29 May 2010

As some of you may have read on our Facebook page, there have been some upgrades going on over the past few weeks. If you have any issues connecting or with quality, please let me know.

21 April 2010

It's ROSFEST time again, folks, April 30, May 1 and 2, 2010. Anyone wanna meet up, email me. See you in Gettysburg...

Cheers!

7 August 2009

Heading to 3RP. As usual if anyone wants to meet up and say hi, send me an email.

27 July 2009

Storms caused a power outage in the area. The UPSes allowed a graceful shutdown of all servers, but the outage lasted for about 6 hours.

11 July 2009

All changes have been completed. PROG.FM now supports 50 128k streams (25 on the local server and 25 on the relay) and 50 56k streams and has capacity for many more. Please report anything that is not working for you.

11 July 2009

I will be making some changes on the SAM server later today, which should take about an hour of downtime.

4 July 2009

Happy 4th of July!

Most of the upgrades are done, but things are still settling. I'm still fixing some settings and doing some updates here and there, so access will be iffy during the rest of this weekend.

PLEASE NOTE that the stream URLs have changed and if you have any bookmarked, please update them!

1 July 2009

During the upcoming holiday weekend, I will attempt to do some upgrades to the systems and network here. Firstly, I will be putting the entire server rack on two UPS battery backup units; and secondly I will be migrating to the Verizon FIOS network, which will provide much higher upstream bandwidth and hopefully will allow more listener streams.

Thus please be aware that there will likely be some system downtime over the July 3-5 weekend.

28 April 2009

The ROSfest tickets are sold. See you all at the show! If anyone wants to meet up, I will be in C108/C109 and I'll have my N810 to check messages again during the show like I did last year.

Also some new music has been added.

Jolly, a prog quartet from Brooklyn, NY kindly sent us their EP; Patrick Moraz kindly sent us his new album, Change of Space. Also added were the She rock opera by Clive Nolan's project Caamora, an album by Satellite side-project Peter Pan; and thanks to Glass Onyon PR for sending us Oxygene 8's album, Freak of Chance.

10 April 2009

I am selling 2 Rosfest 2009 tickets for Saturday and Sunday shows. Great center seats C110 and C111. Face value US$110 per set of tickets. Would prefer to sell together. Please email me if you are interested.

12 February 2009

Strong winds today have been causing intermittent power outages. To prevent damage to the servers, they have been shut down until this evening. Sorry for the inconvenience.

29 January 2009

The following new artists and music have been recently added. There's quite a few so I can't post any reviews this time around, but look for some in the future.

Thanks to all the artists who submitted their work!

3rdegree (USA), Abel Ganz (UK), DeeExpus Project (UK), Dialeto (Brazil), Duty Free Area (Italy), Godsticks (UK), Negus (Canada), Night WinD (Russia), Pinnacle (USA), and Tetrafusion (USA).

As usual, more coming soon!

21 December 2008

Happy Holidays from PROG.FM. As is tradition, PROG.FM will sprinkle the stream with a few holiday classics, prog rock style. Enjoy!

29 October 2008

PROG.FM server maintenance is planned for the upcoming weekend between Saturday 1 Nov and Sunday 2 Nov. Expect several hours of downtime as some servers are being migrated to new hardware.

15 September 2008

Pink Floyd founding member and keyboardist Richard Wright passed away today at age 65 from a short battle with cancer. To honor Richard, we will be streaming additional Pink Floyd selections throughout the evening.

9 September 2008

Sorry for the downtime today. Severe weather is causing power problems across our area and may continue through the day.

6 September 2008

If you were at 3RP you know what an awesome show it was! It's already shaping up to be a great show in 2009 with Phideaux and Edensong already on the bill.

I've been adding more music that has been piling up. I still have some unopened CD's from ROSfest, several CD's sent to me by artists and more stuff I got at 3RP to add.

'This is the story so far...'

From 3RP I've added the debut albums from Kalon and The Mandrake Project. Both bands were performers at this year's 3RP. They both have an art rock and RIO vibe to them, and feature strings and ethnic percussion.

