I Wouldn't Want to be Like You
The Alan Parsons Project comment on society
The Alan Parsons Project, created by engineer/producer Alan Parsons and songwriter/manager Eric Woolfson, was all about experimentation. This track from 1977 uses the most current synth technology of the time and melds it with progressive rock. Lenny Zakatek takes the lead vocals here (there was a rotating group of vocalists with the band) and it was the first single off of the second album, I Robot.1 It features a funk groove and some great guitar work from Ian Bairnson.
The lyrics talk about finding authenticity in a world of conformity. The cool twist to this idea is that it’s a robot talking.2 And in extending the conversation almost 50 years later, I found 3 articles in the last month that go deep into talking about the meaning of the song and I can’t shake the feeling they were mostly written by AI. Considering one of the album themes was looking at the dangers of uncontrolled development of artificial intelligence, it’s pretty prescient.
What’s special about this video is that it’s the only one that Alan Parsons appears in. He spars with a humanoid, playing cat and mouse until he is finally able to destroy his adversary. Keep in mind music videos weren’t a thing yet. This was designed to be a film highlighting the concept of the album.
Enjoy your song of the day!
Yes, it was inspired by Asimov’s novel of the same name. They spoke to Asimov directly and he was excited by the concept of the album.
This is the prog concept of the album, looking at humanity from the perspective of robots, which was different of the themes of how much humans are pre-programmed and the dangers of uncontrolled AI.
Cool stuff, MK! Ian Bairnson, former Pilot (Parsons produced their first coupla albums....first, anyway)! Bairnson passed away just last April at 69. I was trying to remember the reason for music videos from the late '70s. Promo, obviously, but there were precious few places to play them for promotional purposes. They were certainly produced to show label staffers, especially the promo guys'n'gals to better understand the product, and to help decide which radio stations they'd push a single to. They'd also get played at regional and national label meetings and conventions.
Bowie made videos for "D.J." and "Boys Keep Swinging" in the late '70s, and my Houston record store happened to have a video playback system (with a hanging monitor for customer viewing), and we'd play both those frequently. The same had to be true for the Parsons, for the large market record stores (Tower, Sam Goody, etc) who had the set-up necessary.
I had no idea about the connection between Asimov and the album; that's pretty neat. I've always adored this song.