and once again a very “Eye in the Sky” style melody is brought to life by the return of Lenny Zakatek, and to be fair, I've given him some stick but either the guy has learned to tone it down and sing better or he's just being given better material to work with, as here he doesn't annoy me at all. In fact I quite enjoy his performance on “Too Late”, which is, I think I can safely say, not part of the concept (though I suppose it could be stretched to encompass it in some way, but I don't think so). A fine solo by Bairnson and a final impressive vocal from Lenny in his farewell performance, and we're into the the first of two ballads.
I feel this could be included as being part of the Gaudi story, but I'm not sure if it's meant to be. The idea of being “Closer to Heaven” does fit in with that theme, but I'm not quite convinced. I think this is more just a basic love song, but either way it's the penultimate performance with Alan for Eric Woolfson, attended by soft gentle piano and evoking some very tranquil imagery –
”Bird that is flying so high and so free” and
”A ship that is sailing way out to the sea”. I hear echoes of “Old and Wise” here, and I suppose in some ways they were never really able to shake off the shadow of
Eye in the Sky, but this is a lovely song. That said, this is an album with not one single bad track on it. No sir. Not one.
A beautiful sax solo takes the song halfway through, as Richard Cottle shows his brother how well he's integrated into the band and it's Mel who? The slow, bouncing percussion merges well with the rising sax notes which then slides into a truly beautiful guitar solo from Bairnson before Woolfson comes back in with the vocal. Another new vocalist, Geoff Barradale, takes the first really rocky song, again one of my favourites (like most of the tracks on this album) and “Standing on Higher Ground” had, I think, single potential but was not released. At a running time of just over five minutes maybe it was too long, and cutting it down would have been a crime, so maybe it's just as well. Bouncy keyboard opens the song, joined by hopping, thumping percussion and hard guitar riffs, and the boys have found another gem of a singer, perhaps too late. I love the hook in this song, and I love the bridge to the verse. I have no idea what it's about, but given the title who knows? Maybe it's also to do with Gaudi as he designs his cathedral.
The guitar solo in this is really special, and does Bairnson credit, as the impassioned vocal at the end confirms that Barradale could have been a great asset to the Alan Parsons Project, but this is approaching its end now. One more rocker before we get serious, and while “Money Talks” is hardly a new concept, and mostly retreads Floyd's idea from 1973, this is a fun song, vocal taken by John Miles, who shows he can rock out when it's needed. The lyrical matter needs no explanation, as lines like
”Money don't come with a guarantee/It Make a fool of you, it make a fool of me” and
Money don't lose, money gain/ Drags you down like a ball and chain” make clear enough what the message is. The guitar is biting, sharp, almost sarcastic as Bairnson hammers out the riffs, and Laurie Cottle lays down a super little bass line. There's also a nod, again, back to the gambler in “The Turn of a Friendly Card” when Miles sings
”It's heads you lose and it's tails they win.” Indeed. There's even a clever little bit of vocoder work for the final two lines,
”Money talks.”
But now it's time to relax and return to the real story of Antoni Gaudi as we move into the second ballad, the sumptuous “Inside Looking Out”, which features the last ever performance from Eric Woolfson on an Alan Parsons Project album, and it's a real standout. Beautiful laid back harmonies, orchestral arrangements, choral vocals, you just feel yourself drifting as his voice washes over you, rising over the low roofs of Barcelona and floating up to the clouds. There's another voiceover near the end over some superb Spanish guitar by Bairnson as the song just not so much ends as fades away, sighing into the distance, leaving us with the joyful sound of church bells taking us directly into one last instrumental in “Paseo de Gracia” which almost brings us back to the debut album in ways, and reprises the opening of “La Sagrada Familia” as this wonderful, and final, album from the Alan Parsons Project closes the book on more than ten years of superb and mostly underappreciated music.
TRACK LISTING
La Sagrada Familia
Too Late
Closer to Heaven
Standing on Higher Ground
Money Talks
Inside Looking Out
Paseo de Gracia
Although this album was virtually ignored by the charts, it's somewhat gratifying to see that not only did it enter the Spanish charts, but got to number one! Obviously that's mostly due to some sort of national pride, for what British band (or band outside Spain) ever wrote an album about a Spanish architect? So it was possibly the name, or curiosity as to what it could be about that had those Spanish record-buyers putting their hands in their pockets, but in a way it's peculiarly appropriate that the last APP album should be most appreciated in the country about which it was written. Everyone else had forgotten them by now – fans excepted of course – and they were doomed to sink into obscurity. Even Alan's solo career saw no hit singles, and though Eric's later musicals were very successful, again no chart positions for any of the albums he released on his own or even with the remnants of the Alan Parsons Project.
But if nothing else it was a bold move to end their career (if they knew it was ending) by choosing to cover a subject they knew would earn them little praise from, or have much interest for, their mostly British audience, but did it anyway. In some ways, I think that's what the Alan Parsons Project was all about
: making music they enjoyed and could look back on with pride. Sure, hit singles were great and Alan has admitted he and Eric tried to write them, but in the end I think perhaps the words of John Miles's most famous song apply here: music was my first love, and it will be my last.
And so it was.
Rating: 10/10