After The Eye in the Sky, Alan Parsons Project originally intended to release a double album as a follow up. Instead, they split the project into two records: Ammonia Avenue and Vulture Culture, released ten months apart in 1984.
Like its twin, Vulture Culture is another underrated gem, showcasing the Project’s effortless blend of progressive composition and infectious pop hooks.
Where Ammonia Avenue‘s theme was the misunderstanding between scientific progress and the public, Vulture Culture explores misunderstandings between individuals. The songs explore conflict between friends, narcissism, and isolation. Thematically, it’s one of the strongest efforts in their catalog.
“Let’s Talk About Me” opens the record with a few moments of mood-setting ambience with assorted voices speaking past eachother, then it kicks into an aggressive tune with stabbing piano and guitar chords that seem to interrupt the vocals—a curious engineering choice, but perfectly on theme. “Separate Lives” is driven by a pulsing synthesizer and a sweet vocal melody that obscures the pain of the breakup in the lyrics.
“Vulture Track” sets the exploitative nature of greed to a grooving bass synth, sparse acoustic guitars, and a hyped chorus with stabbing horns and keys. “Somebody Out There” explores the paranoia of what other people are saying about you. While the Project has always shifted moods masterfully, this track is perhaps one of the most unnerving, it’s ballad verses shifting into a melodramatic build before launching into an urgent, fleeing minor key in the chorus.
And of course, because of Parsons’ composing and engineering expertise (let’s not forget that he engineered The Dark Side of the Moon), the instrumentation is brilliant. While this is the only record not to include the orchestral direction of Andrew Powell, it doesn’t suffer that much without him.
“Days Are Numbered (The Traveller)” is one of their lushest ballads, driven by a crystalline synth arpeggio, glassy electric guitars, and thick layers of vocals harmonies. While “Sooner or Later” was a more intentional attempt to recreate “The Eye of the Sky,” “Days Are Numbered” comes much closer to recapturing the mood of their biggest hit.
“Hawkeye,” the only instrumental on this record, features a metallic Sonic-the-Hedgehog synth (again, high praise), a drum machine, and a ripping saxophone solo. While closer “The Same Old Sun” might appear to be a nothing but a subdued ballad at first listen, it features some of the group’s most emotive work (and features a real killer power ballad guitar solo).
After intentionally ignoring the Alan Parsons Project’s later work through more than a decade of being a fan, this back catalog is proving rich and rewarding. The further away from The Eye in the Sky I get, I keep expecting the albums to get worse. But so far, that hasn’t happened. Vulture Culture is wholly enjoyable, even if it doesn’t get the credit it deserves.