Classic Rock Presents Prog magazine

Go to any Barnes and Noble Bookstore and they carry it.

New mag jacket looks nice

(Not wanting to defend Future publishing too much, but not just to be contrary either): The purpose of a cover-mount is to sell the magazine, it's a freebie enticement to the punters, the benefit to the bands on the CD is secondary. A CD of unsigned bands is not going to fulfil that purpose, only a limited number of people are going to be enticed into buying the magazine for a CD of unsigned unknown bands, therefore the fee is understandable - a 100% mark-up on that is more difficult to explain but Future publishing is a business not a public service.

So for the kind of money you are talking about (betwen £500 and £800) you can get a track on a cover-mount CD or a (say) full-page adertisement in the same magazine that has a circulation of 10-20,000. Or you can have 1,000 of your own (glass-pressed) CDs manufactured in jewel case with an 8-page full-colour artwork. Of course it makes sense to have something to promote if you are going to pay to promote and since this particular cover-mount is concerning unsigned bands then the band will be paying for that too.

I don't know much about this topic in terms of costs to be published in prog rock magazine, I do however have forefront experience with a band that paid nothing to have one song included in the various artists cd and should they want half page promoting them on a page inside the mag, it would cost them 350Euros. I am not aware of other rates charged/mentioned above. My knowleadge of the costs is limited thus I cannot corfirm nor deny.

Edited by Kati - March 04 2013 at 19:28

Speaking to the point of how much of Prog's expenses are paid for by bands...

In January, I read about Prog's proposed unsigned bands CD and noted "that a fee is involved for inclusion on the CD." So I emailed sales exec Laura Richardson for more information.

The details which came back to me from senior sales exec Katie Taylor included the cost: £800 + VAT per track for 8mins max. (To Americans and Australians, £800 is about $1200, and standard VAT is 20%.)

I was gobsmacked. I know the claimed circulation for Prog magazine, and I know the unit cost to produce a CD in a cardboard jacket from existing audio tracks on that scale. By my calculations, even if I assumed that none of the cover price of the magazine would go towards the cost of the CD, it appeared to me that not even half the money which Prog was asking from unsigned bands would be needed to produce the CD.

I may not have been the only one who noticed this, because a little over a week later, I received a further email from Laura Richardson which offered a discounted price of £500 + VAT. (8min max track length).

 
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I have bought a few copies if there is something I am particulalry interested in

^^^ I also reviewed most o the PROG sampler CDs and have to review the rest later. They are great for throwing in the car and just driving along not knowing whats coming next. I reckon the mag could do with a real revamp and look at bands that have not been covered -anyway it is certainly one of the best music mags out there. Just expensive and a bit hit and miss unfortunately. 

carlmarx38 wrote:    Yeah no sh*t........had to reply to this since you mentioned RIVERSIDE......I may be wrong, but to my knowledge   (and I've only missed about 4 issues), PROG has NEVER done a single article on Riverside. I mean PROG   magazine, as you and I both know, runs A LOT of articles on bands, even though they are often only 3-page   or even 2-page articles.....and despite ZERO articles on Riverside, they have run no less than TWO articles of    on LUNATIC SOUL (spinoff band of lead singer Mariusz D.) .        I'm sorry but the mag just is NOT representative of the PROG scene as a whole......What it is, to my eyes,     is basically a "local London/UK Rag", that focuses MOSTLY on local bands that are playing gigs in and around     the London area.....Just look at the number of articles they have run on "Local" London/UK  prog bands...       TOUCHSTONE, REASONING, MOSTLY AUTUMN, MAGENTA,, AEON ZEN, ETC.   (the list goes on and on, because     there are a LOT of UK bands playing gigs in/around London).           ...THEN...... what they do to get a larger audience, is run a LOT of articles on YES, GENESIS, ELP, JETHRO      TULL, RUSH, DREAM THEATER, etc..........      Case in point :    In a recent issue, in the feature entitled "THE ALBUMS THAT BUILT PROG", (which is one of the      features that kept me interested just to see what albums they would pick).......they ran a ful FOUR-PAGE article       on a band called "CRESSIDA", who.......I mean just how many of you have even heard of this band (NOT to      dis them however, becaiuse I lucked out and found their debut on vinyl from a local dealer, and it's actually a         great band....but COME ON,a band that "BUILT PROG"??)......then I did a little research, and figured it out....      The newly "reformed CRESSIDA" had played a "showcase gig" in......WHERE ?   of course right in a nice club         in the London area !)        I'll quit here.....but here's a question for those of you who haven't missed an issue......"Italian Prog" ?                  "Pain of Salvation" ? (only one article to my knowledge, and a pitiful 3-pAGE RUN)....                   "Ayreon" ? (excluding one tiny article that focused only on Arjen's last STAR ONE album)                   "Maudlin of the Well" ? (ZILCH)                   "Phideaux" ?    (ZILCH)                      Amemrican Prog Festivals ?  (They're complete ignorance of last year's LAST-EVER Near-Fest,                                                                                      for INSTANCE)