My PA rant: Stop reviewing sub-genres you dislike

Can you just have a button where all albums of a certain Genre are marked 1 star? That would be convenient.

Prog Metal = 1 Star
Krautrock = 1 star
Canterbury Scene = 1 Star

 

I have never bought a record based on a review. In the good old days it was about weirdness of the cover. Can't see how anyone's else opinion can have any bearing on how I'm going to like or not care for an album. If you've never tried cabbage and a food reviewer says wow! Cabbage is great doesn't mean that it really is great.

Also, way back in the olden days I used to buy magazines and books to find info about bands and never even really knew what a review was until I happened across this site. I don't know why anyone takes them seriously. Hey when I was in high school listening to crazy sh*t like Guru Guru, Amon Duul II, King Crimson  and Hawkwind most people including my family thought I was nuts to listen to all this sh*t music.  "It's lonely at the top" I thought to myself "for I am one of the knowing ones". Because understood the music and they didn't, I felt bigger, better and smarter. The more people would insult  the music I listened to  the more I loved it. " Yeah idiot go and listen to your stupid Kiss albums I have to go and pick up the Egg album that I have been waiting for for 8 weeks".

I agree with some of the guys here I would rather review an album to turn someone on to it. I just looked at my reviews and they are mostly favourable in terms of ratings. I've said this before, we should ditch the ratings because you can pretty much tell from a person's tone and choice of words how he /she personally feels about a particular album. I also must confess that I've reviewed many albums that need no reviewing at all like ITCOTCK, Tubular Bells, CTTE, DSOTM and Love Beach  just for the fun of it which is what this reviewing should be about. Oh no I forgot, this is a prog site and fun  is strictly forbidden.

Evolver wrote: I think you are taking it too personally.   One of the great things about this site is that we allow anyone to join and post reviews.   I like Opeth's music, but the growling sometimes makes them unlistenable to me.  That's my perogative, and I have every right to express that in a review.   I love Gentle Giant.  I have seen some reviewers lower the ratings of their albums because they sometimes use dissonance.  Does it offend me? No. Does it bother me that they lower the rating on an album because of it?  No.   Being "pissed off" over this?  Really?

Vibrationbaby wrote: I have never bought a record based on a review. In the good old days it was about weirdness of the cover. Can't see how anyone's else opinion can have any bearing on how I'm going to like or not care for an album. If you've never tried cabbage and a food reviewer says wow! Cabbage is great doesn't mean that it really is great. Also, way back in the olden days I used to buy magazines and books to find info about bands and never even really knew what a review was until I happened across this site. I don't know why anyone takes them seriously. Hey when I was in high school listening to crazy sh*t like Guru Guru, Amon Duul II, King Crimson  and Hawkwind most people including my family thought I was nuts to listen to all this sh*t music.  "It's lonely at the top" I thought to myself "for I am one of the knowing ones". Because understood the music and they didn't, I felt bigger, better and smarter. The more people would insult  the music I listened to  the more I loved it. " Yeah idiot go and listen to your stupid Kiss albums I have to go and pick up the Egg album that I have been waiting for for 8 weeks". I agree with some of the guys here I would rather review an album to turn someone on to it. I just looked at my reviews and they are mostly favourable in terms of ratings. I've said this before, we should ditch the ratings because you can pretty much tell from a person's tone and choice of words how he /she personally feels about a particular album. I also must confess that I've reviewed many albums that need no reviewing at all like ITCOTCK, Tubular Bells, CTTE, DSOTM and Love Beach  just for the fun of it which is what this reviewing should be about. Oh no I forgot, this is a prog site and fun  is strictly forbidden.

 

Vibrationbaby wrote: fun  is strictly forbidden.

If there was any fun here, our wives and girlfriends would had forbidden us to spend so much time here.  

frippism wrote:  ... Look, if I know the album, it doesn't really hurt my opinion of it, and whether it's good or not falls solely on my power of judgement because I listened to it. But if I'm looking to start listening to a band, and the album might be reviewed much, and I don't know, it's something like Agaetis Byjurn by Sigur Ros or "Misplaced Childhood" by Marillion, two very prominent bands in controversial sub-genres, and a lot of people are giving the album trash for being what it is, an album that strongly represents the sub-genre, instead of how the album works as an album and as a compositional piece, then I have a problem with it. It's not really correctly representing the album to someone who is looking for something that would fit the characteristic of the sub-genre, that would be along the lines of something he'd like, and yet undeservedly get a low rating (I can't really name such an album, it needs a more in depth look at reviews). ...

