The New Allmusic: D/D?

Because, if there's one thing I want in my bathroom, its Ned.
Teh passion.

― Ned Raggett, Saturday, August 20, 2016 12:35 AM (1 hour ago)

RYM: useful in theory. The community is the problem. I got on one of the narcissist mods' bad side a few years ago and got banned as a result, and now they ban me any time I re-register, like I'm on a "WANTED" list. Doesn't even matter if I use a new IP, someone recognizes my pretty specific taste and alerts the mod I offended, lol

I just use RYM as a little corner of the internet to ramble semi-coherently about stuff I've heard. I've never had trouble w/ mods since I mostly keep to myself but the general userbase kind of annoys me sometimes. Occasionally if I'm really bored I look at the forum, and it really makes me appreciate how (largely) peaceful ILM is - not that RYM is the worst by a long shot but there's only so many times you can read some arsehole in his early twenties spouting received wisdom as Objective Fact before you want to punch the screen.

the reason i've tended to give the rym forums a wide berth is that i think i'm maybe a little too much of an elitist for them. they're just full of people asking dubious questions in garbled english, people arguing about "SJWs", people talking about their drugs, people who won't shut up about dream theater and/or radiohead. that's more brain filtering than i'm up for most of the time. it's too "internet".

but they're kids, you know! that's how kids are.

Plus from what I've gathered, RYM is nothing compared to /mu/ when it comes to insufferable kids talking about music.

not from what i've gathered, but i've also gathered that it's got a lot of overspill from /mu/

RYM is right in the middle of the venn diagram of /mu/ and tumblr

god RYM is another internet reification of awful opinions into something pretending to be Truth

dunno about the forums, just mean the concept and the lists, the lists

Unfiltered lists from RYM reflect overrepresented demographics (there's a lot of metal and prog, for example). The "custom chart" and friends/favorites functions on RYM are essential for getting lists that are closer to my own tastes (an intersection of shambhala, indie 'gaze, avant-jazz, etc). But adding/culling favorites to get a better poll of people like me is really time consuming.

i do see internet culture in general a little bit differently, that advocacy for "truth" long ago ceased being part of it. the "ha ha only serious" ethos dates back to at least the '80s, but only lately have the 4chan alt-right started applying it to racism, for instance. the pretense here is not "truth" but "lulz".

lists in the internet era are imo largely an exercise in recontextualization, a digital outgrowth of mixtapes not vulnerable to dmca takedowns, a necessary evil in an age defined by data overload and sorely lacking in understanding, possibly a first step towards that elusive understanding, but in few minds a substitute for it.

rym for me is good for the would-be omnilisteners, people who have indifference to genre ingrained in their professed ethos, although seldom if ever in practice, as well is, really, for the genre obsessives with a completist bent. there's this one guy in particular who has a deep, deep obsession with midwestern aor/prog, which is not a genre i have a particular love for, but his deep love for the music is contagious. that's social music, i can get behind that.

i'm at a point where i can regularly get good stuff out of that site by basically poking it with a stick a little bit.

>there's a lot of metal and prog

Well... the RYM charts are big on buttmetal but all the good stuff's unrepresented. There's a small clique that knows what's up but, like, Death's 'Symbolic' being the top rated death metal album on their charts just gives me the heebie-jeebies

Rate Your Music has always been a major indicator to me of people who think they are a lot more knowledgeable than they actually are. Like, it strikes me as being for people who want to intellectualize music over just enjoying it.

You're probably all mostly right in your criticism, but I reckon I should probably speak up for the only site I spend more time on than ILX - there's plenty of users who make the site worth using and it's a great place to actually discover stuff (far better than here if I'm honest) especially if you're willing to read a little bit. Just do what I do and ignore charts, the consensus is always turgid and bland as fuck no matter where you are. Just look at those Acclaimed Music polls that we're running.

my least favorite thing about RYM are the users who just discovered & started identifying with "poptimism" this year and are really parochial about it... I'll take all the objective elitists in the world over them.

yeah i mean people can bag on the site all they want to but i just found five great records there in the last hour without really trying.

