Ratings of Bruce Springsteen & Radiohead albums |
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Logan
Forum & Site Admin Group Site Admin Joined: April 05 2006 Location: Vancouver, BC Status: Offline Points: 35940 |
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Posted: June 14 2023 at 23:44 |
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Thanks, Lorenzo. I particularly enjoyed that rendition of Lost in the Flood.
Here are a couple of Radiohead lives: "How to Disappear Completely" from 2001 Live at Canal Plus (I have loved various Canal Plus Concerts -- especially a Portishead one from 2008) And Exit Music (for a Film) from 2017 at Glastonbury (THE song that turned me onto Radiohead and I find this performance really electrifying). |
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jamesbaldwin
Prog Reviewer Joined: September 25 2015 Location: Milano Status: Offline Points: 5989 |
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And this is Youngstown (from the Ghost of Tom Joad), live in NY again.
The lyrics of this protest song are among the most poignant and meaningful I have ever read. Here the story that is told in the song Here the lyrics: |
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Amos Goldberg (professor of Genocide Studies at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem): Yes, it's genocide. It's so difficult and painful to admit it, but we can no longer avoid this conclusion.
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jamesbaldwin
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Talking about the live performances by Springsteen:
This is Lost in the Flood, written in 1972, featured on his debut album, but here it's taken from Live in NY, year 2001. To be listened to with the reading of the visionary logorrhoid lyrics, written with street slang, between outlaw and Catholic reminiscences (at the time Bruce was presented as the new Dylan) |
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Amos Goldberg (professor of Genocide Studies at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem): Yes, it's genocide. It's so difficult and painful to admit it, but we can no longer avoid this conclusion.
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jamesbaldwin
Prog Reviewer Joined: September 25 2015 Location: Milano Status: Offline Points: 5989 |
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1) I'll open a thread on the collaborators zone to explain my proposal of ranking. 2) It's not easy to explain. I dont think that there is some kind of most correct or best ranking we should strive for. I believe there can be well-made rankings that express different authors in the top positions. But I think that some thing shouldnt happen in a ranking. For example, a Top 10 of all time with 3 albums by the group A, two albums by the group B, and two albums by the group C is a bad ranking, it shows that that ranking isnt obtained by a balanced method (it's the case of RYM). I certainly have expectations about the quality of the music, but also about the representativeness of the music. I think a serious ranking will create a trend, i.e. it will tend to bring out some less famous groups than others. I have already given many example in this thread. I prefer the chart that consider like main criterion the beauty of the music (not the historical importance, the innovation or the richness of the arrangements and so on). Scaruffi made a chart in this way, and that chart helped me to discover a lot of less-known bands of great merits. I dont agree with Scaruffi for so many reasons, his judgements on the Beatles and Radiohead and Bowie, and U2 and other famous bands are too much severe, but I appreciate his complete freedom of judgement. And I appreciate even other rankings very different from that of Scaruffi. How can I say? A good ranking expresses a coherent vision on the beauty of the music. As I said, it's not easy to explain what I mean. But I have given many examples. 3) Rankings by genres are better than all-time rankings for all the genres. I would start with ranking by genre and by year. Then by decade. Only at the end we should reason about the best of all time. 4) Yes, etymologically it is an algorithm. But I think you understand what I mean. |
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Amos Goldberg (professor of Genocide Studies at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem): Yes, it's genocide. It's so difficult and painful to admit it, but we can no longer avoid this conclusion.
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Lewian
Prog Reviewer Joined: August 09 2015 Location: Italy Status: Offline Points: 14753 |
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Of course what I wrote was not a complaint that nobody else has started a new thread for this. I could've done it myself of course. However I am active in a few other forums where even from moderator's side such discussion would be moved out, into a new (or existing fitting) thread. There are obvious advantages of this. Particularly it would inform people that this discussion exists who wouldn't look here as the title suggests something else. People who care about the original topic may be put off. Also later it would be much easier to find this, even by somebody interested in the "subtopic" who wasn't around at the time we did it. Of course nobody else may care anyway, but still... That said, the moderators are the heroes who do the work, and I don't, so absolutely I'm not complaining.
