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The teenage Alan Parsons was hired as a tape op by EMI and worked with the Beatles, Pink Floyd, Steve Harley, orchestras, comedians, Pinky And Perky and countless others in the control room at Abbey Road, and saw almost 60 years of technical revolution. He’s just finished a 50th anniversary box set of Harley’s the Best Years Of Our Lives and talks here from his Santa Monica home studio about …  

… the things you find buried in old recordings.

 … how AI will allow anyone to remix their favourite record. 

… the miraculous transformation of Make Me Smile (Come Up And See Me) from a vindictive dirge to a No 1 pop hit, its backing vocalists and its DJ-baffling false ending.

… cutting the tape with John Lennon to end I Want You (She’s So Heavy).

… seeing himself - ‘in an orange shirt and black knitted tie’ - in the Get Back movie 52 years later. ‘It proves I was there!’

… recording the clocks, footsteps and airport announcer for The Dark Side Of The Moon - ‘playing Abbey Road studios as an instrument’.

… recording He Ain’t Heavy, He’s My Brother with Reg Dwight on piano.

… the magical ‘60s technology that made Pinky And Perky.

… opening the door at Savile Row and first seeing the Beatles and all their girlfriends.

… recording Pilot, the Hollies and the Joe Loss Orchestra.

… the story of Clare Torry and The Great Gig In The Sky. 

… Abbey Road recordings stored at a nearby squash court.

… working with David Gilmour on an Earls Court show from the 1990s.

… touring with the Alan Parsons Project (who never toured originally).

… why Papa Was A Rollin’ Stone is the greatest record of all time (clue: the hi-hat and bass figure).

Pre-order Steve Harley’s ‘The Best Years of Our Lives’ here:

https://SteveHarley.lnk.to/TBY

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Continuing a conversation begun with his first novel, On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous, we sat down with Ocean Vuong to discuss his new book, The Emperor of Gladness, which sees a wayward young man unexpectedly caring for an elderly woman with dementia. In another fascinating conversation we see how unlikely friendship, memory and a unique look at America's working class combine in this tale of second chances.

The cultural historian Tiffany Jenkins looks at the long history of the private life from Ancient Athens to the digital age. In her new book, Strangers and Intimates: The Rise and fall of the Private Life, she examines how our attitudes to the intimate and personal, have shifted over time. She argues that the challenge of big tech is simply the latest development that has seen our private lives increasingly exposed for public consumption. It is only through understanding the history of the very idea of the private life, that we might protect it.

Homework: A Memoir is Geoff Dyer's new book. In it he tells his own story, that of a boy growing up in a working class family in the 1960s and 1970s. He charts the transformative opportunities afforded by the post war settlement for an eleven year old boy who wins a place at a grammar school. Evoking deep personal memories, he explores the challenges of his childhood and teenage years in the mid twentieth century England.

Lanre Bakare is interested in the stories of the Black Britain we don’t often hear – the one that exists beyond London. In moving his focus outside the capital, he explores the economic and social unrest of 1970s and 1980s from very different perspectives. His new book, We Were There: How Black Culture, Resistance and Community Shaped Modern Britain suggests that we need to incorporate a broader range of the experiences of Black Britons into the fabric of our national story.

Producer: Ruth Watts

We’re told from a young age to achieve. Get good grades. Get into a good school. Get a good job. Be ambitious about earning a high salary or a high-status position.

Some of us love this endless climb. But lots of us, at least once in our lives, find ourselves asking, "What’s the point of all this ambition?"Historian and author Rutger Bregman doesn’t think there is a point to that kind of ambition. Instead, he wants us to be morally ambitious, to measure the value of our achievements based on how much good we do, by how much we improve the world.

In this episode, Bregman speaks with guest host Sigal Samuel about how to know if you’re morally ambitious, the value of surrounding yourself with like-minded people, and how to make moral ambition fashionable.

Host: Sigal Samuel, Vox senior reporter

Guest: Rutger Bregman, historian, author of Moral Ambition, and co-founder of The School for Moral Ambition

Listen to The Gray Area ad-free by becoming a Vox Member: vox.com/members

Show Notes

Vox’s Good Robot series can be found here:

Episode 1

Episode 2

Episode 3 (discusses the "drowning child thought experiment" and effective altruism)

Episode 4

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In 1980, Finnish singer Marion Rung won the Intervision Song Contest.