Persephone's Dream and Edensong both had vendor tables at 3RP and so I got Persephone's latest CD and Edensong's debut as well. Both are very impressive works.

I was also on a Japanese kick, so I also added Magdalena and Naikaku. Some of you may recognize Magdalena's lead singer Megumi Tokuhisa from Teru's Symphonia, both symphonic bands. Naikaku, however, is a blistering hard prog/fusion act with lots of dueling flutes and tight guitar riffs.

I also got Polish Symphonic Metal ensemble Osada Vida's latest, a clever concept album entitled The Body Parts Party.

I also added artist submissions, including John Huldt, Ian Tescee, Cathedral, and Principles of Uncertainty.

John Huldt is a talented guitar virtuoso who demonstrates his ability to play progressive rock, fusion, blues, jazz and everything in between! The guy is simply amazing. Satriani, Vai and Eric Johnson fans take note!

I remember hearing Ian Tescee's Continua on WFMU's Synthetic Pleasure many years ago. I was floored when I opened a nondescript envelope and saw his latest CD. Ian continues his masterful electronic work in this concept CD about travel to the red planet, called A Traveler's Guide to Mars. Kind thanks to Ruthe at CSC for the submission.

Symphonic late 70's prog ensemble Cathedral returns with a new album called The Bridge from which a few cuts were submitted by new guitar man David Doig.

And lastly, some amazing new stuff from Principles of Uncertainty. PoU is the brainchild of Jeff Storm, who wrote and performed the debut EP entitled Familiar in the Abstract. There's a definite early-period Rush feel to his work but it's also very unique and original.

Thanks to everyone who's been submitting work. I still have a lot more stuff to add.

Last but not least, I will be performing major upgrades to the PROG.FM servers in the very near future, so stay tuned for more updates.

22 August 2008

3RP weekend is upon us. With my vision pretty much restored, I am ready to make the trip and finally enjoy another weekend of excellent music. I will be sitting in E4 or E5 if anyone wants to meet up. As usual, I'll have an array of gadgets with me to check email and stream prog.fm to whatever remote reaches of the planet I happen to be in :)

20 July 2008

I have begun adding more music.

So far, I've added some excellent new music by Cary Clouser, Ice, Vutdevuk, Albion and Moth Vellum.

Cary is the multitalented singer, songwriter, and multi-instrumental frontman for Canadian progrock tribute band, Oracle. Cary kindly sent in his solo demo called Finger Paintings.

Vutdevuk is the prog rock pen name of Brady Arnold, who is also an accomplished songwriter and multi-instrumentalist. He provided several tracks from his discography.

Ice and Albion are neo-progressive bands from the Netherlands and Poland, respectively. Ice is squarely in the Marillion/Fish camp and Albion is a female-fronted ensemble that will easily appeal to fans of Karnateka and Magenta.

Also thanks to Moth Vellum for sending their new debut self-titled CD. This album could have easily been recorded in the mid-70's but it's amazingly crisp and well-produced. Even the album artwork screams "prog!" Recommended for fans of symphonic Yes, Genesis and Starcastle.

 

23 June 2008

My vision is still blurry in my left eye, but I am moving about. The disappointment in having to miss NEARfest prompted me to make up for it by securing Platinum VIP tickets to Three River Progfest in Pittsburgh, PA the weekend of August 23-24. Should be a great show!

Progday in Chapel Hill, NC is the weekend after, but I'm undecided about attending.

Also, I apologize to artists whose music I have not yet added to the playlist. I still have many submitted albums and mp3's to listen to, as well as a backlog of albums I got at ROSfest. I'm trying to limit straining my vision in front of the computer, so it will take a while to get caught up.

20 June 2008

Well, turns out that I can't make it to NEARfest X after all. I was diagnosed with a detached retina and needed emergency surgery on Wedsnesday, and unfortunately per doc's orders, I have to rest til at least Monday. :(

25 May 2008

New nusic by the following artists has been recently added:

7for4, Aquaplan, Astralis, Delain, Demians, Expedition Delta,  GPS, Holding Pattern, Kingfisher Sky, Kitolli, Moon Safari, Qwaarn, and Simon Says.

Much more to come...

