pitchfork is dumb (#34985859340293849494 in a series.)

giving it a 10 is too predictable, 9.9 too much of a troll, 8.0 too confrontational. 9.3 is the perfect rating to piss everyone off for reasons that sound silly when you actually type them out. idk folks maybe Pitchfork's still got it

I knew my fellow young p4k readers would be quick to draw comparison with the 10 afforded Appetite for Destruction

Wow, don’t think I ever read that before… great piece by Maura J. (tho an album said to have “songs that feel like filler” prob shouldn’t qualify for a 10).

(Honestly, that's what I wish more of these retrospective reviews were like – a few paragraphs of background and the rest focusing on the album, instead of the other way around.)

Same generally I think. When I read the Labi Siffre one I had the same feeling I had when I read the Aaliyah one: this is a really nice piece of writing but if it was me I'd have to write more about the record itself.

(tho an album said to have “songs that feel like filler” prob shouldn’t qualify for a 10).

― Nonhuman biologics enthusiast (morrisp), Tuesday, August 8, 2023 3:40 PM (twenty-eight minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

i disagree. i will explain more whenever i write my treatise titled "in defense of skips"

an album said to have “songs that feel like filler” prob shouldn’t qualify for a 10

it's the opposite. an album can't be a 10 if it doesn't have skips. means they weren't taking enough risks

there's that funny story about Jodorowsky thinking Pink Floyd was some serious mystical band and when he met with them to get them to record the music for his Dune movie he got really depressed after walking in the room and seeing a bunch of normal looking guys eating fast food

xp That's an interesting thought... but don't think I can really relate to the idea of factoring "effort" into what makes a perfect album, as opposed to actual results (or can think of many "skips" stemming from noble risks that didn't pay off, as opposed to just weak tracks).

...although that said, I guess if I were inclined to give (say) Exile on Main Street a 10.0, I'd say something similar to what Maura wrote for Appetite – some tracks may initially seem like filler, but upon further listening (etc.)

man it is GNR, they're supposed to be a mess, if they can hold it together for more than 2 or 3 songs they don't deserve better than a 6

I don't really completely buy the 'risks' factor because I don't think an album has to 'take risks' musically to be a straight 10, necessarily.

but even if it did - a 10 to me would be for the albums that swung for the fences and got all of it. doesn't mean all of the songs are of equal quality, meaning there can still be somewhat of a gulf between the best and least. but there's a reason why nobody was giving T.I. vs T.I.P. a 10 despite that being his 'most ambitious' album at the time.

most of the time music that is adventurous doesn't necessarily hook you at first, it just has to make you not want to get off of the ride. like it's saying "trust me, this may not make sense to you now, but just wait until you see where it's going".

i don’t buy the argument that an album not making you want to actively stop listening at any point is sufficient for 10/10 status. often indicates an album that sounds the same all the way through (a favored buzzword, cohesiveness) which is fine but not a virtue in and of itself. nor is an album with one or more tracks you don’t need or want to hear more than once necessarily worse than one that has no such tracks (an entry level example being the white album, an obvious 10/10 to me with multiple songs i skip 90% of the time)

ya white album is a good example. also goldberg variations

don’t buy the argument that an album not making you want to actively stop listening at any point is sufficient for 10/10 status

Just to be clear, I don’t think this either!

don’t buy the argument that an album not making you want to actively stop listening at any point is sufficient for 10/10 status

that's...not what I said?

GNR's audacity and volatility is worth way more than 9 "good" songs. nevermind that the "filler" tracks on Appetite are actually the best ones. there are lots of ways to be great.

a 10/10 album doesn't need to have any good songs on it at all, come on.
https://i.discogs.com/7THU1G9tzeE3wkSjMV7ToO2MmeNqPt3C2qCNFNeAt3E/rs:fit/g:sm/q:90/h:536/w:600/czM6Ly9kaXNjb2dz/LWRhdGFiYXNlLWlt/YWdlcy9SLTU0MzY1/NzUtMTM5MzMyMDg0/Ni0yMjE4LmpwZWc.jpeg

it doesn't even have to totally succeed on its own terms

please give ratings out like candy because who the fuck cares, i mean the minute a 10.0 rating is indicative of some lofty "status" and has to be deliberated and meet "criteria" it's just a thing to throw stones at anyway.

Yeah I do think (and have probably said this already somewhere on this massive thread) that Pfork's 100-point scale does a disservice to the albums/artists, b/c with that degree of granularity it seems harder to "justify" awarding an album a perfect 10, without even a decimal point or two docked.

I grew up w/RS's five stars (incl. half stars), and still think in those terms; though I think at one point they didn't even use half stars (think the red RS Record Guide may be like this). Honestly that may be the best way to go...

