Classic Rock Presents Prog

I think it is fair to say that this magazine has been a major source of debates in the prog rock scene since the first issue hit the street. An issue that also included an interview with our M@X and ProgArchives. Debates about Classic Rock Presents Prog regularly also pops up in our forum. Most of the issues raised are well worth debating and I have tried to cover all of them in my questions to the magazine.

I raised them to Jerry Ewing, the editor of  Classic Rock Presents Prog. I am very grateful to him for his answers and I hope they answers some of the questions raised by the readers of ProgArchives.

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First of all, I want to state my honest opinion that your magazine is one of the best things happening to the scene since 1980. I also remember and I have some copies of some sporadic prog rock specials from Classic Rock magazine from the last ten years or so. Was these specials the forerunners and the motivation your mother magazine needed to start up Present Prog ? Please give us the history behind your magazine.
 
Thank you for your kind words. The genesis (for want of a better word) of Prog probably goes back a bit before that. I devised and launched Classic Rock magazine back in 1998 for Dennis Publishing, who at the time also owned Metal Hammer. Back then there was a fair bit of prog featured in the magazine. Anyway, I was then offered a job editing Maxim magazine’s website and was keen to move into digital publishing so accepted and spent an enjoyable six years or so writing dirty jokes and looking at pictures of scantily clad women.

In the interim period Dennis sold both Classic Rock and Metal Hammer to Future Publishing, and I had remained contributing to both as a freelancer. When I eventually left Dennis Publishing to go freelance I continued working for both Hammer and Classic Rock. Then, when I attended the Classic Rock Awards in 2008 – the magazine’s 10th Anniversary - I got to thinking about maybe starting a new magazine and the more I thought about it, I kept coming back to prog rock.

Although I enjoy most forms of music, there’s always been something about prog. I used to run a prog fanzine when I was at school in the early 80s – Court Jester – so it just seemed to make sense. The more I devised the new concept and spoke to other writers I’ve worked with over the years, people like Phil Wilding, Malcolm Dome, Alexander Milas, the project seemed to have legs. It made sense to approach Future Publishing about the idea, not least because I knew the Publisher of Metal Hammer and Classic Rock well. And I thought the idea would bolster the company’s music portfolio. So I had lunch with him, pitched the idea, he liked it and then took the idea to the Future board of directors. They agreed, and I got the phone call telling me to get in and get a new magazine out.

I think it is fair to say that your magazine is a massive success due to the fact you are releasing # 11 today. Are you satisfied or even surprised with how this magazine has been received and what is you main market, demographic wise ?
 
Well the first issue sold incredibly well. Given the cover price and the fact we were in the middle of a recession I think it took everyone here at Future Publishing by pleasant surprise. Since then it’s settled down and continues to sell well, between 22-25,000 copies worldwide every issue. Obviously it caters for the progressive rock audience who didn’t have anything on that kind of scale, although of course there are other excellent publications like Progressions and websites such as yours and Progressive Ears who do an excellent job of keeping the prog flag flying.

Let me first state that the following questions does not necessary represent the views of ProgArchives or myself. But I think it is a good idea to bring these grumblings to the surface and let you answer them.

No problem. We know prog fans love to have a grumble about most things, ha ha. Fire away.

Let's start with the cover price. Your magazine is one of the most expensive magazines, if not the most expensive magazine, in the newsagents. Why this 50 % added on price compared to Classic Rock magazine and other magazines ?

The price, I’m afraid was pre-set by Future Publishing.

I know it’s a bone of contention with some readers/fans. Believe me, when we got told, as we were preparing the first issue, it came as a shock to everyone on the magazine, and not in a particularly good way either. I remember going to the pub with the publisher that evening feeling pretty dejected. We felt, given the then financial climate, we were pretty much dead in the water before we’d even started. I basically had to make a decision there and then – walk away or continue. I decided if there was nothing we could do about the price, then it was up to us to try and make the magazine the very best value for money we could.

We knew there’d be a lot of griping about the price, and in the end some people would refuse to buy it on that point alone. That’s fine. But we just hoped that those that did buy felt we were giving them something that approached value for money. It seems the majority do, although we still read comments to the contrary on some forums. There’s one guy who seems to exist to sl*g us off on various prog forums, although he seems to buy most issues. Nowadays we find that level of abuse quite amusing, not least as most of the staff can predict what’s coming when he starts. But everyone has a right to express what they think, and we feel it’s not right for us to become embroiled in debating these issues on the forums. Even if sometimes the criticism seems harsh, given the amount of time and effort everyone puts into creating the magazine, it’s best we let the readers have their say in whatever manner they wish.

But back to the price issue – I personally had hoped the company would lower the cover price when they increased the frequency – we now come out every six weeks. There had been talk of that here, but at the end of the day you have to remember that Future Publishing is a PLC answerable to their shareholders, and they’re in the job of publishing magazines to make money. We who create the magazines do it out of passion for the subject matter. But Future seem to have used Prog as a blueprint for other new launches – Comic Book Heroes and the forthcoming AOR magazine. They’re all the same price so it looks like it’s something we’re stuck with.