Using the RYM charts is definitely improved for me by filtering out genres I don't care much about.

I guess I don't understand why everyone is talking about it like it's dead? I just went there and looked up the debut album of the forgotten power pop band Artful Dodger and it seemed p much the same as it's been for awhile?

Doesn't work if you use a certain ad blocker, I guess?

Oh, I don't have an ad blocker on at work but it's fine the ads weren't too bad but some ppl are really babies about any ads I guess

anyway just try it you will be fine everyone and reading a review of a post-peak steve winwood album before you know it!

I DONT WANNA

arc of a diver bro read that shit

I gorged myself on AMG in high school, haven't been able to stand the design since

Would dig a collected AMG works of Andy kellman or Ned raggett book

Too kind.

The Collec-Ned Works, Vol. 1

compnednium

The AMG Omnedbus

^this

The Consumned Guide

Tempting ideas.

Since Allmusic is now blocking people with ad blockers I would like to restrict Allmusic from appearing in my search results for album reviews. Is that simple to do?

i think if you type "-allmusic.com" (not including the quotation marks) it'll exclude it.

on google anyway.

so just preface it with a dash in other words.. or something

A Sentimental Neducation
xp

Ned, Just Admit It: Raggett on Cali Punk

RYM users, can you elaborate a little on how you find good music there? This is what I do whenever I'm there: browse through some lists, click an album title I don't know, read some reviews, check out YouTube for some tracks. Is that it, or are there better ways to find more stuff?

i do it just slightly differently. i look for albums i find interesting and like, see what lists they're in on the sidebar, click on the lists with interesting looking titles, browse through the lists to see if they're interesting, and then hit youtube for the ones that have potential (sometimes based on the cover as not all of them have reviews). sometimes i'll find users whose reviews i find interesting and see what other records they like that i haven't heard of.

Arch: Over the past 4-5 years, I've "curated" a list of about 700 RYM users with sympatico tastes. I'll find them from among those who highly rate obscure albums/singles I love, check to see that they have made over 1000 ratings with a diverse spread of scores, then add them as a "favorite" (a nonconsensual friend). When some I find some release highly overrated "by my friends" compared to my tastes, I'll cull the raters responsible (which the interface doesn't exactly facilitate). Over time, my favorites list has stabilized and pretty closely reflects the mix of genres I care about. Every few months I'll run a custom chart of current year releases "As rated by my friends", usually excluding parent genres I've zero interest in. Import into a spreadsheet, cut out low rated but popular (and hence, ranked) releases, or in subgenres I couldn't exclude (eg, I can't exclude "Indie Rock" on the site because I'm interested in shoegaze, which is considered a child genre). That leaves me with 2-300 releases to sample on YT etc.

Thanks you two, that sounds... promising.

Sanpaku, is there a way to keep up with the ratings of your favorite users instead of having to generate a big list every so often?

User ratings are incorporated in the rankings once every two weeks or so, and you can easily just click your bookmarked custom chart query (I have em for albums, eps and singles in my browser). There's a running sidebar of reviews from individual friends on one's "homepage". But there's no way of looking at how friends in the aggregate have rated releases for the past month or such (like, say, anydecentmusic). The reason I have to dig so far down is that it's the only way of finding obscure but good August (etc.) releases when the chart is already crowded with releases from the past 7 months.

Cool, I was browsing the site earlier today and I already found two great songs I hadn't heard before ("When It's Over" by the Wipers, and "Talk About the Weather" by Red Lorry Yellow Lorry). Time to register an account!

.. and "Talk About the Weather" by Red Lorry Yellow Lorry

good call.

The Ad Blocker blocker has been removed.

no it hasn't

Huh. Well it has been on my end.

(using Firefox)

hmm, I use Firefox too, but the adblocker warning pops up the instant I enable Adblock Plus or Ghostery.

Try Ublock Origin instead of Adblock Plus - it's better and much less bloated.