Alan Parsons and his Project were a big name in prog rock back in the ’70s and now Parsons is coming up with a luxurious box set of his 1978 album Pyramid often ranked as one of the classics of the genre.
The Pyramid set will be released on August 23, 2024, and will feature more than 50 previously unreleased tracks, and will come as an expanded CD and a vinyl release, features an audio Blu-ray and a seven-inch single, and boasts the first-ever Dolby Atmos mix of an Alan Parsons Project album, a 5.1 Surround Sound mix from the original multi-track master tapes by Parsons himself, a new stereo HD and CD remaster of the original album by Miles Showell, plus a fully illustrated, 12” x 12” 60-page casebound book and a replica press folder.
The 12″ x 12″ book offers interviews with Alan Parsons, the Woolfson family and the musicians/lead vocalists as well as full lyrics and commentary on the bonus tracks. The replica original press folder contains an A1 sized poster and postcard of the album artwork plus a reproduction of the original biography, press photo and a hand typed ‘Prologue’ and ‘Preamble’ about the Pyramid album by Eric Woolfson.
As its title implies, the two-million-plus selling, Grammy-nominated Pyramid was a concept album focusing on the pyramids of Giza (interest in pyramid power and Tutankhamun was widespread in the US and the UK at the time of release). A pyramid featured on the back of a dollar bill, and there were stories in the national media about the supposed magical properties of pyramids and there was, of course, the cover of Pink Floyd’s Dark Side Of The Moon, which Parsons had engineered.
It was recorded at Abbey Road Studios with a variety of different lead vocalists employed including John Miles, Colin Blunstone, Lenny Zakatek, David Paton, Jack Harris and Dean Ford. Musicians included guitarist Ian Bairnson and drummer Stuart Elliott with arrangements by Andrew Powell (all three contributed to Kate Bush’s debut The Kick Inside, released only three months before Pyramid).
You can pre-order The Alan Parsons Project’s Pyramid (Super Deluxe Edition) here.
