The problem with stars & bands only slightly progr

 
3.76 | 66 ratings | 28% 5 stars

Excellent addition to any
rock music collection

That's what it says under Ride the Lightning. It's prog related so it's not listed as progressive, just rock music.

 

Essential: a masterpiece of rock music(28%)

Excellent addition to any rock music collection(45%)

Good, but non-essential (15%)

Collectors/fans only (6%)

Poor. Only for completionists (6%)

Edited by Pekka - December 09 2009 at 06:07

This has been discussed before in the threat 'how to rate an Iron Maiden album' (http://www.progarchives.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?TID=61338&KW=iron+maiden&PID=3386048#3386048). I now try to rate all prog related albums as RELATED, not PROG. I do discuss the progressiveness of the record in my review though, which I think is important information for a review on this site.

I guess that's why written reviews are encouraged, so people can back up their stars. Basically all of my ratings don't have written reviews, but I can honestly say I try to stick to the descriptions of the stars and not just rate based on my preferences. And whenever I have time and/or feel motivated, I stick in a review here or there.

Just nitpicking. Cheers.

Probably attaching specific labels and sub-genres to albums will be more appropriate.Also, a 1-10 scale is probably better then 1-5.
For example I may consider Iron Maiden - SSOTSS a 5 stars albums because I like it very much but this doesn't mean that this album is pure progressive album from my point of view. PA doesn't allow me to say this(In the rating system because I can for sure explain in the review). But in the end when making the final top the rating is taken into consideration and not what I've said in the review.

If we have bands/artists/releases which are not prog by generally accepted standards then we should accept also the fact that someone may like those albums/artists and not taken into consideration the progressive aspect.

Is a matter of playing by the rules and to change the rules if these rules are not acceptable anymore. I had watched the evolution of this site in the last few years but maybe is time to change something here and there if there is a current in this direction.

Slartibartfast wrote: Try not to worry about the ratings too much.  People are free to either strictly follow the stated guidelines or take them to mean whatever they want.  Some people go overboard and give five stars to an artist's album just because they really like the artist.  Some people will one star albums because they don't like people giving five stars to an artist's album just because they really like the artist.  Not much you can do about it other than not paying too much attention to the ratings. One of the things used to really annoy me when I was new here is people saying they're giving an album x.5 stars and then rounding down.  Mathematically incorrect, bad, bad.

I wonder if Sean Trane is a mathematician
http://www.progarchives.com/Review.asp?id=253785

Pekka wrote:   3.76 | 66 ratings | 28% 5 stars Excellent addition to any rock music collection That's what it says under Ride the Lightning. It's prog related so it's not listed as progressive, just rock music.   Essential: a masterpiece of rock music(28%) Excellent addition to any rock music collection(45%) Good, but non-essential (15%) Collectors/fans only (6%) Poor. Only for completionists (6%)

So it doesn't matter if an album is progressive for Prog Related or Proto-Prog ratings description purposes, but if it is not rock, then I take it that it should get a maximum rating of three (unless the rock criterion follows down to lower ratings).  Thee key is that it should be a form of ROCK music to get a 4 or 5, but progressiveness does not matter. 

And for non-Prog-related categories:

Essential: a masterpiece of progressive rock music
Excellent addition to any prog rock music collection
Good, but non-essential
Collectors/fans only
Poor. Only for completionists

If it's not a form of progressive rock, then I take it it should only a get a maximum of three.

Of course Blind Guardian which was used in the original post is in Prog Metal (of course many bands/artists in Prog categories released non progressive rock works).

Of course there are albums that one may consider (or are considered Prog) in Prog-Related, and I do rather wish that level of progressiveness, as well as Progginess, was reflected in the ratings.  Course music can be progressive without being Prog.  I find it a shame that if we found a progressive non-rock album in prog-related or proto-prog, we would be expected to rate it lower than the possible rating for a non-progressive rock album.

But I see the ratings descriptions as guides, not rules, and we should use our common, or not so common, sense when rating.


Edited by Logan - December 10 2009 at 18:08