Reviews discussion

Australian wrote: Reviews seem to be getting shorter and shorter...

 

^ I prefer writing reviews of albums I don't like, that way I get to learn about what prejudices me against certain types of music. I just wish that we would wake up to the realisation that you learn more about the listener than the heard in any given review. Objectivity is a laudable and noble intent to be sure, but why kid yourselves that if you don't like the taste of chicken you can approach neutrality when describing its flavour to someone else.
Although I've given many a floating turdberg a damn good kicking over the years, it's very rare I don't find something positive or redeeming in any release. (even bands I heartily loathe have done things I don't actually detest and I've either acknowledged same or will do - Tool, Matching Mole, free-jazz, Tangerine Dream, Captain Beefheart, Dream Theater, Hawkwind, most Neo-Prog.)

moshkito wrote: Australian wrote: Reviews seem to be getting shorter and shorter...   No wonder ... we now say "prog" instead of "progressive" ...

Good one sir.

moshkito wrote: ExittheLemming wrote: ^ I prefer writing reviews of albums I don't like, that way I get to learn about what prejudices me against certain types of music. I just wish that we would wake up to the realisation that you learn more about the listener than the heard in any given review.   That's good ... I like that.   One of th ehardest reviews I ever had to write was for a French film that assaulted your imagination inside out, at the Portland International Film Festival ...  so in a way, I like to review the films that shake you up good, and make you wonder ... what is it that I felt? ... and how did the film put me ill at ease ... and in the end, there is no better learning about your manner and way of listening to music, appreciating art, or reading literature.   The more you understand about yourself in that, the better the reviews are. I can not say the film is bad, or good, but I can tell you that it assaults your imagination like no film has that I have seen in the part 40 years, and Jean-Luc Godard's Weekend (and later his King Lear) were the only other films that totally stumped me ... well, if you don't exclude "Performance" which is one of the best films ever made, if not one of the most literate and intelligent things ever filmed ... that is so far up and away from it's audience as to be scary and too weird for enjoyment.   The film? Gaspar Noe's "Seul Contre Nous" (American title of "I stand alone") ... and I do not recommend this to people that are not adventurous in their taste of film, music and the arts! The other film is "Performance" by Don Cammell and Nicholas Roeg with Mick Jagger and James Fox ... it is by far, one of the best films ever made. And Noe's "Irreversible" has almost the same effect, but is not quite as a total assault as the first one is. That film is like a mind gone awry non stop, beginning to the end ... it's as if the whole film is inside that person's mind ... and the anger and resulting carnage is insane!

I've seen Godard's 'King Lear' once and Roeg's 'Performance' twice and I thought they sucked hugely, but I suspect that you would counter such objections with the 'you don't understand them' riposte. Perhaps they are 'way over my head' but when it comes to aesthetic parameters I have a very firm belief that it's our own cerebral limitations that keep our heads from disappearing up our own backsides. Art is for people, not intellectuals and if only the latter can glean succour from it, it fails as art. You can call that inverted snobbery if you like but it means I don't have to spend my hard earned dough on industrial strength shampoo. (to get the s.h.i.t. out my lunatic fringe)

Easy Money wrote: Snow Dog wrote: moshkito wrote: [<span ="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 11.8056px; ">. I have no problem with the site having its inner core of members that have put in the time, effort and place with many articles and information to help the board and it's work. But there are also lots of people that are mentioned as "collaborators" and all they are posting is ... "trolling comments" and someone like this being accredited with a review, is not likely to get a lot of reads or listens. For someone that can only write three letters or words, to imagine that particular person writing a review ... is strange ... a 3 word review! ... boom ... there's your complaint at the top.</span>   I fail to see the connection between forum posts and reviews. Is your thinking so one dimensional? Lets forget about the admins title for a minute here, just person to person, why do you talk to people like that? Why do you address others with such scorn?

 

Edited by Snow Dog - October 13 2010 at 05:55

Easy Money wrote: The internet makes it easy to say things like "Are you so one dimensional?" Not so easy in real life where there could be physical repercussions for such disrespect.

Edited by Snow Dog - October 13 2010 at 06:14

Easy Money wrote: You know its an insult, you meant it as an insult. Why don't you get off the back of the people you routinely insult on here.

Edited by Snow Dog - October 13 2010 at 06:31

I don't know why the problem.

The Way by Anima Mundi has been brought back to earth by a 3 star review by Snobb. .Would not mind but his review is horrific. How many times did he hear the album. I would say not even in its entirety..........
1)  He calls it their debut album so he must have ignored their page contents
2) He gripes that it is not good enough " Cuban" music and then states his preference for Buena Vista social club
3) His review really says nothing about the content of the album

not a credit to the site

I doubt the band set out to make "Cuban" music

You are right........Anima Mundi are a symphonic prog band and he expected to hear Cuban music, obviously he did not research the band before his review, there is even a great interview on this very site with the band, they are not a prog folk band which interjects ethnic  flavor  in their music and they are not neo prog according to this very site, anyway whatever