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Logan
Forum & Site Admin Group Site Admin Joined: April 05 2006 Location: Vancouver, BC Status: Offline Points: 35940 |
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It's not like one plans all this out. Discussion, be it face-to-face or at the forum, takes twists and turns. Or hopefully does, really narrow topics tend not to be of much interest to me, and as you know, the polls in and of themselves often are not that important or interesting to me, and I treat them more as accessories to discussion. This poll directly grew out of my discussion with Lorenzo in Is Italian Prog epigonic? thread, but also from older topics where I have discussed charts with Lorenzo and others. Here is one where I got into this with Lorenzo a few years ago. 25 Unpopular Albums. I do rather wish all these issues could somehow be tied together into one place though. For instance, I know there was a much heavier discussion we had, but it would take me a while to search for it. It is interesting to see if one's opinions have shifted over the years.
By the way, I spoke of the validity of the results if they are an adequate translation and representation of the input, but I would think that there would be a very significant bandwagon effect. Not only does popularity breed popularity so as an album rises through the charts it gains steam with new people discovering it thanks to its position and so they also rank it highly, but this can and surely must to some extent lead to people rating those highlyu based on how others perceive those albums and how they think others will perceive them based on their ratings. It's all well and good provided that people are actually listening to those albums properly and rating them based on their honest appreciation rather than on how they think others perceive the album and how they think they will be perceived based on their ratings. This is always (never say always) a potential problem, with pro critics too who just regurgitate the expectations of canons of greats/ rate those very highly that they think should be rated highly based on how others rated them and how they will be perceived. |
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Saperlipopette!
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Lewian
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Shouldn't we have done all this in a dedicated thread about ranking and measuring/scoring quality in music in general? This is a topic that interests me enough, apart from the RYM vs. curated expert ranking thing (let alone Springsteen vs. Radiohead, Radiohead now in the lead for quite some time btw). Of course I could do it, and I may, let's see. There are a few more things I may have to say but they really don't fit here (neither does 85% of what is already here actually). Or maybe for another time. Anyway, just to tease Lorenzo:
The thing about this statement is that it is very weak. I could sign up to it, but it doesn't say that much. I am very far away from the idea that there is some kind of most correct or best ranking we should strive for. There is very much space between "everything is subjective" and that idea. Music is not made for ranking in the first place. (In fact some music is, like for winning the Grand Prix Eurovision, but this music does not normally deserve to be ranked high compared to properly good music that isn't. )
I don't sign up to "valuable" without qualifications. "Valuable" will be relative to specific aims that would have to be specified. Also, universal music connoisseurs will be very hard to find, and even if you find some, they may not be the best when it comes to the kind of specialist knowledge that is needed to rank within certain specialist genres. In fact, in many places and for quite some time there was/is a culture of highly educated music connoisseurship that would pride itself for ignoring certain "lower" forms of music.
That, technically, is an algorithm. |
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jamesbaldwin
Prog Reviewer Joined: September 25 2015 Location: Milano Status: Offline Points: 5989 |
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My final post. (Answering to Stressed Cheese) First reason: the knowledge of music If you've read all the posts in this thread, including Saperlipopette's, you should have realised that he and I (and I think Logan and Lewian too) believe that NOT everything is subjective in the same way, and that not all music listeners' judgements are on the same level: an experienced music connoisseur will give more valuable judgements ON EVERYTHING than a RYM forumist who only listens to rap or hip-hop or death metal: if this forumist also listened to how Tim Buckley sings or which composer Frank Zappa was, i.e. if he had given himself a real musical education, then he would have thought long and hard before giving many rap or hip-hop or death metal albums 5 stars. Indeed, one has to consider that RYM's rankings are not just by genre: they are also by historical period, and the one I find least reliable is the all-time Top 100. But the same goes for decades: if you want to rank the eighties, you can't just listen to (this is an example) synth-pop music, you have to listen to the main music genres that were a selling point and critically successful in the eighties: you have to listen, and well, to U2, for example. This Thread derives from another one I opened (Is Italian Prog Epigonic?) where I quote the ranking of Enrico Merlin, an Italian jazz guitarist, musicologist, who studied not only rock and pop music and jazz but also contemporary classical music before drawing up his ranking, which has musical innovation as its main selection criterion. The opinion of Enrico Merlin and