About the Site

progrography

A boot, the site

I'll try to keep this short, since you've got a lot of reading ahead of you. I began building this site at the tail end of 2002 as a way to share all the discographical data I'd been collecting over the years. In a sense, this site started over twenty years ago, when a young boy sat cross-legged late into the night cataloging all of his records on index cards.

Now, a few notes about the content on this site. I initially held the discussion to progressive rock artists, but my personal tastes kept bleeding into the discussion, so now this site is peppered with punk, new wave, classic rock and anything else I stumble across in the cut-out bin. (If you have the patience to tolerate a fool teetering on a soap box, there is the brief essay "What Is Prog?") I've written all of the reviews that appear here (unless indicated). Not because I hold my opinion in such high esteem, but I believe there is value in having a single point of reference for critical judgment. Reviews written by several critics engender a confusing "apples and oranges" comparison, I find. Also, I don't want the reader to lose sight of the fact that the reviewer is a subjective creature, in this case one who should probably get out of the house more often.

I'm not a big fan of rating albums. For those who need some sort of compass, I've provided color-coding at the onset of most reviews: green, orange, red and black (based on the traffic light system), which breaks down as follows:

GREEN = go ahead and buy it
ORANGE = your call or, as my brother Jim would say, "If you can make it, take it"
RED = stop, it's an accident waiting to happen
BLACK = I haven't heard it (or it's a single, and what kind of desperate person would rate a single?)

Yes, I know that the middle lights are actually yellow, but I haven't happened upon a satisfactory yellow yet. And now for the heinie-covering caveat... the release dates and information contained here are not to be taken as biblical fact. I've had to fill historical gaps in some cases, corroborate using established sources* in others, in order to arrive at semi-reliable release dates, but I'm always uncovering new information that renders the bulk of them fluid.

The rest of the site should be self-explanatory. Thanks for visiting Progrography. I know that's an awful name. Titles always give me fits.

*Thank heavens for the following sources:

Amazon.com
AMG
eil.com
everyHit.com
Global Electronic Music Marketplace
The Recording Industry Association of America
Tower Records

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