Prog Rock FAQ: All That's Left to Know About Rock's Most Progressive Music

fine and dandy

Excellent reference content to a much loved prog era, wonderfull reading.

Bought as a gift for my dad and he loved it

Will Romano sub-titles this PROG ROCK FAQ with 'All that's left to know about rock's most progressive music' and then appears to scrape the bottom of an empty barrel.Outside his obvious fixation with YES, TULL, KING CRIMSON and ELP and the many off-shoots and solo careers spawned by these bands he seems somewhat at a loss to come up with anything new or revealing.Chapter One exclusively deals with 1-2-3 or CLOUDS making the claim that they may well be the true pioneers of the whole progressive genre and offers copious amounts of time and space to band member Billy Ritchie. Ritchie enjoys name dropping and laying the blame for the bands commercial failure at everyone's door bar themselves. All this while other bands who had major success and could also lay claims such as theirs are reduced to foot notes ie BJH. Ritchie also claims he should be credited with the works others performed and singles out ELP and Emerson in particular. One has to remind oneself this is not a book of fiction and the music industry is awash with hard luck stories and hard-done-by tales. It's good to remember that during this period in time many young (men mainly) were open to everything and anything and would spend inordinate amounts of time going through well stocked record stores as well as reading music magazines cover-to-cover. Had 1-2-3/Clouds been as good or as influential as the author and Ritchie suggest then the buying public would have picked up on them. Too much on this chapter alone but proggies have great attention spans and the book was completely read.It's not an easy read as the author is fond of dissecting almost everything in a very academic way and often contradicts the subject of his interviews. On more than one occasion he asks for a meaning behind certain lyrics and the adds "it could also mean....." Surely the beauty of prog is that it can mean many things to many people.One the other side of the ledger there are several sections which are quite enjoyable and flow nicely. The chapter on 20 Big Compositions is excellent.After this book it would be hard to read anything else by this author.

Such an excellent and thorough investigation of the true roots of progressive rock - at least asking the questions that no-one seems willing to contemplate. Did this genre begin with a relatively-unknown Scottish band called Clouds? (formerly 1-2-3). They seem to have at least a strong case for being the most important influence on the bands that followed. Many other very interesting topics crop up in this marvellous book. A sequel would be welcome, as this author seems to have a knack of looking under the stones of accepted history and not taking anything at face value - an unusual and wonderful quality in this age of historical complacency.