Torman Maxt

Textbook wrote: So what, we're not allowed to give bad reviews to albums about Christ-inanity because it just means we're bashing the religion? Couldn't it be that the music sucks?

Textbook introduces a brand new perspective here. Always interesting when someone who hasn't really been paying attention to the discussion comes along and says something really fresh and original.

So what, we're not allowed to give bad reviews to albums about Christ-inanity because it just means we're bashing the religion? Couldn't it be that the music sucks?

Ivan_Melgar_M wrote: toroddfuglesteg wrote: I would like to expand on what Easy Livin says.    I originally got in touch with the band because I thought they had an interesting story to tell (and a new upcoming album) which would enhance ProgArchives. Contact established and we had a frank exchange of emails about mine and other reviews. During the whole process, I advised, even urged the band to express their honest views in the interview. They have evidently taken my advice.    I am very happy with the Torman Maxt interview and fully responsible for it's publication and the reactions it has caused. I am also satisfied with my own review of their album.    As I said before Torodd, you did an excellent job, you achieved something not even professional interviewers do, the band member answered you something that otherwise he would had kept for himself, and that's excellent. You are not to be blamed for what they say, by the contrary, you have to receive a congratulation if you can make an interviewed answer his whole truth without hiding anything. GREAT JOB. Iván

Henry Plainview wrote: CCVP wrote: You know, a deadly cancer doesn't instantly kill somebody, in spite of the fact that one will sooner or later die from it. This was the cancer of the featured band. Besides, this website has a much higher number of dayly hits than we have members, so even if every single collab, reviewer and habitual users of the site, much like yourself, don't go though the front page, a myriad of people still do, so that is obviously not the problem. Well it was the first featured band I think you are ascribing too much to this. You have no idea how it would have gone if people hadn't jumped on the first one. Nobody said mean things about 3RDEGREE. I think people aren't doing it because they don't think it's worth it, but you shouldn't definitively state that something is obvious when neither of us have access to any relevant data.

I think you are thinking about this too much in a mathematical way. Human relations are not that simple. The first impression matters more than you are giving it credit for and this was one hell of a bad first impression: the weight of having such a bad feedback in such a short ammount of time do influence other people to bet on advertising their music here or not.

Why do you think that more and more artists are trying to get volunteers to review their music instead of advertising it on the website? Free feedback? OK, that's reasonable enough, but limiting the knowlege of their music to people who individually check reviews is much different than having a heading piece of advertisement on a website that accessed more than 50k times a month. That's more than 1.600 people of a very specific audience visiting PA everyday. Still think it doesn't matter?

Henry Plainview wrote: CCVP wrote: [quote]Like it or not, other opinions do matter when you pick up something. If that was not so, we would not have to classify and rate everything we do, discover or know in order to systematize and ease the job of constructing an opinion and knowlege about it. That goes for science, philosophy and possibly every aspect of our lives. So, yes, if a lot of people hate something, it will be only natural that other people with little knowlege of such thing will have a stronger tendency NOT to like it. Same thing if many people like something.    That is a fact, proven by scientific research over the course of decades. That is how we as human beings behave, wether you like (or care to understand) or not. I was just trying to say that I went beyond that simple inertia and gave a legitimate try to the band. Their music is not a groundbraking masterpiece, but it is far from being as bad as it is portraited here. Yes, that is what caused people to want to write a bunch of reviews rather than just ignore it. But I find it insulting and wrong to say that people are not being sincere in their opinion. Your final sentence is just your opinion, and it's one that's obviously not shared by a lot of the people here: the opinions of people on other websites has nothing to do with it. Maybe you have just been inured to terrible, generic music by evaluating bands on the prog metal team? ;-)

Where the hell did you pulled that from? I did not say people were not sincere, don't put words in my mouth. Being influenced is not the same as NOT being sincere and you are smart enough to know the difference. And the info that other sites had such an uncoditional contrary opinion compared to PA shows how important the firsts opinions are, how influential they can be, not that people were fooled, suckered or lied.

Besides, try and keep the ad hominem out of this, thank you very much.

Very interesting.......I broke a "rule" of mine in that I will usually listen to anything I find new here without regard to reviews. But I remember this band and the 1-2 star ratings it received and figured not to give them a try. I have just downloaded part 1 and part 2, just to see what all the hoopla is about, will take a listen tonight.

Good job Torodd  You did what a good interviewer does. Nobody, at least not I, has any negative feelings about this issue regarding your work. 

Easy Livin wrote: To be fair, Torman Maxt did not resurrect this issue, we did. they were reluctant to give an interview because of the bad experience they had, but were persuaded to do so. Let's not make misguided accusations here; we asked the questions, they just answered them.

To be fair, Torman Maxt did not resurrect this issue, we did. they were reluctant to give an interview because of the bad experience they had, but were persuaded to do so. Let's not make misguided accusations here; we asked the questions, they just answered them.

Ivan_Melgar_M wrote: Rocktopus wrote: Ivan_Melgar_M wrote: This may sound contradictory, coming from the person who participates in religious threads defending EVERY religion, but I believe that when music is used to promote a determined religion or political party, it ceases to be quality music and turns into a jingle. More than contradictory I think it sounds silly and not really thought through. Religion and art has been thightly connected for hundreds and even thousands of years. Bach's St. Matthews Passion just a jingle? Any Stabat Mater a jingle?  How about Pharoah Sanders The Creator Has A Master Plan? And the music of Area, Art Bears, Henry Cow & Matching Mole are nothing but communist jingles? Bach made music to praise God, but not full of EXPRESS messages to guide people to a determined believe in something determinate.

Say what you will, but the main difference between an old mass by Bach and Torman Maxt's concept album based on the Book of Job, is the quality. No matter how much of a genius Bach was, his religious music is still promoting christianity (and quite effectively too, especially when hearing it live performed by over 100 people in a church). 

The T wrote: Ivan_Melgar_M wrote: BTW: As I said before, even when I disagree with Christian Rock....I rated the album with one star because the drumming, vocals and choirs are terrible and because the music is unimaginative and repetitive. Their religious message has no relation with the rating, if they did amazing music I would had to accept it, but this is not the case. Iván The same as I. The album sucks. Period.

Edited by Ivan_Melgar_M - October 18 2010 at 12:13