Progarchives.com New Members Guide

Introduction

Welcome to Progarchives, a site dedicated to Progressive Music in all its forms. Our objective is to build the definitive resource for all aspects of Prog, including band biographies, album reviews, and a detailed history of the genre. The site was founded in late 2003, and has grown rapidly since then.

We are already one of the most popular music websites in the world, and our database is the most extensive prog reference site available. BUT, we need YOUR help to make the site even better.

How YOU can help us to achieve our goal.

You can submit reviews of any albums listed on the site, as many as you wish, the more the better. Unlike other sites, we do not restrict the posting of reviews to a chosen few "expert" reviewers, we value your opinion. As soon as you submit your review, it will be added to the page for that album, and will appear on the home page of this site.

There are no complex formalities before you can submit a review; all we ask is that you register with the site via our forum. The registration process is simple, and will only take a few seconds. To submit a review, just go to the album of your choice, and click on the "Submit review" button, it really is that straightforward!

By registering with the site, you will be able to see a full list of all the reviews you have submitted by clicking on your name in any of your reviews. There are a few guidelines to help you on the review submission page, and further details are given in this thread in the forum: (post link)

The Forum

You can also participate in our very active forum, where you will receive a warm welcome. There is a section to introduce yourself (if you wish), and you can participate in any of the discussions which interest you. You can also suggest the addition of new bands to the site, and let us how you think we can improve the site. Once again, (as you would expect) there are a few simple rules about using the forum and these are detailed in this thread. (post link). You are welcome to create new topics, and there are guidelines on where to put the thread here: (post link).

We pride ourselves on having a friendly, moderated forum, where people can speak freely without fear of intimidation or antagonism.

Some other information you may find useful

The home page has a number of different sections to it:

• The latest reviews submitted to the site. The last 10 reviews are shown here. There is an option after the last review to see the latest 50 reviews instead.
• A few adverts. By clicking on these, you help to drive revenue to keep the site going!
• Links to various parts of the forum, via selected headlines.
• RSS feeds, and details of how to use them
• A list of our most prolific reviewers. Only reviews by what we call our "Collaborators" are counted here. See below for more information.
• A stats section, including our top 100 albums. There are buttons at the foot of the chart to see the top 250 or top 500 albums. Our chart uses a complex algorithm to minimise the possibility of rigging. By clicking on the "TOP 100 button at the top of the chart, you can access a powerful tool which allows to filter specific by sub-genres, years and album types and see the top albums for your selection.

Across the top of each page, you will find links to other parts of the site.

• Prog rock?: Want to know what Progressive rock is? Want to find out about the history of our music? All your questions will be answered here, plus many more you didn’t know to ask! Note that there are many links to further information within this page, look for the underlined text.
• Collaborators: Our collaborators are the key members of our site.
  There are four types of collaborators:
  • The founders and site owners, Rony ("Proglucky") and Maxime ("M@X").
  • The admin team. These are members of the site who have taken on administrative roles such as moderating the forum, monitoring reviews, and the general day to day management of the site. You can contact any member of the Admin team at any time if you have concerns about any aspect of the site.
  • Special collaborators. These are people who have taken on a specific task to help to run the site. They include our experts in the various sub-genres who will be happy to hear form you if you would like some advice or information from them.
  • Prog reviewers. These are people who have contributed many fine reviews of albums.

By clicking on any of the collaborators names on this page, you will see their biography (actually an auto-biography), and a list of the albums they have reviewed. If you would like to become a collaborator, please see the "Frequently asked questions" thread: http://www.progarchives.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?TID=13080


• Forums: We have one of the most active music forums on the internet. You can browse the discussions without being a member, but why not sign up and participate? The forum is designed to be very user friendly, but there is a section called "How do I.." where you will find help with anything which is causing you difficulties. If your question has not already been answered, just start a new thread with your question, and you will get a quick response.
• Prog radio: This section has links to some Progressive Rock radio stations which broadcast on the internet.
• Prog Links: This section contains a list of websites dedicated to the vast WORLD of PROGRESSIVE ROCK, plus some other links we think you will find interesting. Progarchives does not consider other Prog websites to be competition. We share a love of Progressive rock music, and a desire to help people to discover it.
• Prog archives: This section has a number of parts to it. The main body of the page gives a brief history of the site together with official contact details. There is a pro-forma you can complete if you wish to communicate with the site. Note however that it is often better to either post a message in the forum with corrections etc., or to send a "Private message" (PM) to a member of the admin team or a collaborator.

  On the right hand side of the page there are three sections:

  • New albums added - This is a list of albums which have recently been added to the site, regardless of when they were actually released.
  • New artists/bands - This is a list of individual artists and bands who have recently been added to the site.
  • Latest albums updates – This is a list of albums which already appear on the site, where the information has recently been updated.

Note that you can click on any album or artist to be taken to the page for that entry. There is a link at the bottom of each section, to allow you to expand the list.

Switch index

• Genres. As you will discover when you read the "Prog rock" section, Progressive music comes in a many forms. To allow you to find bands who might appeal to you most, you can see a list of all the bands classified as being in a particular sub-genre, by clicking on the links in this index. Remember though that it can be difficult to pin many bands down to a specific sub-genre, especially those who have changed their style over the years.
• TOP 100 Progressive Music Albums by Genre - This is another way of accessing the interrogation tool for the Top 100 albums mentioned above.
• Bands - Here you can see an alphabetic list of all the bands on the site from A to Z. Individual artists are listed by surname, as are bands whose name starts with an individual’s surname. The word "The" at the start of any band name is ignored. Remember that some bands’ names (such as the ELP offshoot "3" and the German band "2Hot4U") are numbers, or start with numbers. These are listed under # . Compilations and other albums which are not by a specific artist are listed separately under "Various artists".
• Albums - Here you can see an A to Z list of all albums on the site.

Band pages

Once you have found the page for a band you are interested in, you will find that the page has three sections. Firstly, you will see a biography of the band. The completion of these biographies is an on-going project. If the band you are viewing does not have a biography, you can help. Either through your knowledge of the band, or by undertaking some research, you can be credited as the author of the biography for that band.

Next you will find a section offering streaming of selected tracks or portions of tracks so that you can get a general impression of the music of the band.

Finally, you will see a full discography of the band. By clicking on any album, you will be taken to the specific page for that album (see below). There is an option to indicate whether you wish the page to show images of the album covers or not.

If you notice that an album is missing from the discography, you can add it to the database. Simply click on the "Add albums" link just above the discography and follow the instructions.

Album pages

Once you have clicked on a link to a specific album, you will be taken to a page giving full track and line up details of that album, together with all the reviews our members have submitted.

Once again, there is a section containing streaming of selected tracks or portions of tracks.

There is a link on each album page allowing you to submit your own review of the album. By clicking on this link, you will be taken to the submit review page, which contains guidelines on the content of reviews.

On the right hand side of each page, the full discography of the band is listed once again, allowing you to link quickly to another album by them. There is an option to indicate whether you wish the page to show images of the album covers or not.