Shit I'm late to the party.

Lessee...

ONE I like this, because I've found where I jive with certain people I didn't necessarily realize before, and it also gives me a hopping off point to new directions. For example, I knew rparis and I had similar tastes, but he's ranked a few things highly I am either unfamiliar with or just sort of passed over. I've also found that elephantstone and I have very little in common chartwise, but we are both Terp fans so he gets a pass.

TWO I know everyone uses a different methodology to account for widely varied tastes. I tried to use a system in my head sorts different things out somewhat consistently with my tastes while still having fun. There are a few albums I am familiar with that I haven't ranked, because I would prefer to revisit them again before rating.

There are other albums like Kind of Blue that I haven't ranked because I just don't like jazz. It bores me to tears. I've heard the album and can absolutely do without it, but in my mind I tend to separate jazz and blues from Rock/Pop and country. It's not so much that I don't feel qualified, but moreso that I don't feel I have an adequate frame of reference.

I have no problem with justifying my rankings based on my thought processes, though many may disagree. Here are but a few pertinent examples:

Exile on Main Street: I gave it a 9 because it's too long for my tastes. I'm not a fan of the double album in almost every case. London Calling gets the same punishment, though only a 7 because of a few tracks I almost always skip, like "Jimmy Jazz".

Mclusky: I bounced between 3 and 4, not that there's much difference. I think the song titles are amusing, I enjoy the loudness and energy, hell, I even liked some of the songs. The deal breaker is that I never have any desire to play it. If it came on WOXY I wouldn't change the channel and might even tap my foot. But I deleted my copies of 2 Mclusky albums long ago and haven't missed them a bit.

Even albums I love feel the pain. Tim gets a 9 because "Dose of Thunder" is so amazingly horrible.

I like the charts, I've been rating and checking them out every day. It's a little slow to load, but that's what tabbed browsing is for, I guess. With repsect to the other comments, it's way too fucking easy to get someone's nose out of joint by trashing one of their beloved albums, so I err on the side of not doing it. I think the closest I've come is ragging on how Jeff Tweady annoys me, despite my love of Wilco and that annoyed a couple of people but I can't recall who. I gave Kid A a '10' and immediately wanted to react to the Senator's '1' rating and ranting about it being a pretentious piece of crap. Do I think he's insane? Possibly. I still think it's one of my favourite albums of the decade and would vociferously disagree that it's (a) pretentious or (b) crap. I found it elicited a strong emotional reaction in myself and still does. But at the end of the day, I think he's got great taste in spite his atttitude towards Kid A, so I forgive him. I also gave Exile a '10'.

I haven't trashed an album yet either, I think my lowest rating is for Radiohead's HTTT. I honestly haven't seen one yet that I really, really hate, but I'll be honest when I see it. There are quite a lot I own but I haven't brought myself to rate yet and quite a lot that I've never heard but always wanted to. The charts are a good way to get some ideas too.

Despite what some say, for people who love music (and that means all of us) trashing an album that someone loves deeply IS personal. It's very personal. It's like telling someone their kid is fuckin' ugly. But, it's like that for anything that people are passionate about. We wouldn't be here if we weren't all passionate about music and sometimes that passion expresses itself in some slight nastiness. Can it go too far? Yes. But, generally, I wouldn't have it any other way.

Steve

I love Charts for the same reasons Bloor and Fu have already mentioned. Who gives a fuck how the ratings shake down? It's not like all the albums under 7.8 will be erased from the conscience of humanity.

well, if anyone wants to trash my favorite albums, knock yourself out.

Agreed, I'll probably start a whole 'nother thread just based on questions/curiosities that I have about some highly rated stuff.

Yeah, but not an attack on that person per se, just their shitty taste

Chocolate and Cheese sucks balls...

not really

Here's a question related to the topic at hand:

I hate Tom Waits. I mean I really fucking can't stand his music, consider it rubbish etc., etc. and would rank it '1', but should I be ranking it if I hate the artist and everything he has done or will do in the future. Have you all done that with your low ratings or do you just avoid the ones you would rank negative fucking infinity if you could.

I'm having a hard time giving something a very low rating. I'm generally not one on extremes, a "1" seems harsh because it's hard to find an album that has absolutely nothing redeeming on it (unless it involves Santana and a "popular singer") and "10" seems like a perfect rating and nothing is perfect. Still, on the charts, I've been giving my favorite albums and those I truly think are worthy, 10s. I can only rate albums I own or have listened to a lot so it's hard to give a 1. I don't buy albums by bands I think that poorly of. Anway, I think my lowest rating thus far is a 4.

I think you know where I stand. I always thought I would 'get' Tom Waits at one point, but basically feel as you do.

But I did rate Wire, Stooges and Smelly like this.

And Kid A...I actually haven't heard HTTT enough to shit on it, so I didn't rate it.

EVERYONE's tastes are different than mine. anyone adding new stuff? -- the top of the rankings are filled with albums i haven't heard yet

I just said seconded Dalen's caring less about the charts cause, well, I could care less about the charts. Who fucking cares?

So I don't take part in all the music discussions and little activities that happen on the board.

