Thanks for replying, I think I'll go with my original idea since either is ok. Heres the blog if anyones interested:
http://ifthisishellthenimlucky.blogspot.ca/

Still in the process of figuring out the layout and some little things.

Konrad Kantor on Arckanum - Sviga Læ


Krallice and Anaal Nathrakh? What about Black Sabbath, Iron Maiden, Motörhead, Gorgoroth, Darkthrone, Impaled Nazarene and a hundred other excellent bands. If he prefers those two over any of the aforementioned... Though in Arckanum's case denouncing his excessive productivity which can be seen to hinder the quality of his later works may be worth criticising, becoming worried because of fairly fast succession of album releases is outright silly.

Also, not bothering to spell the album name correctly in the review title is outrageous.


Heh.

What is he talking about?


It's still not a "p", and your humour isn't funny.

Actually, it doesn't even have any musical description. Perhaps I should post it in the oven fodder.

http://www.metal-archives.com/reviews/M ... dgeDeadite

I would have glanced over that review if it wasn't for the sheer amount of reviews this guy submitted. Holy hell, we've got ConorFynes' partner in crime!

What really bugs me about this new guy is that not only does he not bother with a review title, he doesn't even bother putting the band and release name as the title. Just the website it was originally written for.

The fact that all of them were posted on the same day shows that his apparent productivity is an illusion. He joined metal-archives the previous day, so it's quite obvious that he simply posted his earlier reviews for metal albums.

Most reviews of Lulu have absolutely no idea what they are talking about...I fully get the hate that album gets but a lot of the reviews? Just awful.

And that guy gives high scores to The Black Dahlia Murder, JFAC and Trivium? Haha...

Thanks to GuntherTheUndying for introducing me to Bejelit's new album, which I never would have found without your review. Holy hell, this thing rocks, and it's lifting my spirits in a year lacking a lot of great power metal.

Damn this dude needs to get the fuck out.

Edit: Another RidgeDeadite gem...

Hey thanks man. But yea, that album is pretty damn awesome, lots of great riffs and a lot of fun.

Yeah, he sucks, but all his reviews were acceptable

That's the problem; the people who technically are just good enough to get published, but stupid enough to suck the intelligence out of the room.

I was on the fritz of rejecting his reviews because of the same review title for all his reviews. Friday Music Reviews? WHAT IF IT'S MONDAY OR TUESDAY???

Furthermore, what the fuck is the deal with mindequalsblown.net?

His review titles are, I'm guessing, webzines he originally wrote the review(s) for.

That's annoying as hell, and I thought the generic 'Band - Album Name' review titles were bad. Seriously, put it at the bottom of the reviews, or you could, you know... stop writing reviews altogether.

That guy's apparently also one of the people who thinks that nu-metal is metal because some dumb cunts with an undeserved voice in the music world (who probably thought that metal was Metallica and Pantera and nothing else) happened to give it that oh-so-inappropriate name back in the day.

Good reviews don't need a witty headline.

No they don't, but it would help if they were good in the first place.

Good reviewers can come up with a headline that actually does the review justice. Only exception I've ever seen is Radagast, who is an excellent reviewer. Everyone else who does the generic Band - album title format...usually isn't so much worth reading, I find. Not due to that alone, but it's just coincidental.

Have you ever seen a magazine with review headlines?

I like review titles. They are the most rewarding item in a review, if they truly nail it.

I don't understand why so many reviewers are opposed to actual titles; you'd think one would want something snazzy or magnetic to attract readers other than the vanilla dullness of BAND X- ALBUM Y. Those of us that use titles are a dying breed, it seems.



MA is not a magazine.

If MA becomes a magazine one day, I want Napero centerfold pictures.

I like good and witty titles, but I prefer when the review has good meat in it. Led Zep's best albums were called I,II, III and IV, judging a book by his name is not always the best way.

That wasn't my point. My point was simply that it's far from a prerequisite to have some kind of snazzy, eye-catching title to make a good review. While I don't oppose it, I choose not to do this because it attracts attention to the reviewer instead of the review and the album being reviewed. And since my reviews are published in a magazine, they're not published with titles anyway. And, quite frankly, a lot more people merely think they've come up with a clever title than actually do.

Besides, how could the undying be dying?

A lot more people also merely think they've come up with a more clever review than they actually have.

But hey, to each his own. Frankly, every wannabe writer and his cousin with their blogs are starting to really crowd this place, but I can't really complain, can I?

I still don't understand why you see titles in this light. I've been writing reviews for 8 years now and I don't think like this at all. Maybe it's because my reviews aren't graced by some mag that I give a shit about, but titles don't detract from the review or release at all. I just can't comprehend how you came to that line of thinking.

