>
> it's very good for the timeline aspect, you can flip through and it
> suddenly occurs to you that albums X, Y and Z were all released withing
> a month or two of each other. Helps to show the interconnectedness of
> Golden Age prog, adds perspective on how the genre evolved, and emits
> massive nostalgia waves for those of us who experienced all or part of
> the Golden Age.
>
> For instance, during the winter of 1977 Animals, Songs from teh wood,
> Wind & Wuthering, Expresso, Sea Level's first, Geese and the ghost, and
> Works Vol1 all came out. Seeing tghe albums laid out chronologically
> like this really adds a lot of perspective on what was happening in Prog
> at any given time. Lots of little clusters of albums that most of us
> know well, but treat as isolated entities or as that year's release by a
> given artist. THis is a different way of putting them together, very
> refreshing and really brings back a lot of the excitement of
> experiencing all that material for the first time as it came out.
>
> The cover is fun to play "spot the reference". Adds a feel-good vibe.
>
> That said, SNider is just not a very good writer. His analysis is mostly
> of the teenage fanclub caliber, lots of overprofound raving, vague
> generalities, and trivial analogies. Don't expect to get much insight
> into the music or artists, other than the simple but overlooked aspect
> of who-did-what-when. Props to Snider for that, though, it's a simple
> concept but one that hasn't been assembled this well before afaik.
>
> Definitely worth buying.