other critics, music experts like him, and also musicians, is worth much more to me than the opinion of 100,000 members of the RYM forum or any other music site who subscribe mainly to vote only for certain bands they like (and is also worth much more than my opinion). Merlin included two U2 albums, War and The Joshua Tree, and Radiohead's Ok Computer in his encyclopaedia of the 1000 most innovative records of the 20th century. About Ok Computer he wrote that various music sites (RYM!!) consider it the best album of all time, and he joked about this fact: he actually considers it a great album but not a revolutionary album. This does not mean that a group of critics or music connoisseurs can make objective judgements: various groups of critics/experts also express very different opinions, but within certain limits. For example, I believe there is CONSENSUS among all music experts that Bach, Mozart and Beethoven are among the greatest musicians and innovators ever. No critic would conceive of a ranking of the best symphonies without including Beethoven in the top 10 with one or more of his symphonies. There is consensus on this, it's not to say objective but commonly accepted fact. And I think there would be consensus that U2 cannot be excluded from the top 2,500 positions of any ranking. The Progarchives ranking is quite good because, as I have seen from writing in the forum, there are not only editors but also many forumists who are experts in many genres of music: there are not only rock fans here, and that makes this site full of great music connoisseurs (although there will be some fans of certain bands who will sign up just to give them 5 stars, OK). But the PA ranking is also full of flaws, for example: German prog is missing from the Top 100. And this, in my opinion, stems from the fact that there are subscribers who are only here to vote for their favourite bands. and from the method by which it is compiled, which is similar to that of RYM, i.e. the fact that it is done with an algorithm, and here we come to the second point. PS RYM's ALL TIME ranking, in my opinion, is bad: but I don't think it is the worst possible ranking. As I have already written, if the 'average citizen' made a ranking, it would probably be worse than RYM's (I gave an example with Oasis, Titian Ferro etc). RYM users, I assume from their listings, have a greater knowledge of music than the 'average listener' and are biased towards certain groups/genres. The rankings by decade and genre are not that bad, sometimes they are good. But they are full of gaps, and sometimes embarrassing repetitions: certain groups are present with high ratings with too many albums, even with those that are not particularly successful. Other bands or artists (U2) never get very high ratings (the problem is not that Pink Floyd is more popular than U2: that might be real, and right, the problem is that Pink Floyd gets very high ratings for too many albums, while U2 never gets very high ratings). Ondarock is made up of young people who have similar tastes to RYM, and indeed share many of the artists in the top positions. But Ondarock's rankings, both by the editorial staff and forum members, are much more varied, and do not entirely neglect big bands in genres that are not among their favourites. The second reason is the method by which a ranking is arrived at. I don't think that using an algorithm will lead to good results. Any ranking is based on comparison, and as I said before the reviewers must have listened to all kinds of music to be qualified. So I believe it's much better to produce a hierarchical list of songs, from 1 to 20 (or 50 or 100), which then has to be listened to by each member of the team. In this way, you get to listen to all the songs that are candidates to enter the ranking, and once you have listened to all of them you give them a weighted, hierarchical score. The ranking will be obtained with the songs that get the highest score. Another important thing is to put limitations on the artists' albums to be included in the lists, but not excessive limitations: for example 3 or 4 albums per artist as a maximum number. Ondarock used this system, except on one point: they did not put the rule that every member of the team had to listen to all the albums on the various lists: but being great music connoisseurs, every member will have listened to all or most of the albums that appeared. Finally, one could use selection criteria, which would still remain subjective in their application. If we decided to use 'Innovation' as the main criterion, as Enrico Merlin did, we would find ourselves excluding beautiful albums that did not bring any particular musical innovation but, if anything, brought an already long-standing musical genre to perfection. ------ Thanks to all. Edited by jamesbaldwin - June 08 2023 at 17:38 |
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Amos Goldberg (professor of Genocide Studies at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem): Yes, it's genocide. It's so difficult and painful to admit it, but we can no longer avoid this conclusion.
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Logan
Forum & Site Admin Group Site Admin Joined: April 05 2006 Location: Vancouver, BC Status: Offline Points: 35940 |
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No worries, I figured that was the case, but I wanted to make my little Kobaia and bald wino jokes (I have a terrible sense of humour). I have that Google Translate tool for translating webpages -- installed to more easily read Ondarock. It should be easy to disable and later enable again. With Opera that I am using it shows up as an icon when in use, so I can easily turn it off from there and then go to Extensions to turn it back on.
