Music Appreciation

KoS wrote: DavetheSlave wrote: Mr T - tell me what qualifies anyone here to argue with the professional critics out there and every other music review site on the planet. You care to argue with the pros out there? The difference between PA and a professional music reviewer is the lack of copy editors and pay checks.

Dammit, we need to go on strike!!!

I mean professional music reviewers get paid for writing crap and we could do that though we choose not to.  On second thought I shouldn't speak for all of us.

Edited by Slartibartfast - March 05 2010 at 18:02

Lack of copy editors??? Really?  Then why the huge amount of posts on this thread (alone) to my Yahoo account!

But pay cheques...

When we read reviews of albums in the "proper" press do we get " I love this album so much , cause it's the best an' I like it lots, so there" or something a tad more pro. No matter the pay cheque lack of response perhaps we need to hone our chops as objective reviewers.

With all the words out there it would be good to read the ones worth reading (agree or disagree on the album review in question the points should be interesting, relevant and backed up.)

 Let's make it all the words here for a start.

I for one am interested when a 1 or 5 star review turns up. Why so dire / brilliant? Actually I expect most albums of original material to achieve at least a 3 star review. To get to 4 stars it needs to be of such consistent profound quality. A 5 star means it is socally significant, part of the lifestyle. Conversely once something gets to 1 star level it has to be to he most unimaginative, incompetent drivel it is almost comedic to hear. On that basis it could be worth a spin. 

Technical things like different versions from the inclusion (or ommission of otherwise available) bonus tracks and DVD mixes, live album quality. how representative etc, production should be mentioned as and when possible (research, we do have the www to help) and valued accordingly but it's the guts of the thing I look for in reviews.

As a possible consumer of someone's music I wonder how many of someone's albums do I need to get an idea of their compositional and perforamnce capabilities - how much investment do I need or want to make? With some long music careers this can be relatively difficult.

But as thinking rock reviewers I'm sure this challenge should be welcomed.

DavetheSlave wrote: I see I can post - yesterday I got a message from the site saying that I need to contact a site administrator.

DavetheSlave wrote: But Dean - Strat meets perfectly the description given by the team itself, the definition of Prog Metal. I challenge them to tell me where they don't see matches. In fact Strat meets the definitions given on this site of being prog. I could understand the arguments given if they were given against Toto and that's why I don't carry Toto's flag as high although I love their music. Sonata Arctica do not sound like Strat and neither do the others mentioned. As I said earlier I'm going to quit the Strat fight for now. Once again. Maybe I'll have to bring it up again in a year, maybe I won't - we'll see. Maybe I should learn that brick walls are brick walls and quit bashing my head against them.

You challenge nobody to nothing, they are not answerable to you - you need to show where they match perfectly beyond simply stating that they do in your opinion, your "argument" failed to convince anybody because you don't have an argument, hence your claims of "politics"and bias. Regurgitating the same argument year after year adds nothing new to the debate so the answer will be the same every time - you can't knock down a brick wall by shouting the same old mantra at it.

Edited by Dean - March 06 2010 at 07:07

Oh, and Dean - I get on with people very well. I'm a presbyter in one of the largest Alliances in Evony. Maybe not something to brag about but still - I get on with people.

Nope. This isn't a chat room. If you're done with criticising PRs for 1-star reviews then let this thread die a natural death,