The Prodigal Stranger (studio album) by Procol Harum
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Procol Harum bestography
The Prodigal Stranger is ranked 13th best out of 17 albums by Procol Harum on BestEverAlbums.com.
The best album by Procol Harum is A Salty Dog which is ranked number 1686 in the list of all-time albums with a total rank score of 1,007.
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The Prodigal Stranger track list
The tracks on this album have an average rating of 76 out of 100 (all tracks have been rated).
The Prodigal Stranger rankings
All 4 charts that this album appears in:
Year | Source | Chart | Rank | Rank Score |
---|---|---|---|---|
2025 | ![]() | Top 100 Music Albums of 1991 | 95/100 | 0 |
2020 | Rovers | Top 23 Music Albums of 1991 | 7/23 | 4 |
2020 | ![]() | Top 100 Music Albums of 1991 | 96/100 | 0 |
2019 | Rovers | Top 100 Music Albums of the 1990s | 67/100 | 7 |
Total Charts: The total number of charts that this album has appeared in. | 4 | |||
Total Rank Score: The total rank score. | 11 |
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The Prodigal Stranger collection
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The Prodigal Stranger ratings

where:
av = trimmed mean average rating an item has currently received.
n = number of ratings an item has currently received.
m = minimum number of ratings required for an item to appear in a 'top-rated' chart (currently 10).
AV = the site mean average rating.
Showing latest 5 ratings for this album. | Show all 12 ratings for this album.
Rating | Date updated | Member | Album ratings | Avg. album rating |
---|---|---|---|---|
75/100 ![]() | 11/14/2023 02:46 | mostlymor | ![]() | 79/100 |
35/100 ![]() | 03/03/2023 10:27 | ![]() | ![]() | 70/100 |
70/100 ![]() | 02/25/2022 10:54 | LosWochos | ![]() | 75/100 |
65/100 ![]() | 01/20/2022 03:16 | dhbarrett | ![]() | 65/100 |
70/100 ![]() | 11/07/2020 05:40 | Moondance | ![]() | 72/100 |
Rating metrics:
Outliers can be removed when calculating a mean average to dampen the effects of ratings outside the normal distribution. This figure is provided as the trimmed mean. A high standard deviation can be legitimate, but can sometimes indicate 'gaming' is occurring. Consider a simplified example* of an item receiving ratings of 100, 50, & 0. The mean average rating would be 50. However, ratings of 55, 50 & 45 could also result in the same average. The second average might be more trusted because there is more consensus around a particular rating (a lower deviation).
(*In practice, some albums can have several thousand ratings)
This album has a Bayesian average rating of 68.1/100, a mean average of 64.6/100, and a trimmed mean (excluding outliers) of 64.6/100. The standard deviation for this album is 11.4.
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The Prodigal Stranger favourites
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The Prodigal Stranger comments
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An unexpectedly successful reunion effort; maybe recorded a little too volume heavy and dynamic redundant; but the material is some of their best. And I really quite liked the drum sound even though it wasn't Wilson. Sometimes they fool ya.

Prodigal Stranger was Procol Harum's first attempt at a comeback album after their break after recording Something Magic, and it's not really particularly noteworthy. This is not to say it is bad, far from it, in fact many of the melodies are rather catchy, it just doesn't have any great (I mean truly great) songs on it. It is, in many regards, rather like Procol's Ninth, only (I would argue) slightly better.
The best track is 'Man with a Mission', which won't go down as a classic, but is still worth a listen (much like the album itself). The other interesting tracks are 'The Truth Won't Fade Away' (not of the same calibre as some other Harum opening tracks, but still one of the albums best), Can't Turn Back the Page, All our Dreams are Sold and Learn to Fly. The second best track on here though is Perpetual Motion, a lovely song that manages to have a great catcy hook as well as some pretty good lyrics.
The less good songs (still not worth skipping) are One More Time, A Dream in Ev'ry Home and Holding on (Which is perhaps the weakest track)
Overall, I would recommend any Procol Harum fans purchase this record, but don't make it a priority. I would also recommend it to anyone looking for some easy listening that still has some value. Don't make this your first Harum though, listen to some of the earlier stuff first and get around to this if you have time to spare.
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