1: Prog continued to farm out its lyrics long after the 70s heyday. Marillion, post-Fish, used John Helmer, ex of The Piranhas and Pookiesnackenburger as their wordsmith. Rightly so, as he's a fiercely clever guy, a published novelist and a general good egg.

2: My recent rehearsals with The George Kypreos band - Greek and proud of it: Max Pashm on percussion - took me deep into songs in 9/8 and 7/4. For a while it even looked like 13/8 was going to rear it's strangley beautiful head.

I heard recently that Dick Dale's scales and timing came from his Lebanese oud-playing uncle. If the King of Surf Guitar had Eastern Med antecedents, what about Prog's secret Balkan, Klezmer and Greek background?