My new song/album rating system

[MadeInNewJersey]

For songs:
5 - unreal
4.5 - great
4 - very good
3.5 - good
3 - pretty good/decent
2.5 - average
2 - below average
1.5 - craptacular
1 - bad
.5 - downright awful
0 - target practice

Se each song gets a numerical rating above. Then all the songs are "tallied" to give you a total of say, 42. Take that number, divide by # of songs, get a number like 3.6. Take that number, multiply by 2 (to get to a rating of 0-10, as opposed to 0-5), and voila, album rated.

 

[Demilich]

Why do you people have to rate, rank and order everything? Fuckin lame.

edit: why not make it out of 10 initially and avoid the step of multiplying the dividend by two?

is dividend the right word? haven't done math in years

 

[NAD]

Why do you people have to rate, rank and order everything? Fuckin lame.

i'm pretty much siding with you these days. although i do hang on to a simple 5-star rating at times, but that keeps it nice and simple. gave up on ranking stuff though, i think what killed it was JayK's ridiculously extensive Top 38 Albums list he had us assemble last year.

 

[MadeInNewJersey]

it's the only way I can possibly keep track of what I like, what I don't like (beyond just simple "feel"), and since so many albums wind up similar in the 7-10 range, this helps me differentiate between truly great records vs. very good ones, and so on.

I keep the songs at 5-pt scale so it's easier for me, though I suppose it could be worked out that everything could be a 10-pt scale. I forget the exact reason, but I did it this way on purpose. I was probably stoned though, b/c now I can't remember.

JayK knew I was insane about this.

 

[Dick Sirloin]

For songs:
5 - unreal
4.5 - great
4 - very good
3.5 - good
3 - pretty good/decent
2.5 - average
2 - below average
1.5 - craptacular
1 - bad
.5 - downright awful
0 - target practice

Se each song gets a numerical rating above. Then all the songs are "tallied" to give you a total of say, 42. Take that number, divide by # of songs, get a number like 3.6. Take that number, multiply by 2 (to get to a rating of 0-10, as opposed to 0-5), and voila, album rated.

What if one song is like, disproportionally longer than others?

For instance, GENESIS - Foxtrot. "Supper's Ready" is easily a 5 song, while the rest are 3.5 to 4. This would leave it with about a ranking of 4 (there are 6 songs). BUT Supper's Ready takes up roughly half the album, making it about a 4.5 album. In other words, you'd have to add in song length to get a better idea of how good the album is.

Rating stuff sucks.

 

[Dev]

Rating song by song is gay if you ask me . I rate albums on pure feeling and that's it . And I'm no reviewer..

What about banning notation btw?

 

[Demilich]

I guess the distinction is that I go by feel to determine what I like best. Also, I don't think along this path: X melodic death album from 1996 is Y amount better than Z fusion-prog-psych-core release from 2005. No point to me. They have absolutely FUCK ALL to do with eachother, so why bother?

Thanks for explaining why you do it though, I find it interesting that you have to attribute numbers to albums to determine which albums you like best. EIRWIRIWIDIDS(sp?)!

 

[MadeInNewJersey]

Well that's where simply using your own discretion comes into play. For example, it is statistically impossible to score a 10/10 without rating every single song a 5 out of 5 (or 10 out of 10, whichever you prefer).

However, for me, if an album has at least HALF its tracks as brilliant, that album gets an extra bump from me. All I know is once I associated words with numbers, it was easier for me to say which I loved, which were simply ok, and which were bunk.

 

[MadeInNewJersey]

I guess the distinction is that I go by feel to determine what I like best. Also, I don't think along this path: X melodic death album from 1996 is Y amount better than Z fusion-prog-psych-core release from 2005. No point to me. They have absolutely FUCK ALL to do with eachother, so why bother?

Thanks for explaining why you do it though, I find it interesting that you have to attribute numbers to albums to determine which albums you like best. EIRWIRIWIDIDS(sp?)!

It's because I have 1200+ metal CDs, and honestly, outside of the 50-100 that I know & love best (99% of which are older, b/c I've had them for so long), I really can't keep track.

 

[NAD]

i've never judge an album based on song by song. i go for album feel.

 

[MadeInNewJersey]

i've never judge an album based on song by song. i go for album feel.

That is something that is taken into account, certainly. And that's not something I can "measure" quantitatively, either. My personal example would be if you took Operation: Mindcrime song by song, it might not come out the 10/10 that I consider it. But as an album, it clearly is.

Most bands can't put together cohesive albums to save their lives anyway, so it's a moot point more often than not.

 

[Dev]

Well that's where simply using your own discretion comes into play. For example, it is statistically impossible to score a 10/10 without rating every single song a 5 out of 5 (or 10 out of 10, whichever you prefer).

Statiscally yeah , no album in my top ten gets 5/5 for each song . It's just that I usually don't enjoy track-by-tarck type of albums , and that's statistically proved

 

[MadeInNewJersey]

I would agree with that; basically, this all came up as I was trying to determine which albums to part with, and which to keep, and the tough calls were the ones with 4-5 great-to-unreal tracks, and 4-5 clunkers. The overall score just isn't that good, but those 4-5 great tracks make the album worth keeping.

Capece?

 

[Demilich]

gugs: similar situation here, except my collection is 1/10 the size, so same goes for the number of albums i know very well. it's also a lot less diverse, which probably makes it easier to realise which albums i like best. i'm gonna stick with going by feel though, it just seems to make the most sense. i may never know what order i'd rank the majority of my catalogue in, and i don't intend to lose sleep over it. but more power to you and your ranking system!

 

[Dev]

I feel bad for keeping an album with a bunch of amazing tracks and yet with 60% filler material . Good luck for the "cleaning" .In those cases , it's all about nostalgia or because it dosen't sell more than 2 bucks , even on eGay

 

[Demilich]

I would agree with that; basically, this all came up as I was trying to determine which albums to part with, and which to keep, and the tough calls were the ones with 4-5 great-to-unreal tracks, and 4-5 clunkers. The overall score just isn't that good, but those 4-5 great tracks make the album worth keeping.

This is where i'd bring sentimentality, fanboyism, and how you rate the band in general into the equation. I'd keep a half-great half-crap album by a band I loved (Katatonia - Tonight's Decision and LFDGD have songs I skip usually) while I'd almost immediately toss a cd by a band I've never heard if half of it was garbage.

 

[MadeInNewJersey]

Exactly. I gave the new Helloween, for example, a 7.5/10 (probably overrated it by .5-1), but there are 5 GREAT tracks, a couple OK ones, and about 5 flat-out bad ones.

But it's Helloween, and to me, that means I'll keep it as part of my collection; if I had a first listen to a new band that got a 7/10, it'd be gone.

 

[Reign in Acai]

I gave each post in this thread a numerical rating. "Tallied" them all up to give me a total of say, 75. Take that number, divide by # of posts, get a number like 0.6. Take that number, multiply by 2 (to get to a rating of 0-10, as opposed to 0-5), and voila, this thread 1 star.

 

[MadeInNewJersey]

I gave each post in this thread a numerical rating. "Tallied" them all up to give me a total of say, 75. Take that number, divide by # of posts, get a number like 0.6. Take that number, multiply by 2 (to get to a rating of 0-10, as opposed to 0-5), and voila, this thread 1 star.

This post alone brings the thread rating up over 1 star.

 

[MajestikMøøse]

rating stuff by numbers is for faggots.

I prefer the NAD system of "UNRULY" or "NOT UNRULY"