With say, Chrome. On your computer, open Chrome. At the top right, click More Settings. On the left, click Languages. Under "Google Translate," turn Use Google Translate on or off. |
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jamesbaldwin
Prog Reviewer Joined: September 25 2015 Location: Milano Status: Offline Points: 5989 |
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Sorry. I am writing from a computer that is not my own and it has enabled the automatic translation feature with google. This is causing me quite a lot of problems, because I try hard to write in English (with my very bad English) but every time I edit one of my texts, it shows up in Italian, and so I have to correct it in English, and in the end my last message was published with the translation that the computer did with google. So much work for nothing.
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Amos Goldberg (professor of Genocide Studies at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem): Yes, it's genocide. It's so difficult and painful to admit it, but we can no longer avoid this conclusion.
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Logan
Forum & Site Admin Group Site Admin Joined: April 05 2006 Location: Vancouver, BC Status: Offline Points: 35940 |
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I am translating the above to English (at least part of it after the citations/quotes), as this site has an English language policy. I like to be flexible, especially when it comes to speaking in Kobaian, but to be inclusive it does help to write in a common language, and sadly, no matter how hundin it is, Kobaian is not it. Oh, nor Italiano.
*I knew a bald wino once, but his name was not Giacomo. Or maybe it was, I never really asked. He looked more like a Joe, or a Giuseppe. Maybe a Guido. |
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jamesbaldwin
Prog Reviewer Joined: September 25 2015 Location: Milano Status: Offline Points: 5989 |
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And that's exactly what RYM also does by having people literally rate things. It's not a popularity chart, it's a chart based on people's supposed quality of an album. Keep in mind that when something is very mainstream, more critical and "refined" people also get a taste of it, and will thus rate/review it. Hence why a lot of superhero movies, despite being box office successes, get low user ratings on Letterboxd or IMDB. if it was about mainstream tastes, wouldn't those mainstream tastes actually chart highly on RYM? They don't., so if anything, this should make you love RYM. [QUOTE]So, I criticize the RYM Chart of all time, but try to imagine: 1) Madonna - Loke a virgin 2) Oasis - Morning Glory 3) Rod Stewart 4) Bee Gees 5) Tiziano Ferro 6) Oasis - Stand 7) Oasis - Definitivle.... Se le prime 7 posizioni fossero queste... Avresti ancora interesse per RYM?
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No, ma questo non è ciò che i primi 7 sono su RYM, quindi letteralmente qual è il punto di questo confronto? Ancora una volta, stai discutendo a favore di RYM ora, quindi sto diventando un po 'confuso qui. ---------- + @Lorenzo, hai buoni argomenti sul motivo per cui RYM non è perfetto, ma non credo di capire ancora perché pensi che le liste dei critici siano migliori. Perché mentre RYM non è assolutamente perfetto, ciò non significa che le liste dei critici siano quindi migliori, e molti argomenti contro RYM vanno anche contro i critici, ma anche amplificati. Rappresentano anche una demografia, ma ancora più limitata rispetto agli utenti RYM (e una dimensione del campione molto più piccola). Daranno una spinta ad alcuni album basandosi esclusivamente sulla reputazione, mentre con una valutazione della comunità, ciò non avrà un impatto così forte, poiché le persone generalmente valuteranno solo in base alla propria opinione. Nessuno sostiene che gli utenti RYM siano più qualificati per valutare gli album - nessuno è più qualificato, poiché la valutazione della musica è soggettiva. Ancora una volta, gli utenti RYM valuteranno gli album a cui sono interessati, quindi c'è un filtro che assicura che il campione sia abbastanza rappresentativo del pubblico di un album. Sì, ovviamente, la maggior parte degli utenti sarà occidentale (e apparentemente relativamente giovane), ma ancora una volta - le cose sono già filtrate dal gusto dal semplice fatto che non valuterai un gruppo di album a cui non sei assolutamente interessato nel primo posto. Anche le liste dei critici musicali avranno un tocco occidentale e proverranno