moshkito wrote: frippism wrote:  ... Look, if I know the album, it doesn't really hurt my opinion of it, and whether it's good or not falls solely on my power of judgement because I listened to it. But if I'm looking to start listening to a band, and the album might be reviewed much, and I don't know, it's something like Agaetis Byjurn by Sigur Ros or "Misplaced Childhood" by Marillion, two very prominent bands in controversial sub-genres, and a lot of people are giving the album trash for being what it is, an album that strongly represents the sub-genre, instead of how the album works as an album and as a compositional piece, then I have a problem with it. It's not really correctly representing the album to someone who is looking for something that would fit the characteristic of the sub-genre, that would be along the lines of something he'd like, and yet undeservedly get a low rating (I can't really name such an album, it needs a more in depth look at reviews). ...   But you must remember the axiom of the new age stars ... if you pay for it, and pay bigger, you appreciate it more!   Generally, we have that problem, but in those days, our friends didn't have this, and there was no internet ... our ability to find something was rare indeed, and the music was very special because of it ... it was not hidden by any stretch of the imagination, but in America, it was tough ... because the further out west you went the worse it was and the tougher were the attitudes about "foreign music" ... to the point where you were not "cool" if you did not like the California artists! I doubt you had a similar issue in New York, or London for example.   In the end, there is a psychic saying that goes like this ... when you are ready for it, it comes to you, or you come to it ... and music and the arts has always been like that for me.   Today's ways, and you can preview a band in the internet, is easier to listen to a lot more ... with one serious concern ... it ends up diluting your ability to discern what might be considered "better" or not, or those pieces that are more conventional than otherwise.   Read up on the stories around "Pirate Radio", so you can have an idea of some of the issues around music in England ... and then see the Tom Dowd DVD so you can get an idea of the American version ... and it will explain the history of music a lot better in those two examples than you ever imagined.   The only hard part now, is that the "media" likes to shove things down your throat and tell you that they are good ... and no one is standing up and saying ... you're full of it ... it's not good! And the why is easy ... fans!   Music has changed ... it will never again, be an upper class decision of what music is and is supposed to be ... and tomorrow, it's definitions will reflect that a lot more ... but it's difficult to place yourself in my time, or Dean's or some other time and place ... like that kid in the Iron Curtain I had a really nice discussion with here on this site ... you had no idea of how hard some things were to get around ... but we managed to find them and get them.   Nowadays, there is no "work" to fing things ... you click on this or that ... voila ... free music! With only one problem and MAJOR difference ... we usually listened to the whole album ... and now people make ideas and concepts off one song only ... and tend to generalize on the music a lot more than we did then. It was different then, extremely so ... but nowadays, too many of those differences are simply not there, and neither there are many other differences that would suggest this band is very interesting ... and worth checking out further.   The bad part of the internet? ... I'm not even finding many different things ... and I am not sure, yet, why this is ... too much "commerciality"? ... or simply, people are just doing what they know and not trying out things they don't know ... and our scene (the main and original "progressive") was the total opposite.

I was only k-i-d-d-i-n-g about no fun and that's not my quote above. Do you guys actually do your record or, sorry, CD or sorry download shopping on the basis of reviews?

With the background statement that I fully support that PA is a free platform where anybody can express his opinion, I agree with the OP. If you basically hate a certain genre you better refrain from reviewing / rating its albums, or at least if you do make it clear from the start and use educated and polite terms.

Vibrationbaby wrote: I went through the 70s & 80s without the bloody internet and managed to build up a substantial record collection and knowledge without it. In fact about 90 % of my collection is from my pre-90s period.  I dunno,  I find it tiresome to sift through all th trash that is out there on the web. I'm currently involved in a research project not related to music and man! Sometimes I just want to pull my hair out over all the conflicting information, inacuracies and self-publishing know-it-alls that are out there. I hate using it and wish it never happened to tell the truth. I've even read about things and events that I have been directly involved with that couldn't be farther from the facts.

I'm going to have to disagree - I too have a substantial record collection built-up in the 70s and 80s, but my post 90s CD collection is far far bigger. Through the 70s and 80s the sum total of Kaleidoscope albums I owned was exactly one - and that was bought in the early 70s - you could not buy Kaleidoscope or Fairfield Parlour albums because they were so hard to find (and damn expensive when you did - £200 for a copy of Faintly Blowing - that was two weeks salary when I eventually found it ...no thanks - A fan? Yes - An idiot? No) - Now I have everything they ever recorded, not only as Kaleidoscope and Fairfield Parlour, but even the 1960s recordings they made as The Sidekicks and as The Key.