5 May 2008

ROSFEST 2008 was pretty good. The new venue took a little getting used to but I really liked the area. Much livelier town and a lot more restaurants. I also got to meet up with a few listeners and came home with a sackful of new CD's.

But as luck would have it, the stream server crashed hard sometime during the weekend and I couldn't attend to it til I got back from ROSFEST. If you were at the show, you probably didn't miss anything. My apologies to everyone else :(

29 April 2008

Are you ready for ROSFEST 2008? If any listeners would like to meet up over the weekend to say hello, please email me. I will be checking email periodically via my N800.

22 April 2008

Special thanks to Alfred Mueller for providing the entire 8-CD discography of his solo project Soniq Theater. The comparisons to Melrose-era Tangerine Dream are inevitable but not surprising, considering Optical Race is one of Alfred's top ten favorite albums. Soniq Theater's style ranges from tight percolating sequences to spacey flowing passages to soaring analog solos. Alfred also provided the CD from his former prog rock band, Rachel's Birthday.

Other recent additions include cuts from electronic artist Jamie Craig and some blistering fusion from Greece-based Technical Info.  If you love the sound of the B-3 and bands like Niacin and Electric Outlet, you'll love Technical Info.

29 March 2008

l am in the process of adding more music that I have received over the past month. I have just added songs from The Puddle Jumpers and Martian Ear Zit.

The Puddle Jumpers disbanded in 2001, but their founding member, Rick Vartian, is keeping the spirit and music of the band alive. Thanks to Rick for providing some of the band's best work. It's a shame they are no longer together.

Martian Ear Zit is a transcontinental duo consisting of Don Ramirez based in California and Scott Tatina based in West Virginia. The two have never met and have only collaborated musically via the Internet. They are working towards releasing a full album and have sent us some very unique preview material.

23 February 2008

I will be swapping out firewalls this weekend. Expect about 30 minutes of downtime starting midnight Sunday 24 February EDT (GMT -5).

Take note that if you are still using the IP address to connect to the 128k stream, it will change and no longer work properly. Please begin using the DNS names home.prog.fm:8000 andstream.prog.fm:9178 to connect to the 128k streams.

10 February 2008

Thanks to Udo from Abarax for providing their full length debut album, Crying of the Whales. Insightful lyrics, whale songs, lush soundscapes...and downright goosebump inducing guitar work make for a truly remarkable debut by this Floyd-inspired band.

I also snuck in some songs from the brand new Ayreon concept double-CD entitled 01011001 and some cuts from the forthcoming album by The Tangent entitled, Not as Good as the Book. Again thanks to Frank at SPV USA for those kind submissions.

Also tucked into this weekend's additions are songs by Consortium Project, Parallaxe, and a preview cut from new French band Spleen Arcana.

6 February 2008

PROG.FM is proud to feature preview cuts from the upcoming new RPWL release entitled The RPWL Experience due out on leap-day 29 February 2008. Thanks once again to Frank at SPV USA for the promo. Also coming soon are the new albums by Ayreon and The Tangent.

Also added is The Inner Circle, the debut album by German heavy prog band, Dante. The influence of prog legends ELP, Pink Floyd, Genesis, Yes, Dream Theater and Porcupine Tree are obvious. Dante conjures up songs that are melodically, sonically and lyrically rich, yet they also maintain a very organic feel. Think Sylvan but with a more raw hard-edged vibe. Definitely worth checking out.

16 January 2008

Well, it took quite a bit of switch-flipping and knob-twiddling to get all the new streams stable and working, but I think it's all good now. Let me know if you hear any glitches or rebuffering.

Thanks to Port Mahadia for providng their new album, Echoes in Time. 

This dynamic concept album features guest violinist David Ragsdale (Kansas), cellist Hugh McDowell (ELO) and vocalist Damian Wilson (Threshold.) They describe themselves as a cross between Rush, Symphony X, Yes and Dream Theater and it's a pretty accurate description. The captain's log from a wrecked ship is found, and, through song lyrics and narrations from the log, the story begins to unfold. But ultimately the fate of the ship and its crew is left to the listeners' imagination.