da un gruppo di persone molto specifico (i critici). Continui a parlare di "logica" rispetto a cose come la lista di Rolling Stone, ma non capisco cosa intendi per logica qui. Vorrei sottolineare ancora una volta che non penso che RYM sia perfetto, ma affinché qualcosa comprometta il suo sistema di valutazione, deve esserci una sorta di differenza sistematica tra gli utenti che sono/fanno X e gli utenti che sono/fanno Y, e un effetto sugli album che valutano. Sì, tutti hanno criteri diversi per valutare gli album (come dovrebbe essere - dopo tutto è una questione di opinione), ma perché questo distorcerebbe le valutazioni verso X, Y o Z? Questo fa la media. Perché dovremmo aspettarci che gli utenti che valutano Springsteen abbiano sistemi di valutazione sistematicamente diversi rispetto alle persone che valutano King Crimson? Sì, non conosciamo il background dei valutatori su RYM, ma dal momento che non sei obbligato a valutare gli album al di fuori del tuo interesse e l'opinione di tutti, indipendentemente dal background, è ugualmente valida, perché questo dovrebbe distorcere le valutazioni verso X, Y o Z? Ancora, Queste sono le mie risposte: Se hai letto tutti i post in questo thread, incluso quello di Saperlipopette, dovresti aver capito che io e lui (e penso anche Logan e Lewian) crediamo che NON tutto sia soggettivo allo stesso modo, e che non tutti i giudizi di gli ascoltatori di musica sono sullo stesso livello: un esperto conoscitore di musica darà giudizi più preziosi SU TUTTO rispetto a un forumista RYM che ascolta solo rap o hip-hop o death metal: se questo forumista ascoltasse anche come canta Tim Buckley o quale compositore Frank Zappa lo era, cioè se si fosse dato una vera educazione musicale, allora avrebbe riflettuto a lungo prima di dare a molti album rap o hip-hop o death metal 5 stelle. Bisogna infatti considerare che le classifiche di RYM non sono solo per genere: sono anche per periodo storico, e quella che trovo meno affidabile è la Top 100 di tutti i tempi. Ma lo stesso vale per i decenni: se vuoi classificare gli anni Ottanta, non puoi limitarti ad ascoltare (questo è un esempio) musica synth-pop, devi ascoltare i principali generi musicali che sono stati un punto di vendita e di critica successo negli anni Ottanta: bisogna ascoltare, e bene, gli U2, per esempio. Ora, credo anche che se i critici, o gli esperti di rock, dovessero stilare una classifica dei 1000 migliori album, non lascerebbero fuori gli U2, come nel caso dei RYM. Questo Thread deriva da un altro che ho aperto (Is Italian Prog Epigonic?) dove cito la classifica di Enrico Merlin, chitarrista jazz italiano, musicologo, che ha studiato non solo musica rock e pop e jazz ma anche musica classica contemporanea prima di redigere la sua classifica, che ha come principale criterio di selezione l'innovazione musicale. L'opinione di Enrico Merlin e di altri critici, esperti di musica come lui, e anche musicisti, per me vale molto di più dell'opinione di 100.000 membri del forum di RYM o di qualsiasi altro sito di musica che si iscrivono principalmente per votare solo alcune band che gli piacciono ( e vale anche molto di più della mia opinione). Merlin ha incluso due album degli U2, War e The Joshua Tree, e Ok Computer dei Radiohead nella sua enciclopedia dei 1000 dischi più innovativi del 20° secolo. A proposito di Ok Computer ha scritto che vari siti di musica (RYM!!) lo considerano il miglior album di tutti i tempi, e su questo fatto ha scherzato: in realtà lo considera un grande album ma non un album rivoluzionario. Ciò non significa che un gruppo di critici o di intenditori di musica possa dare giudizi oggettivi: vari gruppi di critici/esperti esprimono anche opinioni molto diverse, ma entro certi limiti. Ad esempio, credo che ci sia CONSENSO in tutti gli esperti di musica sul fatto che Bach, Mozart e Beethoven siano tra i più grandi musicisti e innovatori di sempre. Nessun critico concepirebbe una classifica delle migliori sinfonie senza inserire Beethoven nella top 10 con una o più delle sue sinfonie. Su questo c'è consenso, è un dato per non dire oggettivo ma comunemente accettato. E penso che ci sarebbe consenso sul fatto che gli U2 non possono essere esclusi dalle prime 2.500 posizioni di qualsiasi classifica. La classifica di Progarchives è abbastanza buona perché, come ho potuto constatare scrivendo nel forum, non ci sono solo editori ma anche molti forumisti esperti di tanti generi musicali: qui non ci sono solo appassionati di rock, e questo fa di questo sito un pieno di grandi intenditori di musica (anche se ci saranno alcuni fan di