A Date with Mr. Parsons

Nandita and I went to the One Tree Music Festival at the MMRDA grounds, Bandra last evening to watch an old favorite band of mine, the Alan Parsons Project or APP as we love to call them.

The last I had heard them was their new album, A Valid Path, which did sound a bit different and more electronic than the usual Parsons fare. Also, whilst earlier Parson Project albums were woven around a theme, say Gaudi based on the life of Antoni Gaudi or Turn of a Friendly Card based on the casino/gambler theme or Freudiana based on Sigmund Freud or Tales of Mystery and Imagination based on E A Poe (see album review below), A Valid Path had no discernable theme (or I probably missed it) and also contained a couple of old Parson tunes remixed. Left me a tad unsatisfied.

This did not however stop me from going there anyways and I was not disappointed. I loved every bit of the music they played and it was truly soul-gratifying to sing along to the more sentimental ballads with a tear in my eye. I had a fair bit of throat and chest congestion but that did not stop me from crooning to the tunes and lyrics, which I knew every single one of. Ah, well, the power of music and an intriguing idea.

The Alan Parsons Live Project opened with the haunting instrumental I Robot before moving onto more vocal tracks including old favourites – Don’t Answer Me, Prime Time, Old and Wise, Psychobabble, I Wouldn’t Wanna Be Like You, Don’t Let It Show, La Sagrada Familia, The Raven, Time, Damned If I Do and Eye in the Sky, interspersed with the familiar instrumental pieces – MammaGamma, Sirius and a couple of others I cannot seem to recall. On the lead vocals, by himself – P J Olsen – was certainly very good and did hit the high notes but throughout the concert performance, I could not help compare him with those two geniuses who lent their voices to APP – Eric Woolfson and Lenny Zapatek.

Bass and backing vocals – John Montana and lead guitarist – Godfrey Townsend were fantastic to hear as well as the drummer, ** Murphy (did not quite catch his first name).

The man himself was, ummm, “good” almost bordering on an OK. Now do not get me wrong here. I loved what they played, very bit of it but you see, unlike most live concerts that I have been to – Uriah Heep last year same venue or Buddy Guy at the NCPA or the several that I have attended overseas, there was simply no crowd connect. It was like a “Hi, we’re glad to be in Mumbai” accompanied by the mandatory wolf whistles and show of hands from the crowd and another jewel, “My wife and I were in ummm Karela, err Cochin” Poor man, he meant Kerala. But that was it. No audience reach out at all!!!

And the other brickbats. The only aspect that I sorely missed in the live performance was the famous saxaphone melody that is usually interspersed with and is an essential part of most of APP’s instrumental works. This was poorly substituted by the use of synthesiser music I thought.

I also absolutely disliked the pedantic sales outfit that Parsons briefly donned in the midst of his performance. I mean, extolling the virtues of the remastered albums with “bonus” “never heard before” tracks and reminding us that A Valid Path is available by mail order on the parsons website or oh-so gently telling us that the new double disc, The Essential Alan Parsons” is an absolute must have – pathetic, totally pathetic. Mr. Parsons, I love listening to you and your music, which is why I own all your albums. But, if I may politely remind you, as someone from the Grateful Dead, I think it was Bob Weir, remarked, “We don’t care. Fans listen to our music and if they like it, they’ll go out and buy us anyways”. Full marks to GD. I cannot blame Parsons fully as well. He must have been mouthing that script off something the record label producers wrote up. Poor bloke.

All in all, a performance ranking 6/10 in my score card. Anyways, one more concert notched up on the rack.

Cheers
S

PS: The list of concerts I’ve attended in my livetime soon to be posted on the blog