(...in terms of making the highest rating both achievable and not like some indicator of godlike status)

like if that were the case almost all of my collection would be 10s.

I meant that an album being allowed to retain a 10.0 status despite having one or more skippable tracks is dubious to me, and that skippable tracks doesn't necessarily map to a band's ambition. If a song makes me want to skip it every time I hear the album (as opposed to just instances when I'm not in the mood for it), it's usually because it's not interesting, dull, or actively irritating to me.

my point with the last paragraph was that adventurous music is a slow burn that usually takes many listens to reward, and people who listen to that stuff don't usually demand to be instantly rewarded. so if people are tapping out after only a few listens to the track, it's often not because the track is 'out there' and thus polarizing to the audience, it's that they failed at what they were doing.

xxxposts

what are the filler songs on Appetite for Destruction supposed to be? there are non to me.

Without looking up the review, I would guess "You're Crazy," "Anything Goes" and "Think About You"...

yeah - the only one that I am utterly nauseated hearing any more is "Sweet Child O' Mine" and that's more due to overplay than actually it not being a solid song.

"My Michelle", "Nightrain", "Out to Get Me", "It's So Easy", the album goes fuckin' hard.

Wow, unperson hit the nail on the head.

"My Michelle", "Nightrain", "Out to Get Me", "It's So Easy", the album goes fuckin' hard.

The entire first side through "My Michelle" is unstoppable. Then they kinda run out of tricks and repeat themselves a little, but "Rocket Queen" brings it home huge.

Think About You is one of the best! great chorus

they are all good

And if they suffer in comparison to some of the greatest hard rock songs ever recorded, they'd all be highlights in the catalog of their contempories

i've heard people say all the songs but the 3 hit singles are filler!!! the hits are the ones i skip lol

people = more than one person lol

AFD is all killer, no filler. The B side is great and nasty rock.

Probably five stars/10.0/a+ etc should be handed out with much much more regularity. As it is, it's still only handed out to special legacy artists. As if those without any kind of iconic status haven't met the right people yet. But really, ultimately all of those grades and all are as meaningless as a music hall of fame.

RS did give AFD five stars on release, so they knew what’s up…

this grade thing seems like a good way to ruin music listening to me

what if the best thing in the world was more like an exam?

I don't like AFD one bit but I agree it's at least as good as "goddess in the doorway"

Being graded on exams was not fun but the power fantasy of the tables being turned is pretty fun - I'm the grader now teach.

but you're not. pitchfork is the grader

RS' Goddess in the Doorway was the American cousin of Q's All About Chemistry

esp if the Q review was also a favour to a former(?) fuck buddy

none of mick's lawyers post here right

everyone's a grader imago, why shod pitchfork not be allowed the same fun I'm having?

xps well it was (along with Discovery) their first 5 in three or four years so one might speculate how it happened

this grade thing seems like a good way to ruin music listening to me

― your original display name is still visible (Left), Wednesday, August 9, 2023 3:25 AM (four hours ago)

yeah who listens to records and thinks "this one is 4 and a half stars, that one is only 3" idgi

For whatever reason I can't give a rating to any piece of music I listen to, tried several times and it just feels uncomfortable

that's...not what I said?

― linoleum gallagher (Neanderthal), Tuesday, August 8, 2023 7:45 PM (yesterday) bookmarkflaglink

sorry wasn’t responding directly to you, just thinking out loud

i am responding more to an idea that i’ve seen proliferate among the tiktok generation of armchair critics where the first criteria for a “10/10” is “no skips”

idk I think ratings are useful, I mean sure they're dumb for reasons that have been hashed out over and over in this thread but there's like 400 hours worth of new music released every day, gotta be some way to tell what's good and what ain't

people grouch about RYM a lot but I find them pretty 'accurate', in that if I'm interested in an artist and check out the Top 3 albums there I'm generally getting the best ones. when you got 1000+ sets of ears on something I think that generally covers your bases. yeah I'll often wind up disagreeing with what the best albums are but its at least pretty easy to understand why things score the way they do.

xpost I mostly agree upthread that I don't think of music in terms of numbers because enjoyment of music fluctuates, like if all I was interested in was listening to the 'most perfect possible music' all of the time, I'd be replaying the same ten albums over again. there's fun in listening to flawed albums (like 7s out of 10) but if you get too Pitchfork-ized you start thinking to yourself "why should I listen to this 7 when I can listen to a 10".

not to mention quantifying the amount of like is difficult, and of course the writers don't come up with the rating themselves, so sometimes the P4 review doesn't match up neatly with the rating.

RYM being a collective rating system is more helpful in that you can see what lots of people who are fans of the scene are reacting to