certi gruppi che si iscriveranno solo per dare loro 5 stelle, ok). Però anche la classifica PA è piena di difetti, ne dico solo uno: dalla Top 100 manca il prog tedesco. E questo, secondo me, deriva dal fatto che ci sono degli iscritti che sono qui solo per votare le loro band preferite. e dal metodo con cui è redatto, che è simile a quello di RYM, cioè dal fatto che è ottenuto con un algoritmo, e qui arriviamo al secondo punto. PS La classifica ALL TIME di RYM, secondo me, è pessima: ma non credo sia la peggior classifica possibile. Come ho già scritto, se il "cittadino medio" facesse una classifica, questa sarebbe probabilmente peggiore di quella di RYM (ho fatto un esempio con Oasis, Tiziano Ferro etc). Gli utenti di RYM, presumo dai loro elenchi, hanno una maggiore conoscenza della musica rispetto all '"ascoltatore medio" e sono orientati verso determinati gruppi/generi. Le classifiche per decennio e per genere non sono poi così male, a volte sono buone. Ma sono piene di lacune, ea volte imbarazzanti ripetizioni: certi gruppi sono presenti con ascolti altissimi con troppi album, anche con quelli non particolarmente riusciti. Altri gruppi o artisti (U2) non raggiungono mai ascolti altissimi (il problema non è che i Pink Floyd siano più apprezzati degli U2: questo potrebbe essere reale, e giusto, il problema è che i Pink Floyd ottengono valutazioni molto alte per troppi album, mentre gli U2 non ottengono mai valutazioni molto alte). Ondarock è formato da giovani che hanno gusti simili a quelli di RYM, e infatti hanno in comune molti degli artisti che sono nelle prime posizioni. Ma le classifiche di Ondarock, sia da parte della redazione che da parte dei membri del forum, sono molto più varie, non trascurano del tutto big band di generi che non sono tra i loro preferiti.
Edited by jamesbaldwin - June 08 2023 at 10:46 |
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Amos Goldberg (professor of Genocide Studies at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem): Yes, it's genocide. It's so difficult and painful to admit it, but we can no longer avoid this conclusion.
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Stressed Cheese
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@Lorenzo, you have good arguments for why RYM isn't perfect, but I don't think I still understand why you think critics' lists are any better. Because while RYM isn't perfect by any means, that doesn't mean that critics lists are therefore better, and many arguments against RYM also go against critics, but even amplified. They also represent a demographic, but an even more limited one than RYM users (and a much smaller sample size). They will give certain albums a boost based purely on the reputation, whereas with a community rating, that won't be as impactful, as people will generally rate based on their own opinion only. Nobody is claiming RYM users are more qualified to rate albums - nobody is more qualified, since rating music is subjective.
Again, RYM users will rate albums they have an interest in, so there's a filter there that assures that the sample is pretty representative of an album's audience. Yes, obviously, most users will be western (and apparentely relatively young), but again - things are already filtered by taste from the simple fact that you're not going to rate a bunch of albums you have absolutely no interest in in the first place. Music critics' lists will also have a western edge to it, and will come from one very specific group of people (critics). You keep talking about "logic" wrt stuff like Rolling Stone's list, but I don't get what you mean by logic here. Let me stress again that I don't think RYM is perfect, but for something to compromise its rating system, there has to be some kind of systematic difference between users who are/do X, and users who are/do Y, and an effect on the albums they rate. Yes, everbody has different criteria for rating albums (as it should be - it's a matter of opinion after all), but why would that skew the ratings towards X, Y or Z? That averages out. Why should we expect that users who rate Springsteen have systematically different rating systems than people who rate King Crimson? Yes, we don't know the background of raters on RYM, but since you're not forced to rate albums outside of your interest, and everybody's opinion, no matter background, is equally valid, why should that skew ratings towards X, Y or Z? Again, the most relevant background you can have is that you actually have an openness to enjoy the kind of music an album offers, and that filter is in place on RYM.
