Applying ratings

MikeEnRegalia wrote: ^ If you really LOVE it, of course you can give it five stars. You said it yourself, it doesn't happen often. Five stars (or S-tier at AP) is exactly for those releases. The only thing I would do in these cases: Follow up on them a few weeks after and see whether that loving feeling was a fluke or whether it is persistent. If it was a fluke, the rating should be adjusted. Sometimes the situation we're in when listening to music has a big effect on how we perceive it. Especially for first listen impressions, I've found that my opinion sometimes drastically changes on repeated listens, and I suspect that this is mostly due to changed circumstances.

This is good advice. I once said I wouldn’t change ratings but I am re-thinking that statement lately.

I never rate on headphones
I never rate at low volumes
I never rate on cheap speakers
I always give a minimum of 2 listens ( which may not be enough, I know )

Sound quality and volume really can (drastically) change the way an album plays for me.

Also, if an album is a painfully obvious 1 star for me, I have a good laugh and I don’t rate it at all. Others may love it!! You just never know.
Should I freeze my eggs

Edited by Valdez - July 09 2025 at 09:52

moshkito wrote: tastes change with every generation, and folks today that like metal (example!) are not likely to vote favorably for the KC's first or ELP's first, for example, thus bringing down the numbers.

It can sometimes go the other way. I was born a little late to be a music fan in the 70s, but over the years I started to get tired of the production values of more recent music (which are sometimes maximum sound all the time) and started to really appreciate the sound palette of older material. Part of the appeal is that it doesn't sound like now. I don't know how common that is, but I can't be the only one.

Grumpyprogfan wrote: There are plenty of modern releases that sound stellar...

The latest Karmakanic record (mixed by Chris Lord Alge) sounds excellent. The attention to detail, especially in the drum department, is quite remarkable, I'd say.

Also, I think Roine Stolt is a very underappreciated mix engineer. Yes, he writes songs, sings and plays guitar, but don't forget that he did the mixing on most if not all of The Flower Kings albums. I think those mixes sound super crisp and are very nicely balanced.

I read your review Proggle and it made me want to check the band out. Sounds like it’s up my alley as well. Very well written. Good command of the written word. Thanks!

Checked it out… may be more ambient & minimalist than Fripp enos equatorial stars. I’ll give it a better listen tomorrow morning. Holger Czukay did an ambient album in the same vein. I love this kind of stuff for relaxing.

Edited by Valdez - July 09 2025 at 22:30

Proggle wrote: moshkito wrote: tastes change with every generation, and folks today that like metal (example!) are not likely to vote favorably for the KC's first or ELP's first, for example, thus bringing down the numbers. It can sometimes go the other way. I was born a little late to be a music fan in the 70s, but over the years I started to get tired of the production values of more recent music (which are sometimes maximum sound all the time) and started to really appreciate the sound palette of older material. Part of the appeal is that it doesn't sound like now. I don't know how common that is, but I can't be the only one.

Hi,

One of the things I mention a lot but no one gives a damn, is the series of RCA Red LABEL stuff that was done in the late 1960's and early 1970's and these things were the best recorded stuff anywhere, and the albums were released in a special packaging so you knew that this was treated differently and was not just another recording of the same thing.

Guess where a lot of Abbey Road folks came from? Including Alan Parsons! Guess what he did with PF ... made it sound classical like the Red Seal albums!

Recording, today, is a lost art, and will probably come around in 20 to 30 more years when the DAW craze finally dries up and folks start realizing that just because they got a DAW, they do not have, necessarily, a work of art.

Today, folks do not know, or understand, much about the high level of the playing ability of a lot of music. Heck, my receiver was $400 dollars in 1976, and the ESS AMT 1 speakers were $750 each at that time, but when a turntable was added it was no big deal, until a Stanton 681EEE cartridge showed up ($375 then) ... and all of a sudden you have a monster of a stereo sound that headsets and regular speakers and the average household anything these days, will not even come close to the experience of the stuff ... and folks think it's the LP ... it isn't!!!!! IT ISN'T!

But the quality of the work that we generally hear (tube for the most part in the Internet) is not a good take on quality, and I seriously doubt that many folks have any idea, and for that they call me stuck up because I still have a stereo system that is above and beyond the quality of what the tube and spotify and bandcamp give you, which is garbage with fancy words to make you feel fine ... but why will they waste 1GiG of space on one band when they can still show it for one tenth that and the listener would NOT know the difference?

And that is the part that hurts the most. The artistry is taken out intentionally!

Finnforest wrote: In my mind and intentions, a 5-star "masterpiece" is top 5 percent.

The frame of reference is important here. Top 5% of all music? Of all prog? Of all prog I listen to, i.e., I'd be up for devoting enough time to?

(Of course no answer is needed; I'm just saying it's not so easy. I absolutely see how some people can give, say, 30% 5 star ratings still sticking to some kind of 5% rule...)

MikeEnRegalia wrote: Valdez wrote: I never rate on headphones I always give a minimum of 2 listens ( which may not be enough, I know ) Why no headphones? I pretty much do all my listening on headphones for practical reasons, as long as it is good quality headpones, I don't see an issue I think that two listens are ideal! You have a first listen impression, then after a short break doing other things, listening to other albums, you return once and listen to it again. It could be argued that 2-3 listens is the ideal time to rate a release.

I need to hear the music in the open air, quite loud, and have a practically deaf left ear. I do a lot of mixing and can’t use headphones for that either.   I use headphones only when the wife is home because she is not too fond my music. Lol.   A few years back I popped an eardrum and did not go to the doctor, I just lived with it. Then I made the HUGE mistake (a year later) of putting some ear cleaning drops in there and the pain was unbelievable. (Peroxide).   I rushed myself to the doctor and was told I damaged the inner ear. Dumb.

So I record everything in mono now and just pan tracks to the left and right with my DAW.   😆 like The Beach Boys used to do . Then I have Kalvin my son in law listen and make final adjustments to stereo effect.

^ AFAIK you cannot upload mp3s to Bandcamp at all nowadays. It's because they provide different formats, so you need to provide the music as a lossless file which they then generate all the lossy formats from.

Sorry to hear about your ear ... of course with any hearing impediment, even less dramatic ones, mp3s will sound much worse than lossless files because the psychoacoustic mechanisms no longer work.

I have some tinnitus in my right ear, but so far it is not too bad. Fingers crossed ...

MikeEnRegalia wrote: ^ AFAIK you cannot upload mp3s to Bandcamp at all nowadays. It's because they provide different formats, so you need to provide the music as a lossless file which they then generate all the lossy formats from. Sorry to hear about your ear ... of course with any hearing impediment, even less dramatic ones, mp3s will sound much worse than lossless files because the psychoacoustic mechanisms no longer work. I

Of course you are right, I should have said , if one uploads junk then the playback will be junk. I love the sound of Bandcamp . I’ve uploaded a few things that were a bit quiet and never had a final mastering… and they sounded great!

Valdez wrote: MikeEnRegalia wrote: ^ AFAIK you cannot upload mp3s to Bandcamp at all nowadays. It's because they provide different formats, so you need to provide the music as a lossless file which they then generate all the lossy formats from. Sorry to hear about your ear ... of course with any hearing impediment, even less dramatic ones, mp3s will sound much worse than lossless files because the psychoacoustic mechanisms no longer work. I Of course you are right, I should have said , if one uploads junk then the playback will be junk. I love the sound of Bandcamp . I’ve uploaded a few things that were a bit quiet and never had a final mastering… and they sounded great!

Soundcloud did a really good job with the automatic mastering:
https://soundcloud.com/mikeenregalia/earth-and-sky-mix-6