Alan Parsons was born on December 20th of 1948 in London, England.

Parsons began his career in music as an audio engineer at Abbey Road Studios in 1967 at just 18 years of age. He was involved in recording of The Beatles final album, 1969′s Abbey Road. He he received a Grammy Award nomination for his work on Pink Floyd’s 1973 masterpiece Dark Side of the Moon.

He formed his own group called The Alan Parsons Project with songwriter Eric Wolfson in 1975. The idea stemmed from Parsons feeling that the opinions of the artists he was producing for were sometimes negatively interfering with his own work as a producer.

The group was unusual in that it didn’t have set singers or instrumentalists. Instead Parsons & Wolfson would choose singers and instrumentalists to fit with their song & production ideas. Wolfson sang lead vocals on a number of their songs, but he was just one of a great number of vocalists who sang on Alan Parsons Project songs.

They released 10 studio albums from 1976 through 1987 and all 10 charted in on the US album charts (as high as #7 and as low as #57.) They had their best success in Germany where four of their albums hit #1. They were not as successful in the UK where their best charting success was 1984′s Ammonia Avenue which hit #24 in the UK.

Their most successful single (in the US) was 1982′s “Eye in the Sky” from the album by the same name. It reached #3 in the US. It was their only song to chart higher than #15. It was sung by Woolfson.

It was track two on the album, the preceding track was an instrumental track titled “Sirius” and it segued directly into “Eye in the Sky.” You’ve probably heard “Sirius” before as it was used as the entrance music for the Chicago Bulls during their 1990s domination of the NBA which was lead by the legendary basketball star Michael Jordan.

“Eye In The Sky”
(Complete with “Sirius” intro)

*note that the video is fan made.*