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Lewian
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Yeah, thanks! Very informative!
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jamesbaldwin
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Thanks a lot, Greg! So, if I understand well, half of RYM forumists hare under 35.
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Amos Goldberg (professor of Genocide Studies at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem): Yes, it's genocide. It's so difficult and painful to admit it, but we can no longer avoid this conclusion.
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Logan
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Lorenzo would be better to respond for himself of course, and I don't mean to be rude by stepping in (some get upset seemingly when I answer questions directed at others, with "I wasn't asking you, I was asking..." to which I respond, "I know, but this forum is intended for group discussion. Apologies, didn't mean to step on any toes", but from my own limited research....
In terms of the audience, I have read that over half come from the US, Canada, and the UK. In terms of visitors according to this: Country ---------- US 42.0 UK 8.2 CA 6.1 AU 3.7 BR 2.3 ES 2.0 DE 2.0 IT 1.8 MX 1.7 FR 1.6 Age ---------- 18-24 23% 25-34 27% 35-44 15% 45-54 14% 55-64 12% 65+ 9% Gender ---------- Male 66% Female 34% https://rateyourmusic.com/discussion/rate-your-music/site-demographics/ I fall into 6.1 percent Country location and 14 percent for age. And male, seems quaint not to see genders other than male and female, but I think that option was available for registering (don't know for how long). According to wiki:
And is Available in English, Dutch, Finnish, French, German, Italian, Polish, Portuguese, Russian, Spanish, Turkish. Hossein Sharifi who resides in Seattle created the website. Obviously you can search artist and albums by artist location, and you can search charts by user location which is I think very cool. If you search the progressive rock chart by users in Japan, for instance, you find In the Court of the Crimson King at number one with 4.29, 202 ratings and 932 reviews (hmm, those are weird numbers with so many more reviews). If you include users from Italy, then the same album is top but it has 4.53, 1,461, and 923/ That shows as the top all-time album from Italian users at RYM,. The Velvet Underground and Nico is number two, then A Love Supreme, then the Black Saint and the Sinner Lady, then Kind of Blue, then The Doors, then Spiderland. Italians are pretty awesome from my perspective, great albums all. Here is a link, I think Lorenzo might find this interesting. https://rateyourmusic.com/charts/top/album/all-time/uloc:italy/ Since this map is on the users page, I would think it gives an idea of user locations: https://rateyourmusic.com/community/. As for how Western it is in terms of where music comes from, that should be made easy to see at the site. They have had a global map that shows the distribution of artists (wonky last I heard ) apparently. Most are from North America (and southern Canada), Europe and South America. Then Australia, I've come across plenty from Japan, not surprisingly as well as South Korea and China to a lesser extent. This stuff should be so easy to find, yet I'm sucking with my searches or RYM is not making this stuff as available as I would hope. Anyway, neat to search by user location for the charts, wish that option was available at PA. Edited by Logan - June 07 2023 at 20:17 |
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Lewian
Prog Reviewer Joined: August 09 2015 Location: Italy Status: Offline Points: 14753 |
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I'm not sure how "Western" RYM actually is. Any information on that?
