fRoots Writers & Reviewers Guidelines

General Guidelines

fRoots' motto has always been "inspiration to enthusiasm". Within that, we have to strike a balance between informing new readers and interesting experienced ones.

Please avoid: unspecific geographical terms like "British folk", "African music", when you perhaps mean "English" or "Senegalese", for example; Sexist designations like "girls" or "ladies" unless for specific effect; obscure unexplained references to records, musicians, books, films etc. that the majority of the readership won't have a clue what you're on about; the over-used adjectives "stunning", "exciting" and "exotic" (the cliché zapper will get you!). In particular, we are often criticised for over-praise. It should be remembered that we are writing and reviewing in the general music market place and not just in comparison with the fairly low average standards of production and presentation of certain areas of the "specialist" scene - i.e. go easy on the ultimate superlatives!

Features

Please note that because of the sheer volume of wonderful new artists constantly emerging, we rarely repeat features on artists we have previously covered. Before suggesting a feature subject, it's best to check with our past features index.

Where possible, we much prefer that interviews are not presented in straightforward question/answer format, and that the interviewer's questions are removed or abbreviated. We do not use sub-headings or academic-style footnotes/references.

The Root Salad section falls between the news roundup and major features. These pieces, which include introductory features on new artists, longer news items on certain special projects and products, various scurrilous bits of current controversy, historical itemettes, etc, are around 800 (preferable) to 1000 (very maximum) words. Keep them snappy and entertaining (or very thought-provoking).

We will always need photographs if a feature or Root Salad is to appear.

Reviews

We do not normally review CDs from pre-production CDRs without full final packaging, unless by an artist clearly of urgent major interest to our readership. Generally we have no space for privately-produced short run CDRs, unless important historic documents. We only have space to carry reviews of new releases (not back catalogue) and recent events.

It helps our typesetter if you present your review in the house style. Please preface record reviews with ARTIST, title, record label, catalogue number, in that order. For live reviews, list artist, venue, in that order. For books, list title, author, publisher, ISBN No, price, in that order. Put your name at the end of every review. Where CDs, DVDs or books are from small independent companies or are imports, always include the address - web site is best - and/or distributor at the foot of the review. If in doubt, include it.

CDs AND DVDs: Because of the impossible volume of CDs we now receive, only noteworthy releases should get full reviews. This means either that the music is well above average or extremely interesting, or that the content is important for historical or rarity reasons (which can justify compilations getting full reviews, for example), or that the artist or release has a high profile which may mean that readers are likely to want to know more.

In the case of full reviews, please aim for a maximum length of 300-400 words, unless we have specifically asked you to do otherwise. No track-by-track detailed accounts: overall impressions, highlights and lowlights only. Please remember that you are reviewing the music on that CD; although some background is desirable, we do not want to learn more about the biography of the artist or the reviewer than the item in hand. Wherever it is possible/logical to combine more than one item into a joint review, please do so. In this case, write less per individual record - the more records, the less words each. For two or three together, a maximum of 200 words each would be appropriate. Again, where CDs are on small independent labels or are imports, always include the address - web site preferably - and/or distributor at the foot of the review. If in doubt, include it.

Any musically average CDs, especially if self-released or on imports that are barely available, any straight re-issues or compilations of readily available material (unless significant), any fringe items of marginal musical relevance (however good) and of course all the complete crap should be consigned to the And The Rest... section. This is a simple listing of artist, title, label and catalogue number plus a snappy, maximum 40 word description. Readers expect savage wit. In the And The Rest section, you will be anonymous...

LIVE EVENTS: The majority of our live gig reviews are now contributed by readers in the Gig Reviews section of our interactive fRoots Forum. We do not generally have a lot of space for routine live reviews in the printed magazine, preferring the unique or out-of-the-way. Always check first to find out whether we want a live review for the print version - somebody else might already be reviewing the same event or a similar one, or we might feel the artist is inappropriate or over-covered. For a single artist/band at a concert or club, around 350 words maximum. Please, no song-by-song accounts; overall flavour and highlights are the most important. Remember you are reviewing that gig: we don't want biographies, history of the venue, details of floor singers or support acts, or what funny things happened to the reviewer on the way to the gig, unless very relevant (and brief!) Reviews of festivals can be longer, but rarely over 600 words, depending on the scope and importance of the gig. Because many festivals often tend to have similar bills, on those few which we accept we only want the highs, lows, atmosphere, not a "what we did on our holidays" list of every act who appeared.

Copy Submission

The majority of our writers and reviewers submit their copy by email, or at least on disc. Best is straightforward text in the body of an email, accompanied by an attachment in Quark XPress, Appleworks or Microsoft Word. We can also accept either 3.5" floppy discs, 100 Mb Zip discs or CDRs.

In the case of the ubiquitous Microsoft Word, PC users please save in "Rich Text Format (*.rtf). Then select this file when you specify the e-mail attachment. This way we can print out a proofing version which has italics, bolds etc in place, and we get all accented characters correctly.

If you are not sending an attachment as specified, please also fax or realmail us hard copy so we can check that accents, italics etc have been properly translated. It's even more help if you follow our established house style which saves lots of "search and destroy" time translating files! Please follow these simple rules:

1. Do not put inverted commas around song or album titles. They will be italicised.
2. All words in song titles should be initially capitalised: e.g. The Flight Of The Bumblebee, not The Flight of the Bumblebee.
3. Do not indent paragraphs with letter spaces or tabs. Our style sheets do this automatically, so we have to delete additional ones you have inserted.
4. Do not double space after stops.
5. Only one paragraph return please. Do not put an additional return in to widen inter-para gaps. Our style sheets do this automatically.
6. Don't fully capitalise any words in text for emphasis. They will be italicised. No need to SHOUT!
7. Please put your name at the foot of each individual review.
8. CD reviews need ARTIST Title Label and Catalogue number at the start. Book reviews need TITLE Author Publisher and ISBN number. Check with a recent issue to see what we mean.
9. There are many alternatives, but we spell it "accordeon" if for no other reason than it irritates the shit out of accordion/accordian anoraks

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