I think it's good to have variety. 8)

Depends. I hate Beck (except for Sea Change, which I haven't seen) and gave Odelay a 1. For some reason many moons ago I actually owned it, but have since removed my head from my ass. Being that I owned it and listened to it a number of times in its entirety and now would rather pay extra rent than hear it again, I gave it a 1. The other Beck albums escape free from harm though, because I doubt I've heard hardly any of them and have no desire to hear them, except maybe Mutations, which Haq recommended once and it was just okay.

I gave Of Montreal's Sunlandic Twins a 1 because it's awful. I gave Satanic Panic a 7, I think.

I gave Arcade Fire a 1. The more I hear from this band, the less I like. I will most likely not rank any future albums from them. I feel about the same with The National and Clap Your Hands Say Yeah, but I have made zero attempts to hear their albums, so they get off easy.

It's probably going to be rare that I give many ones to multiple albums by the same band, because I'm usually pretty good about figuring out what ain't for me.

I just said seconded Dalen's caring less about the charts cause, well, I could care less about the charts. Who fucking cares?

Loogar, Waits has sorta had 2 careers. His 70's stuff is kinda lounge lizard with tales of losers and loneliness. Beginning with Swordfishtrombones he started getting experimental and it's this period that is most highly regarded.

However, I have always prefered his early stuff. Just wondering if you maybe didn't know that there is really two sides to the guy. Or, perhaps you just hate both.

Steve

I'm taking a stab in the dark. No, you shouldn't. Here's why: you obviously hate the man on merits above & beyond his music. Can't stand his voice? I might understand. Hate his work beyond music, i.e. art, film? Fair enough. But, I've a feeling you hate all the 'pretension' that surrounds him. Not his craft necessarily - well, maybe his craft - but the aura built about his rep, and the annoying folks who admire him yet couldn't really tell you why - this really fucks you off. He's become this object, this target of hate, and therefore you piss on everything associated with him, his music, his art. This overcomes you and you're no longer able to see subjective meaning/value in his work. For this, you should not cast a vote.

"Seconding" doesn't require saying it twice.

I'm curious as to why Chase gave both Kinks albums a 2.

I'm also skeptical as to whether or not he's ever really listened to that Jackie-O Motherfucker album. I'm not really complaining about that, though, because I really didn't like it sitting on the first page with just 1 vote. I certainly don't expect stuff like that to end up anywhere near the top of the charts, but I do feel kinda bad when nobody else votes on something.

I thought for sure at least one of you guys would be familiar with those Bill Evans albums. Anyway, I've finally taken the hint not to add any more jazz.

Also, I could have sworn that a few other people here knew that Cluster album. Again, I don't really expect anyone else here to give it a 9, but I know somebody has some kinda opinion about it.

That's pretty intuitive, man. You summed up everything up nicely. If I had to quantify it, I say it's 80-85% music/voice reasons. I even hate music that reminds me of it, like those songs on Modest Mouse's 'Good News..' album. Overall, I questioned my ability to objectively judge Rain Dogs based on my subjective feelings about the whole Tom Waits gestalt and ended up passing on a rating.

Not necessarily from two angles. Number one, I find Waits to be generally boring an unable to capture my attention or imagination. Some may find this difficult to believe, but it's just another opinion variation.

Secondly, I do believe that other factors influence your ratings. Just as oldbulee has a favorable rating for Doggystyle above and beyond the music itself, it is not rare to associate certain artists or albums with things unrelated to the recording itself. I think most ratings are influenced in some way by factors outside of the artist's intentions. It is probably even true to some extent that some people rate Waits higher due to the external influences and don't want to be seen giving him a 4 for Rain Dogs. Overall, they should all even each other out, I would think.

Probably a birth defect.



i havent heard any of those records but my curiosity is piqued.

Ya know, ive never actually heard that mcKlusky do Dallas record either and i know that people jizz on themselves over it.

It's really silly to complain about stuff that has a 10 off of 1 or 2 votes and is thus "at the top of the charts," because obviously a chart that isn't filtered by a minimum vote count of at least 10, it's not representative of anything. The unfiltered chart is by no means "THE CHART."

I on the other hand see this as the best reason TO cast a vote. I rarely base my judgements on how empirically good something is. I base them on my level of approval or dissapointment with something.

Steve - I bought the Island Years comp a long time ago, and have tried to revisit it.

I will say that the song 'All the World is Green" prompted me to buy Blood Money, the rest of which sucked the shit out of my ass.

Also, the song he penned for that Solomon Burke album is beyond qual.
So, there's a glimmer of hope, but I dunno if it will ever really click for me.

I had something from Bill Evans off emusic when I subscribed during the unlimited era, but it never really got me. Then again, I stated my non-jazz leanings earlier. But, I don't think that should deter you from entering them, for there may come a time when others are looking to leap in that direction. Despite my interest in jazz, I did listen to Mingus Ah Um once and found it to be quite interesting. I only listened once, so I haven't rated it here, but it was a pleasant surprise.

I also think that if a genre feature is added, that could also keep it from being perched up top all the time with just one or two votes.