^ right there with you. I just see the lack of a title as sheer laziness. These mass reviewers seem to just not want to take the effort to think of anything, so they just slap the Band/Album Title crap on there.

Well, reviewers that typically spend a lot of time coming up with witty, attention-getting review headlines also tend to write in ways that draw attention to themselves anyway in the reviews themselves. You don't have to agree with my opinion, but you also don't have to feign incredulousness over the possibility of its existence.

I've never encountered anything like this. If anything, I see more generic first person comments in untitled reviews like "I first discovered...", "Now onto MY review...", personal histories, and the like. And why should it be so bad to let some personal light into a review?

I'm not going to write a personal review manifesto over here. It's just not the way I work, and not what I prefer to see in the writings of others, as it rarely serves a valuable function in educating the reader about the subject of the review, which I hold to be paramount. I find it rather odd, quite frankly, that so many people are bothered by the lack of marketing-style review titles. "Megan Fox loses her top! Also, a review of the new Judas Priest..."

I already explained that the main reason that I don't do that is because my reviews are published in a magazine (i.e. without headlines), so I'm not going to make one up to post them here. It's bad enough that I'm required to assign a numerical grade.

Because more and more reviewers use the BAND X- ALBUM Y formula for reviews. Originally, they were nonexistent, but now they've spread like wildfire.



Coming up with a title is not time-consuming in the least bit. But yes, they are meant to be attention-grabbing, because a good title can lure in a potential reader, which is why we have a title bar in the first place. I'd rather read, say, a review titled "This is fucking trash" instead of "Burzum- Ambient Buttfuck," both with the same general themes or ideas. Granted, the former may not be better per se, but it has a degree of magnetism the latter did not....but then again, I'd probably read any review for an album called "Ambient Buttfuck."

You get my point though.



Marketing-style review titles? What happened to being creative or original? And I really don't think I'm bothered by this trend in review titles...it just looks flat, uninteresting, and dull. It baffles me why someone wouldn't want to use it, but hey, I'm still kicking it over here and it certainly isn't screwing up my flow. It probably means that outside readers will find creative titles more attractive and read those rather the plastic titles others use, so in the end, I really see no harm. Whatever floats your boat, I guess.

Fair enough. I'm not trying to be so difficult, just seeking some insight is all. I'll just never see what's wrong with making your review look as appealing as possible and respecting great bands with an interesting title in the process.

I hope you understand that I was just playing with your username here.



Some of the titles I see seem rather labored-over. Of course most people don't spend more than a minute on them; I understand that perfectly. But what if I don't particularly care about my review title being attention grabbing? I understand why it's more interesting for readers to read a well-written or clever title than Band Name - Album, but then again there are a lot more poorly written and dense titles than clever ones anyway, and you can't deny that Band Name - Album Title doesn't accurately account for what the reader should expect from the review. But again, it's not really my goal to get as many people as possible to read my review based on my review's title. I think that's fair, no? And, again, a poor attempt at witticism detracts my interest far more than Band Name - Album Title.



You understand what I mean by "marketing-style", surely. You said it yourself: attention-grabbing. The purpose of the headline of which you speak is to attract attention, like "free boobs". I hardly think it's fair to reduce the usage of Band Name- Album Title to a simple lack of creativity, originality, or whathaveyou. In reality, a review's title is its least essential part, anyway, unless you turn it into a one line review itself.

I already explained why I wouldn't want to use it. Personally, I think my explanation is perfectly reasonable. I write metal-related news articles for another website, so I am accustomed to creating headlines. It's not that I'm incapable of doing it. It's just that it's not the place for it in reviews in my outlook, but you also have to understand that my perspective comes from magazines, and not from metal archives. I'm sure the majority of the reviewers here can cite metal archives as at least 90% of their experience with reviews, and likely also grew up with this site's outlook on reviews as well. People that want to attract as many readers as possible to their reviews will attempt to write clever headlines and people who are indifferent to that will stick with Band Name- Album Title. No big deal.

Your point is valid, sure. As it's been said, titles are only secondary to the actual content of the review. There's no penalty or cardinal sin for not creating a review title of godly proportions.

Anyone else think we've had enough of this discussion?

I just want to clarify that I don't actually think that people who write headlines for their review titles are only interested in bringing attention to themselves, because I can see how that can be easily construed from what I said. I also readily admit that a[n actually] clever headline will of course draw even my interest over a generic title. But in reality, I tend to stick to reading the reviews of certain reviewers anyway that I know I can trust.

Now this discussion is thoroughly exhausted.

Agreed. Until it inevitably recurs a couple months down the line.

Holy shit, ConorFynes just used a genuine review title. Hate to ignite this conversation again, but isn't that quite a coincidence?

He probably read our discussion.

Mark my words, in 6 years, ConnorFynes will be the new Napero.