Born in the 1960s, Intervision was the Eastern Bloc’s answer to Eurovision. It ran until 1980, although in 2025 Russia’s President Vladimir Putin ordered its revival.

Finland, which maintained neutrality during the Cold War, was one of the few countries to participate in both competitions. Marion Rung achieved top 10 Eurovision finishes in 1962 and 1973 before winning Intervision. She speaks to Ben Henderson.

Eye-witness accounts brought to life by archive. Witness History is for those fascinated by the past. We take you to the events that have shaped our world through the eyes of the people who were there. For nine minutes every day, we take you back in time and all over the world, to examine wars, coups, scientific discoveries, cultural moments and much more.

Recent episodes explore everything from football in Brazil, the history of the ‘Indian Titanic’ and the invention of air fryers, to Public Enemy’s Fight The Power, subway art and the political crisis in Georgia. We look at the lives of some of the most famous leaders, artists, scientists and personalities in history, including: visionary architect Antoni Gaudi and the design of the Sagrada Familia; Michael Jordan and his bespoke Nike trainers; Princess Diana at the Taj Mahal; and Görel Hanser, manager of legendary Swedish pop band Abba on the influence they’ve had on the music industry. You can learn all about fascinating and surprising stories, such as the time an Iraqi journalist hurled his shoes at the President of the United States in protest of America’s occupation of Iraq; the creation of the Hollywood commercial that changed advertising forever; and the ascent of the first Aboriginal MP.

(Photo: Marion Rung performing at the Intervision Song Contest in 1980. Credit: Juha Jormanainen/Shutterstock)

Drift—the powerful force of making decisions by not deciding—can shape our lives without our conscious participation.

Resources & links related to this episode:

• Secrets of Adulthood
• If you’re wondering if you’re drifting, I created a checklist

Get in touch: [email protected]

Visit Gretchen's website to learn more about Gretchen's best-selling books, products from The Happiness Project Collection, and the Happier app.

Find the transcript for this episode on the episode details page in the Apple Podcasts app. 

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Thirty years. Over 850 episodes. Nine Peabodys. One Pulitzer. And yet somehow, three decades in, This American Life (and its creator, Ira Glass) remains as innovative and timely as ever.

We begin with a week in the life of Ira: a typical Monday at This American Life (4:52), the rigorous notes process (6:05), and how the team selects the stories it wants to tell that Sunday (8:23). Then, we unpack Trump’s ongoing threats to slash government funding for public media (14:14), Glass’ formative days as a teenage intern at NPR (19:06), and the radio mentors who shaped his ideas around narrative (27:18).

On the back-half, we discuss how his taste and talent eventually converged (42:03), what makes a good interview (45:36), the guest he most identifies with (1:00:25), the episode he’s most proud of (1:15:31), and, naturally, the future of This American Life (1:20:07).

We’re now on YouTube! Thoughts or future guest ideas? Email us at [email protected].

Learn more at talkeasypod.com.

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The word “Cartesian” is synonymous with a radical contrast between mind and body. What led Descartes to his dualism, and how can he explain vital activities in humans and animals having rejected the Aristotelian theory of soul?

Duncan Keegan doesn't consider himself a poet, but this deeply beautiful talk shows otherwise. With simple grace and quiet eloquence, he celebrates family, connection and togetherness, often most called for at the hardest of times.

This is episode seven of a seven-part series airing this week on TED Talks Daily, where author, podcaster and past TED speaker Kelly Corrigan — and her six TED2025 speakers — explore the question: In the world of artificial intelligence, what is a parent for?

To hear more from Kelly Corrigan, listen to Kelly Corrigan Wonders wherever you get your podcasts, or at kellycorrigan.com/podcast.

Want to help shape TED’s shows going forward? Fill out our survey!

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The first American pope's pro-immigrant views have put him publicly at odds with Vice President JD Vance. How Pope Leo XIV's ancient Catholic order collides with the beliefs of a growing group of converts like Vance.

This episode was produced by Amanda Lewellyn and Avishay Artsy, edited by Jolie Myers, fact-checked by Laura Bullard and Gabrielle Berbey, engineered by Andrea Kristinsdottir and Patrick Boyd, and hosted by Noel King and Sean Rameswaram.

Listen to Today, Explained ad-free by becoming a Vox Member: vox.com/members. Transcript at vox.com/today-explained-podcast.

Photo by Francesco Sforza - Vatican Media via Vatican Pool/Getty Images.

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