14 January 2008

I spent most of the weekend building a new server to start converting the streams.

Having both a Live365 and Shoutcast 64kbps mpPRO stream seemed a little redundant. Thus, I have removed all of the mp3PRO streams except for the Live365 relay.

I have switched the former 64kbps mp3PRO stream to a simple 56kbps mp3 stream. The former 40kbps and 24kbps streams are now 48kbps and 24kbps AAC+ streams.

For those who wish to listen with Windows Media Player, there are now 80kbps and 32kbps WMA streams as well.

FIREWALLED USERS: The 80kbps WMA stream is accessible on port 80 so that you can listen from work or anywhere else where port 80 is open!

The 128kbps mp3 stream is unchanged except for being moved to the new server.

A WORD OF WARNING: if you had installed the Thomson mp3PRO plugin in Winamp, you may have to uninstall it to get AAC to work properly. AAC is built into Winamp 5 or later.

And finally, OGG streams are now available as well. If you have any trouble with the streams, please email me.

23 December 2007

Sorry for the unexpected downtime today. There was a lengthy power outage, after which I also took the time to perform some unscheduled maintenance, including a CPU upgrade to the stream server.

19 December 2007

I am considering converting the mp3PRO streams over to AAC+. When I initially set up the streams a few years ago, the mp3PRO algorithm seemed to be the best choice for high quality at lower bit rates. But with the lack of support and improvement of mp3PRO and the industry favoring of  AAC+ combined with Dolby's acqusition of Coding Technolgies is putting question mark over mp3PRO's future. 

Please let me know what you think. Keep the mp3PRO streams? Dump them in favor of AAC+ or OGG? Are four different bit rates overkill?

17 December 2007

Thanks to TILES and Frank from SPV USA for sending us the new Tiles album, Fly Paper, due out January 28, 2008.  It's a very polished album produced by Terry Brown of Rush and Fates Warning fame, with some very special guest artists contributing their magic. If you're a Rush fan, you have to check out these guys out.

Also thanks to epic proggers,  DYONISIS for contributing their self-titled album. If you like epic operatic female-fronted productions like Leaves Eyes and Xandria, this band is definitely worth a listen.

14 December 2007

I have noticed that the streamer software occasionally begins pegging the CPU up to 100%, causing the stream to stutter and cut out. This appears to be a bug in the streaming software. The only way to fix it is to restart the streams. If you notice the streams stuttering for more than a few minutes, please email me.

17 November 2007

PROG.FM is happy to announce that 25 additional 128k relay streams have been added via our Fast-Serv streamhost provider, making 30 high-quality streams available for your enjoyment. Clicking the 128k link to the left will connect you to the new relays.

Please email me if you have any trouble listening to any of the streams.

Also, I would like to thank QUIDAM for sending us their latest album, Alone Together. QUIDAM is the first band to provide new material since our re-opening.

PROG.FM is back on the air after over a year's hiatus.

I have begun rebuilding the radio station by first reopening the Live365 relay and also by offering a few streams. I can't stream too much off my cablemodem with any reliability so I am working on getting the stream relays back up too.

I also have a huge backlog of songs to add from my library and from CD's submitted by artists just before the station went offline.

PROG.FM started life as Starstream Progressive Rock Universe in August 2001. The station gained a respectable following over the years being one of the first progressive music stations to offer 128k streams. I decided on a name change to PROG.FM because it sounded simpler and more distinctive. We'll let prog artists think up the creative titles :)

PROG.FM is committed to showcasing the work of progressive music artists to a global listening audience. We feature music from core artists such as Rush, Yes, Kansas, Genesis, Marillion, as well as upcoming, independent and obscure artists from around the world.

All subgenres are represented, some of which include classic, symphonic, neo prog, prog metal, electronic, gothic, space rock, fusion, ambient, Canterbury, Italian, Krautrock, RIO, Zeuhl, and much more.

Needless to say this is a temporary website until I can get a real site designed and put online. Check this space often for updates and news.

Please spread the word that PROG.FM is alive and on the air!

If you have suggestions or comments, please email me. 

Cheers!

Epsilon Process
Station Admin