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jamesbaldwin
Prog Reviewer Joined: September 25 2015 Location: Milano Status: Offline Points: 5989 |
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@Greg, @Christian @Stressed Cheese @Saperlipopette (if he wants) it seems clear to me that you (exc. Christian) like RYM charts mainly because you consider them to be of good quality. But precisely for this reason, you should also accept those who criticize them because they believe they are representative only of certain groups/genres, while they are poorly representative of other groups/genres. Then, the thought that it's all subjective, again, shouldn't be used to prevent criticism. It is obvious that for me the absence of rock "giants" in the first 100 or 200 or 300 places and the presence of other great groups with so many albums in the top positions make that classification an analogue of that of Rolling Stone, which follows precise logic. The difference, however, is that we know all the limits of the Rolling Stone rankings and we admit them (little interest in prog, great interest in the more essential rock, and recently great, exaggerated interest in black music), while RYM is presented as a representative sample of the tastes (or worse, musical judgments) of the whole West. That is, I see two big dangers in the exaltation of RYM performed by Stressed Cheese, Saperlipopette and partly you (Greg): 1) The idea that RYM is a representative sample of the main Western music connoisseurs, much more "qualified" to give judgments than music critics, as if judging music were a matter of democracy (the idea is this: the critics are few and have particular tastes, RYM, on the other hand, is made up of many thousands of people who love all types of music, and therefore for this fact they would give a more democratic, and therefore more "objective" response.) 2) The idea that making a real ranking, i.e. a precise operation, with transparent methods and criteria, by a group of music experts is worth less than the RYM rankings, which is obtained via an algorithm, as if the ranking made by the critics would be subjective, while the one made by RYM would be more objective, more estimable because it was achieved with the participation of thousands of people all around the world. These are dangers that seem obvious to me from what has been written in this thread. I want to say, in conclusion, clearly what I think. 1) RYM, even if it were made up of millions of people, does not in any way represent a "significant sample" of the "average citizen" of the West, nor of the "great connoisseur" of Western music. As Lewian well explained, according to statistics, there is very little chance that RYM is a significant sample because the population of RYM has not been selected according to any statistical criterion 2) The idea that the quantity of reviewers produces a good result in terms of music quality without that - nothing is known about those reviewers - are committed to listening to and voting for music of all kinds - specify the criteria on the basis of which they vote - do not make any hierarchical classification of their favorite albums this idea, I was saying, for me is completely wrong. The method by which the charts are obtained counts for producing coherent charts, with a logic, and to make a chart it is therefore necessary to do an orderly job of listening to all the albums, of every genre (if you want to classify every genre), who are candidates for the top positions. I don't believe that a team of reviewers can ever produce an objective ranking, but I say that a team of reviewers who follow this method will obtain more consistent and balanced results. EDIT: I hope it's clear that by saying this I don't mean that I only appreciate classifications that suit my tastes, because I appreciate, on the contrary, critics and classifications that are also quite different from each other, and different from my tastes - better: different from the classification I would make, which is not entirely the same as that of my tastes.
Edited by jamesbaldwin - June 07 2023 at 12:44 |
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Amos Goldberg (professor of Genocide Studies at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem): Yes, it's genocide. It's so difficult and painful to admit it, but we can no longer avoid this conclusion.
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Logan
Forum & Site Admin Group Site Admin Joined: April 05 2006 Location: Vancouver, BC Status: Offline Points: 35940 |
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While I find much quality in the RYM charts. that is subjective/ follows my biases. I would not look at RYMs top list in terms of quality, and if assessing an album like Kendrick Lamar's To Pimp a Butterfly of style one might not appreciate, consider more the qualities of the music rather than the quality, and try to compare it to other albums that seem to share the most similar qualities (research and time helps). This can help to judge it and have a judgment that is more likely to be of value to others. Appreciation is subjective. I have taken issue with the kinds of professional reviewers and music critics/ reviewers who put a lot of emphasis on objective best when it comes to matters of appreciation and start telling me things like "This is the greatest album of all this year, you should go out any buy it." Biases aside, they have not listened to all albums, and I find it annoying when someone tells me I should buy it. And that I should appreciate it.
I have no issue with how RYM's charts at populated at this time at least/ and thinking that this or that should be there instead of what is because we think it more significant is a subjective evaluation. Thinking it devalues music because it is nor ranked as high as some others, well it would have to be a deliberate skewing of the data for me to think in those terms and/or some conspiracy to manipulate the ratings and rankings (this has happened at PA, where competitors (albums) were rated low in order to prop up certain albums in he list. This is rating abuse. It is to be expected that if many users rate one album and rate it highly by an artist, they also will rate other albums by that artist and I don't believe that finding some artists with many albums well-ranked devalues the chart (I think the chart should be an honest representation of its user appreciation index) -- one could add the option to see it with only the top-rated album of each artist listed in the chart. Again, what I like about RYM is how customisable the charts are through the filters. I like being able to look for albums by more than one genre for instance. And if an album rises to prominence, then more are likely to check it out and rate it (fame begets fame). |
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