As I said, we didn’t set the price of our magazine, we agree it’s costly and we try and make sure you get value for money. Something like The Word is about £5.80 I think, and I think Prog offers far more than that title. At the end of the day it’s the price of what? Two pints? I’d forego that for the coverage of prog we offer. I know not everyone will agree, and they have every right to feel like that of they so wish. I’m afraid it’s an issue I have no control over.

Then we have the claims that your magazine is too centered on the big names and the smaller, some will say more interesting acts are being pushed in the background or even ignored. Does the likes of the Zeuhl and the lesser commercial genres within the prog rock family have a future in your magazine and what is your answer to the “sell out” claims ?

Well we have to make sure the magazine sells. So it’s always going to feature a major artist on the front cover. And in order to establish itself on the news stands it has to have a certain element of mass appeal. But these days I think we’re starting to look further afield. To us, progressive music is a broad church and we just haven’t got round to broaching some areas of the genre. Nothing’s being ignored though. It took us 11 issues to get round to putting Yes on the cover! Slowly but surely we’ll get round to covering everything. Even Zeuhl.

Let's continue with some picked up objects from my radar screen. There are claims that Present Prog is too focused on British bands and is less accommodating towards other geographic scenes. Any comments ?
 
Well we are a British magazine. We did have the Prog Around The World feature but we ended up having huge problems getting usable photos for many of the bands. That feature will be reworked into a more usable format when we revamp the magazine in the coming months. But all four bands in the Threshold section of the latest issue are from abroad. As are the four in the issue we’re working on now. We are actively seeking out new young talent from around the world.

When you read this, I am picking up issue 11 in my local newsagent. The prog fans in Australia are looking forward to be able to buy issue 10 sometimes next week. I believe the same also goes for USA too. The distribution of your magazine is an issue, in other words. Is this a situation we have to live with or is there moves to speed up the distribution ?

The bulk of overseas copies are shipped out, not airfreighted. That’s part of why it takes so long. That side of the business uses other parties, as do things like subscriptions, so they’re areas where we perhaps don’t always have the kind of control over that we’d like.

If the overseas buyers of your magazine switched over to subscription, would that mean they would get it faster ? Please advice your overseas buyers what to do.

I’d have thought they would get it a lot quicker, yes. They can do so here: http://www.myfavouritemagazines.co.uk/music/classic-rock-presents-prog-magazine-subscription/. But then again, as I said in my previous answer, some of these areas of the business use third parties. We recently changed subscription house and experienced all manner of teething troubles. Then you find that whilst some areas of whatever section of the business you’re looking at show a tenfold increase in performance, others, such as customer service might be sadly lacking.

I’ve been working in magazine publishing for over 20 years and these kind of problems have been ongoing. Like a lot of the post we get sent failing to arrive. Music magazines have been experiencing problems with the postal services for years, but there seems very little you can do about it.

For bands and artists among us who also want to be featured in Present Prog, to where do they send you their albums and what do they include in the package ? Do you review every prog rock relevant albums coming your way or are you pretty selective ?
 
We try and review everything we get sent. The amount of new progressive related releases is impressive and pleasing. The usual package will be a CD and a press release/biography. Sometimes a covering letter. That’s pretty much adequate. Sometimes the American bands (not mentioning any names) will go way too overboard with what they send in. But at the end of the day it’s great to be receiving all this music. It shows how healthy and vibrant the scene is.

Over to the CDs. How do you choose the bands and the tracks for each CD ?

Standard practice on all covermounted CDs on all our magazines is that bands buy onto them. Although we do reserve the right to say no if we feel a band isn’t right for the magazine.

Besides of your Facebook profile, you do not have any cyberworld presence. Any plans to get a proper homepage ?
 
I don’t know to be honest. We’re pretty happy with the Facebook and Twitter set up because we like the direct interaction with our readers. I’m not sure how much more we’d benefit from further Internet presence now that Facebook has become such a big phenomenon. And, as I’ve previously said, websites such as yours and Progressive Ears do such a good job already. Why put ourselves in direct competition with you guys on the Net?

What is the plans for your magazine for the near future ? Are you keeping the current release schedule or are you planning to change it ?
 
Well, like I said, we now come out every six weeks. I’d assume we won’t change from that. And we have a new Art Editor starting on Monday. So there will be a revamp of the magazine in terms of design and new features over the next few months.

I am aware that you do not have a magic crystal ball in your office. But what do you think the long term future will bring for both your magazine and the prog rock scene ?
 
Well prog is very much a self-sustaining genre. It needed to be to survive the fallow years in the 90s. It’s currently in rude health and has sustained that since the magazine has been going. Please don’t think I’m assuming credit for that – the genre was burgeoning before we launched. But I’d like to think we’ve helped raise the profile.  And a festival like High Voltage which generated a lot of mainstream press interest in both the genre and the magazine. As I told the Guardian when they interviewed me in the summer, prog won’t ever be the next big thing. Nor does it need to be. That wouldn’t be beneficial. But it’s always been there and I believe that’s the way it will remain. With the idiotic preconceptions that used to exist in the UK music press dying off, then more and more young people are going to want to explore an intriguing and challenging genre and to create thoughtful music. It’ll be very interesting to see where else they take progressive music forms.

Finally, is there anything you want to add to this interview ?
 
Thank you for your support and for the opportunity to help spread the word. Prog on.

Thank you to Jerry Ewing for answering my questions

I wish everyone in

Classic Rock Presents Prog 

all the best