Riverside ranked higher than ELP?

Hello to everyone,

As many of you know, I am not the sort to stir up trouble and make rash statements designed to rile up my fellow prog afficianados.

But again I must direct the forum's attention to the prog LP/CD rankings on our beloved home page.

I realize that Fitzcarraldo and MikeEnregalia are smart, reasonable people, probably moreso than myself unless I really try hard, but the fact is, under no reasonable system would a work by Riverside be ranked higher than anything by Emerson, Lake and Palmer.

We again need to revisit this ranking business and get at a reasonable approach that ranks these LPs in a manner that makes sense and comports with prog history as it is commonly understood.

Otherwise the list is just an odd assortment of works that really is meaningless to all but the designers of the algorhythm.

What do others think?

Kotro wrote: What's your point? That Riverside aren't better than ELP or that the rankings list should be redone acording to some sort of historical priority?

My point is that any reasonable polling of prog members would have ELP albums ranked higher than anything by Riverside. I'm not saying one is better than the other (though I happen to think ELPs best is some of progs best as well).

I think our list should reflect this (and for the most part it does), but due to the logic of the algorhythm, certain anomalies creep in, such as this. I don't believe that if you polled all prog members across the forum that the Riverside lp would rank higher than ELPs best lps (e.g. BSS, ELP, Tarkus, Trilogy).

This is my point. Thanks for letting me clarify that.

Well... the point is quite obvious: I don't like Riverside and it really pisses me off that they are higher then the awesome  ELP...

The algorithm is simple and good...  If the rank is higher than that means that Riverside gets much attention now and has more good reviews... but this will probably change when everything will cool down a bit...

bluetailfly, the algorithm figures that in.  (Otherwise, it wouldn't be an algorithm...it would be an average.)

Like it or not, but of the people who have made reviews have given higher marks to Riverside over ELP.  I actually would rather listen to Riverside myself.  I understand that you are wanting ELP to have some "bonus" for being influential in this music that we love.  But frankly, ELP struggled with putting together a solid album.  In my opinion, all of their albums (BSS included) has glaring flaws (e.g. Benny the Bouncer).

Ed_The_Dead wrote: Well... the point is quite obvious: I don't like Riverside and it really pisses me off that they are higher then the awesome  ELP... The algorithm is simple and good...  If the rank is higher than that means that Riverside gets much attention now and has more good reviews... but this will probably change when everything will cool down a bit...

Why will it change when things "cool down?" Please explain.

Lofcaudio wrote: bluetailfly, the algorithm figures that in.  (Otherwise, it wouldn't be an algorithm...it would be an average.) Like it or not, but of the people who have made reviews have given higher marks to Riverside over ELP.  I actually would rather listen to Riverside myself.  I understand that you are wanting ELP to have some "bonus" for being influential in this music that we love.  But frankly, ELP struggled with putting together a solid album.  In my opinion, all of their albums (BSS included) has glaring flaws (e.g. Benny the Bouncer).

The fact is Lofcaudio, if you asked prog members at large which of those two lps should be ranked higher, I believe the vast majority would say BSS. I'm not asking for a bonus, just an accurate reflection of the prog membership's opinion. The fact that you'd rather listen to Riverside than BSS is an semi-interesting footnote to the discussion, but isn't really relevant.

bluetailfly wrote: Lofcaudio wrote: bluetailfly, the algorithm figures that in.  (Otherwise, it wouldn't be an algorithm...it would be an average.) Like it or not, but of the people who have made reviews have given higher marks to Riverside over ELP.  I actually would rather listen to Riverside myself.  I understand that you are wanting ELP to have some "bonus" for being influential in this music that we love.  But frankly, ELP struggled with putting together a solid album.  In my opinion, all of their albums (BSS included) has glaring flaws (e.g. Benny the Bouncer). The fact is Lofcaudio, if you asked prog members at large which of those two lps should be ranked higher, I believe the vast majority would say BSS. I'm not asking for a bonus, just an accurate reflection of the prog membership's opinion. The fact that you'd rather listen to Riverside than BSS is an semi-interesting footnote to the discussion, but isn't really relevant.

 This website is asking exactly that ... and the people are answering in the form of ratings and reviews. IMO the ratings in this case say that ELP are more popular ... but Riverside are either generally rated better, or recieve less "bashing" (1 star reviews).

bluetailfly wrote: Well, then I see this "dampening" as the cause of the problem. Why was that instituted? So that lesser known bands would appear in the top lps?

No ... so that better rated bands would appear at the top. (see below)

bluetailfly wrote: What would happen if this "dampening" effect were taken off? I would be curious to see the results. BTW/ Thanks for providing this information; I really appreciate it.

When I first came to this website the list was compiled like you suggest. The result was that Dream Theater - Train of Thought and later also Dream Theater - Octavarium were in the top 10 with more than 200 ratings but an average of less than 4.0. At the same time, Jethro Tull - Thick as a Brick (which back then had an average of 4.88 with a respectable number of ratings around 70) was around position 50.

I presented the changes of the algorithm to M@x and we both liked the new list better than the old one, and so it was adopted. But it is in no way manipulating the results.

BTW: When the new version of the progarchives website nears completion (whenever this will be), I will suggest to M@x that several "algorithms" can be chosen from - average rating only, number of ratings only, this algorithm ... and another more sophisticated algorithm that I have in mind, which finds underrated "gems".

One of the issues is that Progressive Metal reviews generally tend to be of the "fanboy" type, along the lines of "This is really great" and "I love this", and there are a lot of them.

Classic Prog album reviews tend to be more realistic, and concentrate on qualities of the music rather than the percieved quality, since the sort of people that typically listen to Classic rather than Metal are more critical.

Not only that, but people who aren't into Prog Metal tend to stay away from it as a genre rather than review it, so the reviews almost invariably come from people that love the albums.

Please note that I'm not making this up or taking a swipe at Prog Metal or its fans - the reviews speak for themselves - simply look at the front page of ProgArchives for verification of this.