Alan Parsons Project – Luciferama

Englishman Alan Parsons met Scotsman Eric Woolfson in the canteen of Abbey Road Studios in the summer of 1974. Parsons had already acted as assistant engineer on The Beatles’ Abbey Road and Let It Be, had recently engineered Pink Floyd’s The Dark Side of the Moon, and had produced several acts for EMI Records. Woolfson, a songwriter and composer, was working as a session pianist; he also composed material for a concept album idea based on the work of Edgar Allan Poe.

Parsons asked Woolfson to become his manager and Woolfson managed Parsons’ career as a producer and engineer through a string of successes including Pilot, Steve Harley, Cockney Rebel, John Miles, Al Stewart, Ambrosia and The Hollies. Parsons commented at the time that he felt frustrated in having to accommodate the views of some of the artists, which he felt interfered with his production. Woolfson came up with the idea of making an album based on developments in the film business, where directors such as Alfred Hitchcock and Stanley Kubrick were the focal point of the film’s promotion, rather than individual film stars. If the film business was becoming a director’s medium, Woolfson felt the music business might well become a producer’s medium.

Check out ”Luciferama” by Alan Parsons:
[audio:http://zipyourmix.com/files/2009/11/06-Luciferama.mp3%5D

Buy Luciferama at iTunes:

The Old and the New : Floyd ft Prydz

“Proper Education” is a remix by the Swedish DJ and producer Eric Prydz. The original song by Pink Floyd, “Another Brick in the Wall, Part II”, was remixed to create this song; it has a much more emphasized 4/4 beat than the original song. It made it to number two on the UK Singles Chart and reached number one on the U.S. Billboard Hot Dance Airplay chart in 2007, making it the first remixed recording of an original song to reach the top spot on this chart. On December 8, 2007, the song also received a nomination for best remixed recording at the 2008 Grammy Awards.

httpvhd://www.youtube.com/watch?v=afa-2HErL70&feature=fvst

The music video for this song includes teenagers escaping school while doing parkour stunts and other various actions, like jumping from building to building. They then sneak into a number of apartments and perform energy efficient tasks, such as replacing lightbulbs with their energy efficient equivalent, turning down thermostats, turning off televisions, putting bricks in toilets (to save water) etc. Finally, they tap into the apartment complex’s power grid and power down the whole building, before re-lighting some of the apartments so that the words “SWITCH OFF” appear in lights on the side of the building. The video ends with the words “you don’t need an education to save the planet”.